Lake O'Hara is THE best place in the Canadian Rockies to photograph the fall colours of the Alpine Larches.

Location: Lake O'Hara in Yoho National Park

Start: Sept. 17, 2016 at 7:45am

End: Sept. 18, 2016 at 6:00pm

Cost: $875.00

What's Included: Meals, lodgings, Parks Canada back country user premits and transportation along the restricted access 12 km road to Lake O'Hara is all included.

Number of Participants: 12

Leaders: Brian Merry, Robert Berdan and Kevin Annala

Lake O'Hara is a specuacular brilliant blue mountian lake in a high, small mountian valley nestled up against the west side of the continential divide. The Eastern boundary of the region is Mount Victoria, whch is the same beautiful mountain seen in the famous landscape photograph of Lake Louise, which is just a little farther East.

Most people who've been here agree that this is the best scenic little valley in all of the Canadian Rockies. And, it is highly competitive to get a spot on the quota restricted buses that transport visitors there.

Come and join me on my 6th annual Lake O'Hara Landscape Photography Tour based at the Alpine Club of Canada's Elizabeth Parker Hut. This beautiful log cabin Alpine Club of Canada hut It is located a mere 800m meters along a trial from where the buses drop us off in the morning. The hut has one large co-ed dorm room with bunkbeds equiped with clean mattresses, which we lay our sleepings out on to sleep the night away.

We'll enjoy beautiful meals prepared by experienced backcountry chef, Kelly Mager, from Backcountry Bistro. This will be Kelly's 6th year with us leading the cook team. She loves this area as much as I do and she loves coming back to join me on the tour, year after year. I must admit that the amazing food she prepares is one of the highlights of the tour.

The Photography:

We'll spend our time hiking around the valley at a photographer's pace enjoying the amazing landscape photography locations that the area has to offer. It seems that every few minutes I spend hiking down any of the trials in Lake O'Hara I see another world class landscape photography scene revealed in front of me. They just keep on coming and coming and coming... This place is incredible!

The Lake O'Hara trial system is know as the best in the Canadian Rockies for hiking through spectacular scenery. I, for one, can't get enough of this place. I've visited the area for both climbing and photography close to about 40 times now since the late 1990s.

The leadership team of professional photographers and I will use our experience in the area to maximize your time here, putting you in the best places to take your own landscape photographs. We will have multiple hikes going out each day lead by the different photographers covering low, medium and higher impact terrain while using the established Parks Canada hiking trials.

What to expect:

1. Expect to hike 3-10 kilometers a day in terrain varying from 3 kms of flat terrain around the lakeshore to 8-10 kms with 1000 feet in elevation gain/loss.
2. Be prepared for all possible mounatin weather including early fall snow /rain to bright, warm and sunny weather
3. Dorm style co-ed accommodation is at the Elizabeth Parker Hut, the Alpine Club of Canada's most beautiful alpine log cabin complex.
4. Gormet meals prepared by Kelly Mager - former head chef in a trendy restaurant in Toronto - turned full time professional backcountry caterer.
5. Landscape Photography. We'll be photographing the famous grand landscapes of Lake O'Hara.
6. Night sky photography session.

And most of all,.. be prepared to be blown away by the beauty of this place! I'm not kidding!