Ice Climbing, The Rambles: A Photo Essay
Recently we drove a few hours North in search of good Ice to climb near the Gold Rush town of Lillooet, BC. We weren’t hopeful as the conditions over the previous few weeks had not been favorable. In the 11th hour we received word that The Rambles, an area about a 30min drive South of Lillooet, was “in” meaning the ice could still be climbed. We booked a cheap Motel in Lillooet, crammed all our climbing gear into the back of our friend, Adriens, SUV and were off. Myself and Spring both popped our leading an Ice cherries over the weekend and loved it. Below is some of the photos we took over our two days there....
Ice Climbing, Canmore
Swing like you screw, kick like you poo. “I don’t screw like that” a girl replied cheekily from the back row of our Ice Climbing group. Our instructor, Carl, paused a moment, cracked a wry smile in response and moved on: “When you swing your Ice Tools get your hips in against the ice, legs extended and shoulders out, like you screw. When you want to kick, hang off your highest tool and get your butt out, like you’re going to poo and look at where you want your feet to go” We were on our second day of Ice Climbing instruction with Yamnuska Mountain Adventures near Canmore, Alberta. The previous day they’d given us an intro to Ice Climbing at the climbs Irish Mist and The Water Hole, today we were at Kings Creek to hone our technique further on some single pitch Ice. The snow gods had finally answered the pleas from Skiers all over the Rockies and on this day it was dumping snow after a rather long drought in these parts. Anything we put down on the ground for a few moments was soon buried under fluffy white powder. I imagined it might make for a rather miserable day of climbing Ice but it turned out to be one of the best. Kings Creek lies at the bottom of a gorge with steep rock walls on either side. As snow built up above eventually it would fall off branches, boulders and slopes when they could no longer hold the weight of it. It would cascade down, get funneled into gullies, gain speed, bring other loose snow with it and eventually reach the bottom where we were climbing. This made for an almost ethereal experience while climbing ice, which isn’t exactly the most normal activity to begin with. Snow cover Belaying in Kings Creek Kings Creek Climb As we climbed, periodically, these sluffs of snow would hit us in waves. It was like being suddenly shaken up inside a snow globe. You could only brace against the ice and hope your belayer hadn’t been buried below. As I finished climbing another line and shouted “Take!” to my belayer, I clipped my ice tools into my harness and lowered my hands to my sides. My hands started to ache, ache badly (In ice climbing this is affectionately known as the Hot Aches or the Screaming Barfies). I braced against the pain and resolved to stop over gripping my Ice Tools next time. I looked down and shouted “Lower” to my belayer. At that moment I could see a snow sluff from my vantage point picking up mass and momentum above and barrelling down....
I a go to Great Bear: The French Connection
On Family day weekend, 2013, myself and a surly bunch of fellow backcountry recreationists spent a cold, somewhat windy night atop a mountain we had no intentions to be anywhere near. This somewhat serendipitous weekend occurred thanks in large part to my French friend, Mr. Adrien T. (drumroll please) What follows will be less an account of the events from that weekend and more the experiences I had and have gladly had in Adrien’s company. Mountains have the capacity to make people a little crazy in my opinion. If you’ve got even a slightly obsessive or addictive personality then you are going to find a way to feed it in the Mountains. You have the peakbaggers who just have to “collect ‘em all”, the adrenaline junkies, the First Ascentists, those who count every foot of elevation they’ve ever climbed, those who constantly need to push their physical and mental limits (I’d count myself among these) and then you have your Completists, to name a few. I’d define Adrien as a bit of a Completist. He sees beauty in order, organization and structure. How this translates to the Mountains is lists. Lists of peaks, lakes, trails, routes. There is a cornucopia of guidebooks out there on most subjects mountain related. Some use them as a reference, while others see them as a challenge. The challenge to visit all of the respective locales in these books and tick them all off. He’s certainly not alone. I’ve met many people who do this. When I have informed fellow hikers on the trails that I am using a certain book as a reference I’ve been oft posed the question: “how many have you done?”. I have no clue, but I do see the appeal of keeping track, if only to see how I have personally been progressing in my ability and experience. Adrien is working on a few lists at the moment and most trips that he plans tend to be chosen in such a way as to tick off at least one of the places they reference. Which is why it came as some surprise last weekend when he made us aware of a trip he wanted to do that wasn’t in any guidebook that I know of. He wanted to visit a peak accessed from the Coquihalla Hwy named Mount Henning. Adrien organizes like a mutha hubba, I mean he usually has it dialed in up to 11 when it comes to working out distances, weather, gear lists… etc. So when he said he wanted to do a few mellow peaks to do some testing of his new AT Ski setup I agreed. Saturday morning arrived, and in my typically Irish fashion, I was running...
