Lefroy, Victoria South, and Huber Linkup | 11000ers of the Canadian Rockies

Lefroy, Victoria South, & Huber Linkup
3442m, 11293ft | 3467m, 11375ft | 3368m, 11050ft
July 28 2024

From Lake Louise and Lake O'Hara a number of Canadian Rockies giants loom above. Mount Victoria is one of the most photographed mountains in Canada with views of it behind Lake Louise being recognized worldwide, and while Mount Lefroy and Mount Huber pale in comparison to how well known Victoria is Lefroy is well known for being the site of the first tragedy in Canadian alpine climbing history. Huber is by far the least exciting of these 3 objectives as it's more of a subpeak off of Victoria but it still offers a fun ascent and can easily be paired with the other 11000ers in the area.

A climbed descending the exposed and snowy ridge of Mount Lefroy with peaks like Mount Fay, Mount Deltaform, and Hungabee Mountain along the horizon.

Given the close proximity of a number of the 11000ers near Lake Louise I knew that I wanted to try linking some of them together to save a few trips and make for a cool route. Huber is often done with Victoria South but with the easy access to each lake on either side of these peaks a point to point seemed like it would be the coolest way to get them done. I hadn't seen any information or reports of another group doing it but I was confident that Victoria North or Lefroy could also be added to this linkup to make for a three in one 11000er trip, and given the technical nature of the Victoria Traverse between the north and south peak decided that Lefroy was the most realistic option.

A few weeks after a successful trip up Mount Alexandra with Jøsiane Begin both of us were looking to get into the alpine again and a big send like this seemed like the perfect way to get back into it! We had a couple options to reach the standard west face route up Lefroy with the most popular being approaching right up the death trip but given that it was already late July and the coverage was bad the Fuhrmann Ledges seemed like the way to go. I read a bit about the ledges and they looked a bit gnarly from afar but I was keen to see them for myself.

With our point to point plan in mind we needed a vehicle at the start and end point so Jo and I met up at the O'Hara lot at 2am and got her car set up before heading to Lake Louise to start the day. After packing up we were out by 2:40am and the approach up the Plain of Six Glaciers Trail went quickly as we were both still half asleep. Before long we were ditching the trail and onto loose moraine as we beelined for the ascent line to reach the start of the ledges.

links: STRAVA | GAIA
elapsed time: 26hrs
DIFFICULTY: mountaineering - multiday or one massive day, glacier travel, steep snow / ice / mixed climbing, 5th class

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After crossing the loose terrain and getting some morning light we started up an even more loose slope to reach the ledge entry point. This section was a grind to get up but eventually we reached more hands on terrain and were onto the Fuhrmann ledges. The ledges were quite exposed in places but they're wide enough that they still feel quite secure as long as you don't go too close to the edge. After making our way across we were shot out onto an upper bench on Mount Lefroy above the cliffs that tower over the death trap and all that remained was a dreaded sidehill to get to Abbot Pass.

Once we got close to the pass the snow started and we switched to crampons in preparation for the climb ahead! I had received beta from a different group a few days before that showed Lefroy's west face route not entirely covered in snow so we knew there would be some mixed climbing to do and these sections proved to be the toughest of the day. Lefroy's grade was steep and consistent and once we reached some exposed rock felt quite insecure as it would be difficult to arrest a fall here but we were able to manage and continued upward until we reached a wall above us.

Here we had to get creative as everything seemed quite steep and technical, and given the lower levels of snow also seemed quite serious. After looking around we landed on a chimney-esque feature to gain this section and although it was challenging it had a flat section immediately below it making it feel less severe and sustained. Following this steep section the grade eased and we were able to quickly gain ground until we reached the summit ridge. The summit ridge on Mount Lefroy is quite exposed especially on the east side and given the remaining snow we had to be careful but we were able to make our way across without issue and reach our first 11000er of the day!

The glacier on the way to Lefroy may be rock covered but there are definitely still
some holes to watch out for

Up the nasty scree treadmill to reach the
Fuhrman Ledges now, looking down

Looking up, we climbed up this gully until
reaching the ledges, don't trust that rope!

Looking towards The Mitre with Lefroy's impressive cliffs rising high above

Definitely exposed, if they're not dry it's a no go

Looking down towards the entry of the Death Trap

A party of five headed up Victoria North

The end of the ledges sent us onto the upper plateau of Lefroy, mellow terrain
from here to Abbot Pass

Switching to crampons, time for the good stuff!

