Mount Verendrye is a mountain

summit A summit is a point on a surface that is higher in elevation than all points immediately adjacent to it. The topography, topographic terms acme, apex, peak (mountain peak), and zenith are synonymous. The term (mountain top) is generally used ...

located in British Columbia, Canada.

Description

Mount Verendrye is situated on the western boundary of Kootenay National Park near the southern end of the Vermilion Range, which is a sub-range of the

Canadian Rockies The Canadian Rockies (french: Rocheuses canadiennes) or Canadian Rocky Mountains, comprising both the Alberta Rockies and the British Columbian Rockies, is the Canadian segment of the North American Rocky Mountains. It is the easternmost part ...

. The peak is the southern end of what is known as the Rockwall which is an escarpment of the Vermilion Range. The Rockwall Trail is a scenic 55 kilometer (34 mile) traverse of alpine passes, subalpine meadows, hanging glaciers, and limestone cliffs, in some places in excess of above the trail. Neighbors include

Floe Peak Floe Peak is a mountain summit located on the western border of Kootenay National Park, in the Canadian Rockies of British Columbia, Canada. The name for this mountain has not been officially adopted yet. Its nearest higher peak is Foster Peak, ...

six kilometers to the northwest and

Mount Wardle Mount Wardle is a mountain summit located in British Columbia, Canada. Description Mount Wardle is situated in Kootenay National Park at the southern end of the Vermilion Range, which is a sub-range of the Canadian Rockies. Mount Wardle is ...

six kilometers to the southeast. Topographic relief is significant as the summit rises 1,820 meters (5,970 feet) above the

Banff–Windermere Highway The Banff-Windermere Highway, also known as the Banff-Windermere Parkway, is a highway which runs through the Canadian Rockies in British Columbia and Alberta in Canada. It runs from Radium Hot Springs, British Columbia to Castle Junction, Albe ...

in six kilometers (3.7 miles). A roadside pullout along the highway near Verendrye Creek provides a view of the mountain and the scorched Verendrye Creek valley which burned in 2003. Precipitation runoff from the mountain drains west to the Kootenay River via Whitetail Creek, and east into Verendrye and Serac Creeks which are tributaries of the Vermilion River. Mount Verendrye is composed of Ottertail limestone, a sedimentary rock laid down during the

Cambrian The Cambrian Period ( ; sometimes symbolized C with bar, Ꞓ) was the first geological period of the Paleozoic Era, and of the Phanerozoic Eon. The Cambrian lasted 53.4 million years from the end of the preceding Ediacaran Period 538.8 million ...

period and pushed east and over the top of younger rock during the Laramide orogeny.

History

The mountain's toponym was applied in 1884 by Canadian surveyor George Mercer Dawson and was officially adopted in 1952 by the

Geographical Names Board of Canada The Geographical Names Board of Canada (GNBC) is a national committee with a secretariat in Natural Resources Canada, part of the Government of Canada, which authorizes the names used and name changes on official federal government maps of Canada ...

to honor Pierre Gaultier de Varennes, sieur de La Vérendrye (1685–1749), a

French Canadian French Canadians (referred to as Canadiens mainly before the twentieth century; french: Canadiens français, ; feminine form: , ), or Franco-Canadians (french: Franco-Canadiens), refers to either an ethnic group who trace their ancestry to Fren ...

military officer,

fur trade The fur trade is a worldwide industry dealing in the acquisition and sale of animal fur. Since the establishment of a world fur market in the early modern period, furs of boreal, polar and cold temperate mammalian animals have been the mos ...

r, and explorer.Glen W. Boles, 2006, ''Mountain Place Names: The Rockies and Columbia Mountains'', Rocky Mountain Books, , p. 260 The first ascent of the summit was made in 1922 by Morrison P. Bridgland (1878–1948), a Dominion Land Surveyor who climbed and named many peaks in the Canadian Rockies.

Climate

Based on the Köppen climate classification, Mount Verendrye is located in a

subarctic climate The subarctic climate (also called subpolar climate, or boreal climate) is a climate with long, cold (often very cold) winters, and short, warm to cool summers. It is found on large landmasses, often away from the moderating effects of an ocean, ge ...

zone with cold, snowy winters, and mild summers. Winter temperatures can drop below −20 °C with wind chill factors below −30 °C.

Gallery

File:Kootenay Route 93 highway.jpg, Distant view looking north at Mt. Verendrye (center) File:Mount Wardle aerial.jpg, Aerial view of Mt. Wardle (centered), Mt. Verendrye (top, left) and Vermilion River (right)

References

External links

* Weather
Mount Verendrye
* Parks Canada web site
Kootenay National Park
{{Geographic Location 2 , Center = Mount Verendrye , North = Serac Creek , Northeast = Vermilion River , East =

, Southeast =

, South = Kootenay River , Southwest = Whitetail Creek , West =

Rocky Mountain Trench The Rocky Mountain Trench, also known as the Valley of a Thousand Peaks or simply the Trench, is a large valley on the western side of the northern part of North America's Rocky Mountains. The Trench is both visually and cartographically a s ...

, Northwest =