Jut Mountain (Lake Merlin, Skoki Lakes)

Every year as September comes to an end and the hiking and scrambling season winds down, I like to do a few “larch marches” to end the summer. There are many options within a few hours drive of YYC to see larches but naturally I am running out of places to visit nearby — at least if I want to remain in the Rockies.

A few years ago I hiked and scrambled up Merlin Ridge and Peak with Wietse in early October, proving once again that the Skoki area near Lake Louise is a clear winner in the larch march category. Other trips to the area with Phil Richards over the years have also yielded incredible days out.

I don’t have many objectives left in Skoki that hold my interest, but there are still a few. I first realized there was an unofficial “Jut Mountain” overlooking Lake Merlin when reading Matt Hobbs trip report and put it on my list. I decided that a gorgeous Thursday would be perfect for a long solo trip through the larches to ascend this relatively easy objective.

I left the very full parking lot at 07:20 on my bike. I’ve almost always biked up the Lake Louise Ski Out road rather than hike it. It’s almost 4 kilometers each way and makes for a VERY quick and enjoyable descent on exit. Recently, I read something on Facebook where a person claimed that they were told by Lake Louise staff that biking is no longer allowed here. Interestingly enough, I biked right past some Lake Louise staff at the parking lot and they didn’t say anything about bikes being banned. Apparently there is now a small “no biking” sign at the trailhead but I didn’t see it.

(NOTE : Thanks to Jean Francois Richy who emailed Parks Canada, he confirmed that this bike ban is temporary and put in place by the Lake Louise Ski Resort — NOT the parks.)

Despite my heart coming out of my chest on the way uphill, the ride went quickly and by 07:50 I was marching up the familiar hardpack trail to Boulder Pass.

The first 4.5 kms from the end of the ski out to Boulder Pass is slightly less boring than the first 4 kms but only slightly. Despite the lack of larches and dramatic scenery, I was happy to be out, and on a Thursday morning I was the only one there. The scenery always improves closer to Boulder Pass and I was relieved to see that most of the larches up there were well-turned. September 25th can be hit or miss with larches being too green but apparently I was going to be lucky today.

I crested Boulder Pass at 09:00 to a very familiar view of Ptarmigan Lake. There was some wind and haze disrupting the view and I didn’t linger long before continuing on the well worn path around the NW shore of the large backcountry lake.

Usually when approaching Lake Merlin I take the route over Packers Pass through the Skoki Lakes but today for some reason I decided to take Deception Pass. I was thinking it might save some time and that I could take my time and enjoy the lakes on my return. I didn’t count on a few things that derailed this plan. First, the morning sun is better than the afternoon sun at the lakes. Second, thick smoke rolled in over the afternoon. Third, the route over Deception Pass is a bit longer and a bit higher than the one over Packers Pass. Conclusion? Go over Packers Pass to access Lake Merlin.

The descent from Deception Pass to Skoki Lodge was quick and scenic with morning lighting glowing up the larches and reflecting off rock walls to my left from Ptarmigan Peak and the Wall of Jericho. As I neared the Skoki Lodge I realized that I would be back tracking slightly to reach the Lake Merlin trail and regretted my route choice but it was too late for that.

After crossing a bubbling creek near the lodge on a good bridge I came to the infamous “fork in the trail”. I briefly got annoyed by the lamest joke in Banff National Park before taking the right hand branch and finally starting up towards Lake Merlin on a thin but obvious trail.

It didn’t take long and I was back in the green and yellow larches. As the trail ascended through boulder fields and traversed rubble slopes, beautiful Castilleja Lake sparkled in sunshine below. The long rubble massif that hosts Merlin Peak and Jut Mountain at its far SW end loomed above me across the valley catching all the morning sun.The trail up the Lake Merlin headwall is always a fun, easy little scramble and soon I was marching my way down towards a blustery Lake Merlin.

I was relieved once again to note that the larches up here were indeed about as turned as they can be just before starting their inevitable shift towards brilliant orange and then to dull brown.

