On the morning of September 4, 2025, I took the shuttle bus up to Moraine Lake, deep in the Valley of the Ten Peaks. The lake greeted me with its unforgettable turquoise waters, framed by sheer walls of stone and ice.
To start the day, I walked the short Rockpile Trail. After about 250 meter I turned back and was impressed by the Tower of Babel (2,310 m).
It is a striking, steep-sided mass of layered limestone and shale that rises immediately above the Rockpile and the Moraine Lake Lodge area. Unlike the jagged Ten Peaks across the lake, the Tower of Babel looks almost like a vertical wall of rock stacked in giant slabs, with little vegetation clinging to its base. Its sheer, column-like structure explains the name: it resembles a broken tower of stone blocks reaching up toward the sky.
The climb was only about 400 m long, yet each step carried me higher onto the pile of ancient rock debris, and when I turned back, I was stunned by the view. Right there on the left side of the lake rose Mount Fay, its solid grey cliffs cutting a bold vertical line into the sky, crowned by the gleaming Fay Glacier. It was the mountain I had to photograph, the one immortalized on countless postcards. No matter how often I had seen it in pictures, standing there in person, with the sunlight glinting off the glacier, felt utterly different.
After lingering on the Rockpile and taking photographs from every possible angle, I treated myself to a large cappuccino by the lakeshore—perhaps a small luxury in such a wild setting. Energized, I set off on the Eiffel Lake Trail. From the very beginning, the path climbed steadily uphill through the forest, each switchback lifting me closer to the high country. The air grew thinner, and the trees gave way to openings where shafts of sunlight illuminated the slopes.
After nearly three kilometres, the climb eased and the trail became almost flat. Here the vistas truly opened up, and the Valley of the Ten Peaks unfolded before me like a vast amphitheatre. The mountains stood in a row, jagged and proud, their sheer faces marked by glaciers and permanent snowfields. My eyes were drawn again and again to Mount Fay, whose glacier shimmered like a frozen waterfall.
Not far away, Mount Bowlen revealed its elegant pyramid form, rising in sharp lines of limestone and dolomite. Then came the vast bulk of Deltaform Mountain, one of the giants of the valley, its summit massive and block-like,
crowned by the Deltaform Glacier that draped its upper flanks like a white mantle. Even from the high point near Eiffel Lake, I could see tongues of this glacier spilling downward. Beside it rose Wenkchemna Peak, less massive than Deltaform but serrated and dramatic, a true saw-toothed ridge that seemed to guard the valley.
I chose not to descend all the way down to Eiffel Lake itself, as its waters looked rather subdued compared to the drama of the surrounding walls. Instead, I lingered on the high trail, taking in the panorama. The entire scene was overwhelming—so much vertical stone, so much ice and snow, all above the improbable turquoise of Moraine Lake now far below me. The Fay Glacier on Mount Fay gleamed in the sun, and from my vantage I could even make out the higher reaches of the Deltaform Glacier tucked against the cliffs.
Other peaks also filled the horizon, each distinct in its character. Some rose in graceful pyramids, others in blocky bastions or jagged spires. Unfortunately, the sun at midday made photography difficult—the light was harsh, and the camera struggled to capture the subtleties of shadow and depth. Yet what the camera could not hold, my memory preserved: the immensity, the color, the contrast of rock and ice.
When I finally turned back, the trail descended easily, carrying me back toward the deep blue of Moraine Lake. The Valley of the Ten Peaks remained behind me, a place of raw grandeur, where glaciers carve their way down stone faces and every peak seems to tell a story of deep time.