Yes, this is a little out of order, but better late than never! So, (Dave here dictating) since it's winter and cold and snowy, I thought I would try to embrace the season and go for my semi-annual ice-climbing adventure.
My friends Alex and Quinn (Peru buddies) already had a scheme to climb some ice at the base of Notch Top Mountain in Rocky Mountain National Park.
The specific area is known as Grace Falls. We made plans to leave Boulder about 6am. We loaded up the gang in my SUV and headed out. The forecast was for a cold and windy day so I knew it would be a "full value" day of ice climbing.
Temperatures dipped as low as -2 f on the drive into Bear Lake. One could see the snow plumes coming off the high peaks and ridges - no worries about the ice melting today!
To this point in the season, not much snow had fallen in the high country so we anticipated a fairly efficient approach hike. In the summer this 3.5 mile approach is just over an hour at a quick pace. But today, after half a mile or so of well packed trail, to our surprise we got into a quite a bit of unconsolidated and untracked snow that slowed our pace considerably.
For almost 3.5 hours we slogged away to the base of Grace Falls. Of course Grace Falls is completely shaded this time of year and we enjoyed our last rays of sun for the day before descending a short ridge and traversing to the base of the ice. My guess is that is was about 0 degrees, with 10-30 mph winds.
It was cold.
And the boys agreed with me. We chose a line up the center of the falls that would be about 200' of fairly steep ice. Alex took off on the lead while Quinn and I belayed and jumped around a bit trying to stay warm. It took Alex a while to lead the first pitch because it was so cold, then Quinn and I followed simultaneously on different ropes to speed things up a bit.
The name of the game was 'keep moving to stay warm.' Quinn led the second pitch up and over the Falls and it was still likely around 0 or 5 degrees. We decided to climb with our packs - to go up and over the Falls - and traverse to a ridge that we descended to meet with our inbound trail.
The views were nice but the weather conditions were pretty nasty. After about two hours of outward bound slogging "fun" we arrived back at the car. We did enjoy a nice moon rise on the hike out. We piled in the car, turned up the heater, and headed home after a full day of "type two" fun.
Now I don't have to go ice climbing again for a while. :)
Yes, this is a little out of order, but better late than never! So, (Dave here dictating) since it's winter and cold and snowy, I thought I would try to embrace the season and go for my semi-annual ice-climbing adventure.
My friends Alex and Quinn (Peru buddies) already had a scheme to climb some ice at the base of Notch Top Mountain in Rocky Mountain National Park.
The specific area is known as Grace Falls. We made plans to leave Boulder about 6am. We loaded up the gang in my SUV and headed out. The forecast was for a cold and windy day so I knew it would be a "full value" day of ice climbing. 
Temperatures dipped as low as -2 f on the drive into Bear Lake. One could see the snow plumes coming off the high peaks and ridges - no worries about the ice melting today!
To this point in the season, not much snow had fallen in the high country so we anticipated a fairly efficient approach hike. In the summer this 3.5 mile approach is just over an hour at a quick pace. But today, after half a mile or so of well packed trail, to our surprise we got into a quite a bit of unconsolidated and untracked snow that slowed our pace considerably. 
For almost 3.5 hours we slogged away to the base of Grace Falls. Of course Grace Falls is completely shaded this time of year and we enjoyed our last rays of sun for the day before descending a short ridge and traversing to the base of the ice. My guess is that is was about 0 degrees, with 10-30 mph winds. 
It was cold.
And the boys agreed with me. We chose a line up the center of the falls that would be about 200' of fairly steep ice. Alex took off on the lead while Quinn and I belayed and jumped around a bit trying to stay warm. It took Alex a while to lead the first pitch because it was so cold, then Quinn and I followed simultaneously on different ropes to speed things up a bit.
The name of the game was 'keep moving to stay warm.' Quinn led the second pitch up and over the Falls and it was still likely around 0 or 5 degrees. We decided to climb with our packs - to go up and over the Falls - and traverse to a ridge that we descended to meet with our inbound trail. 
The views were nice but the weather conditions were pretty nasty. After about two hours of outward bound slogging "fun" we arrived back at the car. We did enjoy a nice moon rise on the hike out. We piled in the car, turned up the heater, and headed home after a full day of "type two" fun. 
Now I don't have to go ice climbing again for a while. :)
1 comment:
Spectacularly grim...
Come to OZ - you don't have to put up with this uber-masochistic stuff!
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