March 17, 2005

Hi Folks,

If you're out climbing right now you should be aware of the very real possibility of an avalanche, even in places where it would not normally be an issue. I was guiding over at the North End of Cathedral on Saturday during the storm and experienced a small slough avalanche that came down from the area right of Thresher. Trust me, this was a LOT of snow. It had a massive amount of energy and dumped snow up to my crotch. Had I been up on the ledge when it released, as I had been an hour earlier, it would have almost assuredly blown me down over the headwall and into the woods.

According to more than one source, there were at least 2 avalanches on Standard Route at Frankenstein on Saturday. These were not trivial releases and had anyone been in the direct path they likely would have been blown off the climb. Additional reports indicate that there were releases that covered the tracks north of Dracula as well as smaller ones that slid down through the woods near Dropline.

I have seen obvious small avalanche debris paths as I have been walking around in the woods. Places normally considered safe, like Goofer's or Willie's, may not be safe at all. The top of Dracula and the 1st pitch of Penguin are often loaded and waiting to let go. Even today at Cinema, the snow build-up on the climb as well as on the ledge above it is significant. Frankly I don't think the climb in its state is safe. Check the picture below if you don't believe me.

It is YOUR responsibility to check the situation carefully before you start. The snow really built up from the storm on Tuesday and the weekend storm really added to the problem. In many places there is a ton of wind slab just sitting there ready to release. You simply DON'T want to be in the way when it does!

Is Spring Is Actually Here(?):
It's hard to believe that Spring is almost here. The winter has just been hanging on for so long. It's hard for me to let go, but in many ways I'm ready for it to be over. On the warmer days I'm starting to look pretty darn longingly at the South Buttress and Humphrey's, not to mention thinking about Peregrine banding and hauling the road bike out of the garage!

That said, there still is a gracious plenty of ice out there that's good to climb. Brad White and I managed to get a good workout Wednesday morning breaking trail uphill to Black Pudding. Brad led the main climb and then we followed up by TR'ing the mixed variation to the left, a chossy smear about 20' to the right, and 2 very thin and fun runnels over to the left. It was a great morning/afternoon and it certainly gave me a pump! Ray Rice & buddy Zack dropped by for a run up B/P while we were working over the right hand smear. From all the whoops and hollers on their way down I assume that they had a lot of fun on the luge run to the bottom. <grin> Now that was exciting! Here's a couple of pix of Brad on the Pudding, making it look very easy.

Up
and Up
and Upper

Bayard Russell and Tim Martel were also looking for something different last week and found it on Refusal on Cathedral Ledge. From what Bayard says he took a few falls to clinch the ascent, but he managed it in good style. Check it out the next time you're doing Upper Refuse! The corner is Black Crack, the winter FA was done by George Hurley. Thanks to Tim for the nice shots. Amazing what you can do with a 3 MP camera IF you're in the right place at the right time!

Bayard 1
Bayard 2

What HE Said:
The following are from a page on Will Gadd's web site, www.gravsports.com. I agree with most, not so sure about 1. I'll leave it as an exercise for you to figure which is which. It's pretty obvious really. <wry grin> In any event Will is a very astute observer of climbing & I totally dig reading whatever he has to say. These are 4 of 16 paragraphs of thoughts jotted down after his recent climbing trip to Norway.

6. I’m done with leashes for technical ice climbing. I can lead wet, scary WI6 in the dark, the Viper Fangs are good enough. The harder and weirder the ice is the more I prefer leashless tools. I put my leashes back on for one hard day and was lost, especially on ice where there are limited placements. The freedom to match and switch is worth it, you can move your body into the best position for the tool rather than either using awkward body position or having to make new placements--difficult to do when there aren't any. I'll still use leashes on big cruiser routes, they add security, but for any sort of technical climbing I'm staying leashless.

10. Most packs are far too heavy. Carrying 5 pounds of pack is just crazy unless it's filled with bricks or somehthing requiring heavy fabric. I'm going to work harder on packs.

13. I’m done with vertical mono-points for hard ice climbing. They are a junk show for climbing really fresh ice. Ice on mixed routes often forms slowly and has good density, fresh ice is just too hollow for mono-points, Sabretooths work far better. I’m going evangelical on this, I just had my vertical monos rip too many times to ever want to use them again.

16. I still really, really like ice climbing, even after 20 years of it. Every year I learn something new, refine my systems and discover a facet of the ice jewels we're prvileged to climb.

Here's the URL to the full article. Thanks to Chris LeMay for pointing it out to me.

Climbers Bad For Ecology?:
I hear this every once in a while. Usually I just say, "Bugger Off!" There is so much other stuff, like car and water pollution, that just seems so much more important. However, this article, from Science Daily, is pretty well done and it certainly made me think...

Selected Ice Conditions effective March 21, 2024
I can't actually say that there is nothing out there that can't be climbed. That would be foolish. But for the average, or a little above average climber, that's probably correct. That said, I did hear that there is climbable ice on Parasol in Dixville Notch. Not sure how that will be after we get a foot of heavy wet snow on Saturday. Regardless, here's a few pix I took today just to document things.
	Huntington Ravine	AVALANCHE
	Repentance	OUT
	Standard Route	OUT
	Dracula	OUT
For the full current conditions report, CLICK HERE

Remember - climb hard, ride the steep stuff, stay safe and above all BE NICE,