The air was cool, clean and crisp as I marched my way up a faint trail to a sign indicating “Merlin Meadows” ahead. Right before the sign a much fainter track led off to my left and I knew from previous hikes that this was my route.

From Lake Merlin to the Dragons Drink tarn was pure magic. As a larch aficionado I took notice that there are many different forms and expressions of these trees — even over relatively small areas. Some things that I noted as I walked were the various colors of the needles. Some trees were approaching orange while others were still in an almost fluorescent greenish yellow phase (my personal favorite). There were short, squat trees, tall thinly branched trees and everything in between. Some trees had a myriad of cones while others were completely bare. There were hunched trees, straight trees and curved trees. I’m not gonna lie — I loved every single one of them.

As I approached tree line, I came to another junction and chose the righthand one. A steep dirt track quickly lead up to the Dragons Drink tarn and the bottom of my ascent slope. From here I already had excellent views back over Lake Merlin and forward to Merlin Castle and Tower with Jut Mountain’s long ridge looming high above.

(A quick note about “Merlin Castle”. I have seen trip reports referring to Jut as the castle, but it isn’t. The castle is the striking wall of rock sitting just off the main massif to the SE. Merlin Castle is at the SW end of this outcrop while Merlin Tower is obvious at its NE terminus.)

Using a track from Geoff Hardy, I started my ascent up easy south rubble slopes directly above a small unnamed tarn just downstream of the Dragons Drink. Despite appearances, I managed to find reasonably solid footing for most of this ascent, quickly gaining height to the ridge high above.

As I crested the upper ridge I was blown away by the view to the north over the Pipestone River valley towards Mount Hector and Molar Mountain. This valley has an extraordinary amount of larches and despite some haze in the air, they were lighting up the canvas of trees for kilometer after kilometer. I had places to go and a long way to get there yet, so I forced myself to quit gawking and get moving.

From the top-out on the ridge it isn’t rocket science to the summit of Jut. Follow the ridge west and then southwest as it curves to the distant high point. To keep things in the realm of SC5/6 is a little more work, however. At first I stuck on the ridge crest and had good fun with blocky terrain and of course stunning views to both my right (Pipestone) and left (Lake Merlin). It didn’t take me long to realize how slow this technique was going to be and soon I was looking mostly to my left for easier / faster routes off the ridge crest.

I enjoyed some exposed steps along the ridge, all while slowly making my way to the distant summit of Jut Mountain. As I finally descended the nose of one last stretch of scrambly terrain, I was amused to see Merlin Peak rising obviously higher beyond my “mountain”. The game of peakbagging is such a good metaphor for life sometimes. 😆 The endless pursuit of trying to feel like we are accomplishing something when in reality there’s always a higher “thing” or another “thing” that we think we need to do. None of it matters in the end, but sometimes it sure feels like it does, doesn’t it?

I was pleasantly surprised by an exposed sidewalk feature just under the tippy top and as I crested the cairned summit the views were admittedly pretty darn excellent. As I took in the summit panoramas I still wasn’t convinced that this objective deserved its (admittedly unofficial) name but the atmosphere of this area of the Rockies rarely disappoints.

The wind was cool and I was a long way from my car at this point so I didn’t linger long before slowly picking my way back over the sidewalk. My plan was always to deviate from Geoff’s track at this point and descend into the steep rubble valley between Jut and Merlin Castle. I knew this canyon had a reasonable route down to the Dragons Drink below and wanted to use it.

It turns out there was another reason to descend here — it led me to an overlook just off the summit that convinced me that “Jut” does, indeed, deserve a name. The view from the slope just under the summit, looking along the dramatic cliff wall towards Merlin Ridge was jaw-dropping. WOW. Photos, as usual, don’t do it justice but standing there was a highlight of my day for sure.

