At the end of February I was finally able to get my plans together to go meet up with my friend George for some ice climbing in the Adirondacks. We first started talking about an ice climbing trip back at the Nor'Easter, and we'd tried a few times to put something together but my schedule just wouldn't accomodate an ice climbing trip.
George put a lot of effort into planning this trip. He picked the climb, arranged the cabin rental, coordinated meals and gear rentals... Every detail was taken care of. I pretty much just had to show up.
I took Friday off work for the drive down. I left around 10am, got an oil change, and then hit the highway. For some reason I chose to take the US-based route, crossing at Buffalo and then driving I-90 across New York and up into Lake Placid. This was definitely a mistake. The road conditions weren't ideal. I counted 7 collisions on the QEW between Burlington and the border. Most of these involved at least one other car, plus a flipped minivan. On the other side of the border there were another 8 cars and trucks in the ditch, but nobody flipped, nobody hit anything, and nobody was hurt.
All told, what should have been an 8 hour drive, took just over 11. I got a bit nervous in the Adirondacks when I drove through 4 full on whiteouts, but I made it.
It was already dark when I pulled up to the cabin to find Katie, Dan, and a couple of other guys I hadn't previously met shovelling an area beside the road for parking. The rented cabin had a parking lot, but it was down a hill; there was no way any of us would be getting back up that hill if we had parked at the bottom. When the shovelling was done we headed inside to wait for the others to arrive.
Since the group was so large, we each got one day of climbing and one free day for other activities. Saturday was my climbing day. We got up reasonably early... early enough to get to The Mountaineer to rent our gear shortly after they (before everything was all rented out), then we headed to Chapel Pond to get on Positive Reinforcement (WI4-).
Due to the recent snowfall, the normal Chapel Pond parking lot was unplowed, so we had to posthole across the lake to get to the base of the climb. It was a great way to get the blood flowing before hitting the base of the climb, and the effort was well-worth it. Positive Reinforcement was in great shape.
I belayed George on lead, and he promptly set up two top ropes and rappelled down.
Dan seconded (the line on the left in the picture). We talked briefly about leaving one screw in as a directional but decided that it would be harder to climb past the screw if it was in, so we decided to pull it and climb slightly off line from the anchor. This turned out to not be the best idea... I planned on topping out and anchoring in at the top to get some pictures. Three quarters of the way up I fell and went for a nice 20 foot swing (thanks again for the catch Katie!). I finished the route on much steeper ice than I was prepared for, and ended up feeling pretty pumped at the top. I decided to lower off; I'd try to get some shots from the top later.
We all took turns on the two lines George set up. And trying out the Grivel Quantum Techs that George took out on demo for the day. They were SO nice to swing... I'm new to ice climbing and have only really swung three axes, but I was seriously impressed with the Quantum Techs as compared to the OLD Petzl Quarks and the Black Diamond Vipers that Katie has. I'm pretty sure I'm going to pick up a pair for next season.
After a few more ascents I did top out and try for some shots from the top. Unfortunately they didn't really turn out as I had hoped.
Sunday was my free day, but given how long it took me to drive to the Dacks in the first place and how tired I was from Saturday's ice climbing, I opted to hang out at the cabin with Katie & Dan and help clean up. Shortly before noon I hopped in my car for the drive back home... this time, taking the shorter, faster route. I really had a blast on this trip, and I hope to turn this into an annual event.
More pics are here: Ice Climbing - Chapel Pond. I really need to learn more about how to edit photos... and how to take better ice climbing pictures.
