Mount Assiniboine, also known as Assiniboine Mountain, is a mountain

Mountain

Image:Himalaya_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|The Himalayan mountain range with Mount Everestrect 58 14 160 49 Chomo Lonzorect 200 28 335 52 Makalurect 378 24 566 45 Mount Everestrect 188 581 920 656 Tibetan Plateaurect 250 406 340 427 Rong River...

 located on the Great Divide, on the British Columbia

British Columbia

British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...

/Alberta

Alberta

Alberta is a province of Canada. It had an estimated population of 3.7 million in 2010 making it the most populous of Canada's three prairie provinces...

 border in Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

.

At 3618 m (11,870 ft), it is the highest peak in the Southern Continental Ranges

Continental Ranges

The Continental Ranges is a name for a major grouping of mountain ranges in the Rocky Mountains located in eastern British Columbia and western Alberta...

 of the Canadian Rockies

Canadian Rockies

The Canadian Rockies comprise the Canadian segment of the North American Rocky Mountains range. They are the eastern part of the Canadian Cordillera, extending from the Interior Plains of Alberta to the Rocky Mountain Trench of British Columbia. The southern end borders Idaho and Montana of the USA...

. Due to Assiniboine's pyramidal shape, it has been unofficially named the "Matterhorn

Matterhorn

The Matterhorn , Monte Cervino or Mont Cervin , is a mountain in the Pennine Alps on the border between Switzerland and Italy. Its summit is 4,478 metres high, making it one of the highest peaks in the Alps. The four steep faces, rising above the surrounding glaciers, face the four compass points...

" of North America

North America

North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

. Mt. Assiniboine rises nearly 1525 m (5,003.3 ft) above Lake Magog.

Mt. Assiniboine was named by George M. Dawson

George Mercer Dawson

Dr. George Mercer Dawson F.R.S., C.M.G., was a Canadian scientist and surveyor. He was born in Pictou, Nova Scotia, the eldest son of Sir John William Dawson, Principal of McGill University and his wife, Lady Margaret Dawson...

 in 1885. When Dawson saw Mt. Assiniboine from Copper Mountain

Copper Mountain (Alberta)

Copper Mountain is a mountain in Banff National Park, north of the town of Banff. The mountain was named in 1884 by George M. Dawson after he had climbed to a mining site setup by Joe Healy and J.S. Dennis in 1881. Healy and Dennis claimed they had found a copper deposit at the site...

, he saw a plume of clouds trailing away from the top. This reminded him of the plumes of smoke emanating from the teepees of Assiniboine Indians.

Mt. Assiniboine lies on the border between Mount Assiniboine Provincial Park

Mount Assiniboine Provincial Park

Mount Assiniboine Provincial Park is a provincial park in British Columbia, Canada, located around Mount Assiniboine.-History:The park was established 1922...

, in British Columbia, and Banff National Park

Banff National Park

Banff National Park is Canada's oldest national park, established in 1885 in the Rocky Mountains. The park, located 110–180 kilometres west of Calgary in the province of Alberta, encompasses of mountainous terrain, with numerous glaciers and ice fields, dense coniferous forest, and alpine...

, in Alberta. The park does not have any roads and thus can only be reached by a six hour hike 27 km (16.8 mi), three hour bike ride (now disallowed to reduce human / grizzly encounters) or helicopter. The usual approach is via Bryant Creek. From Canmore, Alberta

Canmore, Alberta

Canmore is a town in Alberta, Canada, located approximately west of the City of Calgary near the southeast boundary of Banff National Park. It is located in the Bow Valley within Alberta's Rockies. The town shares a border with Kananaskis Country to the west and south and the Municipal District of...

 follow the Smith-Dorien road to the Mount Shark parking lot. The trail is well signed. A helipad is also here.

Climbing

Mt. Assiniboine was first climbed in 1901 by James Outram

James Outram (mountaineer)

Sir James Outram was a British clergyman, who made many first ascents in the Canadian Rockies in the early 1900s....

, Christian Bohren and Christian Hasler. In 1925, Lawrence Grassi became the first person to make a solo ascent. On August 27, 2001, Bohren's granddaughter Lonnie along with three others made a successful ascent, celebrating the 100th anniversary of the first ascent.

There are no scrambling

Scrambling

Scrambling is a method of ascending rocky faces and ridges. It is an ambiguous term that lies somewhere between hillwalking and rock climbing. It is often distinguished from hillwalking by defining a scramble as a route where hands must be used in the ascent...

 routes up Mt. Assiniboine. The easiest mountaineering

Mountaineering

Mountaineering or mountain climbing is the sport, hobby or profession of hiking, skiing, and climbing mountains. While mountaineering began as attempts to reach the highest point of unclimbed mountains it has branched into specialisations that address different aspects of the mountain and consists...

 routes are the North Ridge and North Face at YDS

Yosemite Decimal System

The Yosemite Decimal System is a three-part system used for rating the difficulty of walks, hikes, and climbs. It is primarily used by mountaineers in the United States and Canada. The Class 5 portion of the Class scale is primarily a rock climbing classification system. Originally the system was...

 5.5 which are reached from the Hind Hut.

See also

• Mountain peaks of Canada
  Mountain peaks of Canada
  This article comprises three sortable tables of major mountain peaks of Canada.Topographic elevation is the vertical distance above the reference geoid, a precise mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational surface. Topographic prominence is the elevation...
  
  
• Mountain peaks of North America
  Mountain peaks of North America
  This article comprises three sortable tables of major mountain peaks of greater North America.This article defines greater North America as the portion of the continental landmass of the Americas extending northward from Panama plus the islands surrounding that landmass...
  
  
• Mountain peaks of the Rocky Mountains
  Mountain peaks of the Rocky Mountains
  This article comprises three sortable tables of major mountain peaks of the Rocky Mountains of North America.Topographic elevation is the vertical distance above the reference geoid, a precise mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational surface...
  
  
• Ranges of the Canadian Rockies
  Ranges of the Canadian Rockies
  The Canadian Rockies are a segment of the North American Rocky Mountains found in the Canadian provinces of Alberta and British Columbia.-List of Ranges:There is no universally accepted hierarchical division of the Canadian Rockies into subranges....
  
  
• Rocky Mountains
  Rocky Mountains
  The Rocky Mountains are a major mountain range in western North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch more than from the northernmost part of British Columbia, in western Canada, to New Mexico, in the southwestern United States...
  
  

External links

• http://bivouac.com?MtnPg.asp?MtnId=1479 Mount Assiniboine in Canadian Mountain Encyclopedia (Bivouac.com)
• SummitPost - Mt. Assiniboine
• Peakware - Mt. Assiniboine
• ACC - Accident history