From the overlook, I continued along rubble slopes high above the canyon below, until approaching the Merlin Tower end — still far below me at this point. Here the rubble slopes descend right to the canyon floor and it’s here that I started my descent in earnest. I never did hit the canyon floor choosing to stay above it as I remembered our route from 2022 when Wietse and I returned from Merlin Peak. Views of the Merlin Towers were stunning as I slowly picked my way out of the canyon towards rubble slopes leading down to the Dragons Drink.

After a careful descent on shifting rubble I took in sublime views over Dragons Drink before finally exiting off the shifting landscape and back onto much more solid footing. I have to say that the 3 hours I spent on Jut Mountain proper were some of the more scenic hours of 2025 for me and I’ve had some pretty darn scenic walks this year.

From Dragons Drink it was a long, familiar walk back to Lake Merlin and from there down the headwall and along rubble slopes back to the lamest sign in Banff National Park. (That “fork in the trail” nonsense is sure taking up a lot of my rapidly shrinking headspace isn’t it?!)

After a brief march in green pine forest the views opened up again and an army of larches once again overwhelmed my senses. As I approached the Skoki Lakes headwall it was hard to concentrate on walking — this is truly one of my all time favorite landscapes in all of the Rockies. There’s something about the yellow and red vegetation with a distinct trail snaking its way through that excites me every single time I see it. As someone who gets bored shockingly quickly, this is a rare thing. 🙂

When I turned around to take in Skoki Mountain behind me, I was shocked to see a cloud of incredibly thick smoke rolling in from the north. It was a reddish orange smudge, and now that I was seeing it I could certainly smell and even taste it! Yikes. I guess my anticipated late afternoon view of the Skoki Lakes wasn’t going to be quite as scenic as I was promising myself at Deception Pass earlier in the day. 🔥

Just up the trail from the most annoying trail markers in Canada’s oldest national park, is one of the coolest routes in the park — leading up the Skoki Lakes headwall. I remember my first time through it with Phil, when I had no idea where the trail went. I thought it must be a difficult scramble until coming on top of it and realizing there was an easy staircase crevasse leading under a chockstone below. Very unexpected and very fun. A waterfall plunging over the cliffs and stunning views back over the flats below as you top out make this a highlight of the trip every time I hike it.

The smoke cloud rolling over the landscape was shockingly thick as I made my way around another one of Banff’s most scenic landscapes — the Skoki Lakes. I can’t think of another Rockies feature that is this intimate, containing a myriad of larches strung along aquiline waters with soaring cliffs, waterfalls and vibrant green foliage underfoot, all competing for photons.

I slowly made my way along the lower Myosotis Lake before ascending a shallower headwall up to Zigadenus Lake. While the larch scenery continued to be stunning, the ominous cloud of smoke was now clearing, disrupting the photons and impacting my views. Oh well, I’ve been here many times and have many different memories of the same views which is kind of special in its own way.

As usual the ascent back up to Packers Pass from Zigadenus Lake was a bit of a grind, especially at the end of an already long day. I crested the pass with familiar views of Mount Redoubt over Ptarmigan Lake and continued over it down towards the shoreline trail to Boulder Pass.

At Boulder Pass I noted the cloud of smoke was now interfering with the sun directly, slowly creeping closer and closer. The hardpack trail back to the top of the ski out road was its usual grumpy self, but I was still in a good mood from all the larchy goodness and didn’t care as much as I normally would about sore feet and interminable, heavily used trails.

My ride down the Lake Louise ski out road was fast and furious and fun. I returned to a very full parking lot at 19:30 hours, just as the sun set to the west in an angry reddish brown smudge cloud of wildfire smoke.

As I drove back to YYC down a surprisingly busy Trans Canada Hwy, I meditated on how lucky I was to be able to enjoy such beautiful landscapes only a few hours from my house. I am fully aware (and plenty of folks keep me informed) that there are many areas outside of the Alberta Rockies to enjoy fall hiking and scrambling. Even though I will surely branch out of my beloved Rockies at some point, there is still something about enjoying familiar areas with new objectives. For now, my soul is well-filled with a tasty Skoki diet of larches, lakes and mountain vistas. And that is good enough for me.