A bit sketchy on this thin section, not enough snow to arrest here in the event of
a fall

Jøsiane nearing the cliffband, it's steep!

All ten peaks of the Valley of the Ten Peaks visible alongside Hungabee & Biddle

This section of ridge usually needs to be bypassed when there's too much snow

Looking NW towards Victoria & Huber, Lake Oesa & Lake O'Hara visible at left

The hanging glacier of Lefroy with Aberdeen & Temple

Given the technical and slick terrain we had to be quite careful reversing the section until the chimney feature and Jo ended up doing a few rappels to get below this cliffband while I downclimbed. Once we were below that we still had to do some steep snow downclimbing and while serious felt a lot easier than the upper mountain. Aside from the rocky section part way down that we had to be cautious on the rest of the descent was quite easy and we were back at Abbot Pass.

And it keeps going, gotta be dialed up here!

Jøsiane doing her first rappel on the upper mountain

Looking down the crux step, I decided to downclimb rather than rappel since I felt comfortable

It was already past 2pm by the time we returned to the pass so I was considering the option of exiting down to Lake O'Hara at this point but Jo was keen to follow through with our linkup despite the time we had already taken so we stuck to our plan. The ridge from Abbot Pass to the summit of Victoria South was very long but quite fun with amazing views of the huge cliffs dropping to the SW below and spectacular position. There was one hands on section following the sickle that felt like stiff low 5th that we took to avoid another transition to crampons but aside from that reaching the summit of Victoria South felt like mostly a climber's scramble. Before reaching the summit we ditched our packs above where we would be descending towards Huber to make things easier and continued up for the summit.

Views towards lake Oesa as we work our way up

We avoided snow here to avoid having to switch to crampons

Epic views towards Hungabee & Biddle with Lake Oesa & O'Hara at center & right

Looking back at the sickle with Jo ascending

The ridge goes on and one, pretty wild place

Looking back at the long ridge of Victoria to Abbot Pass

Victoria North & Center across the gnarly looking ridge

The view down towards Lake Louise, some people ski this slope!

By the time we reached the summit of Mount Victoria it was 6:30pm and we knew we were in for a late night. Once we were back at our packs we started down the loose terrain and had to be careful not to knock any rocks onto each other. Jo opted to do a few rappels here while I downclimbed and once we reached the upper Huber glacier we started up for our last peak of the day. We roped up until things got steeper and then ditched the packs and had to bypass a large icy section to climber's right but the ascent of Huber was the most chill of the day and after a few obligatory photos we headed down as it was already 9pm.

Deltaform, Hungabee, & Biddle are the notable sharp peaks on the horizon

We made our way down the upper and lower glaciers on Huber towards the Huber ledges but unfortunately didn't reach them until dark and that made this section super challenging. The GPS wasn't cooperating so we had to do a lot of tedious route finding in the dark and at one point considered cowboy camping with how stumped we were on where to go, but we ended up finding a bolt and figured out that it was the technical section of the ledges and both rappelled down.

Following the rappel things got technically easier but mentally a lot tougher. We had been going for over 20 hours by this point and headed down the trail from Wiwaxy Gap to Lake O'Hara I felt like I was dreaming at times. Eventually we reached the lake and then things got really rough as I was starting to fall asleep as we were walking / running down the road. Anyone that's been up the Lake O'Hara road knows how long it is and it's about 2 hours to get down if you're walking so this part of the trip felt like it lasted an eternity. Eventually it got to the point where we had to take a few 5-10 minute nap breaks cause I was so messed up and I was impressed Jo wasn't having the same sleep deprivation issues as I was. After the longest 12km exit of my life we finally reached the O'Hara parking lot and were exhausted but happy to be done.

Still on the upper glacier and it's already getting dark, uh oh

It was awesome successfully pulling this linkup off but it was definitely more of an epic than I had been expecting! The benefit of day tripping this route was the lighter packs but you're in for a long day covering all that ground, undoubtedly the longest and wildest day trip that I've ever done. My sleep schedule was messed up for a number of days after this trip but that's the life of a mountaineer and this wasn't helped by Darran Steffler and I making plans for another send less than a week later! Thanks to Jo for being a trooper to get this crazy outing done with me, it's not easy finding partners willing to suffer for over 24 hours in one push with ya!