Sky Pilot: Why I Climb
Back in August 2011 I reached the summit of a little peak that sits only a handful of kilometers away from where I live. In a lot of ways this peak, outside of the scrambling and mountaineering community in and around the Southern Coast Mountains of BC, is largely unknown by most individuals. It was unknown to me also until one day I was flicking through the pages of my recently bought copy of Matt Gunns “Scrambles in Southwest British Columbia” in mid 2010. The name “Sky Pilot” instantly stood out. It’s a great name for a Mountain in my opinion and instantly gave the peak a mystique that drew me to want to climb it some day. In many ways climbing Mountains for me is an endeavour to get further away from the comfort and ennui of postmodernity at sea level. The closer I get to the sky above me, the less the trappings of modern life apply, the greater the viscerality of experience. To stand atop this Sky Pilot became a singular focus for me. At the time of discovering this Mountain I could barely hike for 3 sustained hours at sea level. I’d never carried an overnight pack on my back and the word “scrambling” was a manner in which I’d prepare eggs on a Saturday morning, not the homonym for a method to progress over rocky terrain. I knew I had a long way to go before I could hope to safely and enjoyably climb this mountain. An entire year went by. I hiked often and began scrambling to the tops of many peaks in the Ranges close to where I live. But, when I’d stand atop those summits, I’d always scan for the familiar shape of Sky Pilot on the horizon and imagine I was there instead. It is an odd compulsion to be consumed with thoughts about a jutting protrusion of rock and ice. I have spent many an hour trying to understand why some mountains can capture my attention so entirely while others, of no lesser height, difficulty or prowess go unnoticed. Certain mountains get imbued with a personality. I think most people that climb mountains regularly anthropomorphise them a little. They sit like foreboding giants with their shoulders curled away from us. We spend time to get to know their moods, when it seems these Ogres might allow us to reach their summit, and then, as we ascend, gain an intimate understanding about the mountain. Some are not ready to let their guard down and we must retreat, while others welcome us to their top freely. I wanted to get to...
One Year Ago: Slalok Mountain
Last December Leigh and I decided to take advantage of a good weather window and make an attempt of the NF of Slalok in the Joffre Group. This was going to be a day trip and it was going to be a long one! The alarm went off at 3:00am and shook me from sleep. I kept thinking it was too early to head out into the cold dark morning, but if we wanted to summit that day and still make it back home in time for a late dinner we need to get out on the road. Hesitantly we got ourselves up, dressed and ready to go. Stepping outside the moon seemed unusually bright, but the fact that we could see the moon would bode well weather-wise for the remainder of the day, so off we went. To save time we decided to skip eating breakfast at home (or making lunch) and go for the traditional Canadian experience and get a drive-thru Timmy’s. Unfortunately as we soon found out they do not serve breakfast before 5:00am, so we ordered bagels for breakfast and bagel sandwiches for lunch(as they didn’t have rolls ready for sandwiches)….mmm this was going to be a bagel filled day. Heading north up the Duffy in the dark the conversation often turned to how tired we felt, how dark it was, how cold it was; but we kept driving. Once pulling into the Joffre Lakes car park, knowing that the estimated temperature for the day was supposed to dip to -20c, we stepped out in the frigid cold and started to layer up. With numbing fingers we both looked at each other and Leigh said “Are you feeling it?” Deep down I thought about the comfort of my warm bed at home and how if we turned around right then I could be back in bed within 2 hours. But I knew I would regret not attempting the peak more than I would regret not getting back into bed, so putting on a brave face I said “Let’s just check it out, we’ll start feeling better once the sun comes up.” The trail to the upper lake was uneventful, just plodding along trying to follow the trail markers in the dark and continually moving forward in hopes of reaching the warmth of the sun. Upon reaching the upper lake we could see some ski tracks headed across the lake tending towards the shore, rather than straight across. It was still early in the season and wanting to save time but still be smart about it, we decided to makes tracks across the lake as close to the shore...
Hurley Silver Mine
Sometimes it’s nice to tag along on a trip and not really do anything to plan it. It’s too easy nowadays to completely destroy any discovery when exploring a new area by doing research online. Most places will have pictures of everything on the route, 360’ video panoramas, HD Satellite imagery available in Google Earth, with detailed reports describing every step of the way. (I’m aware of the irony of writing this and posting it online). This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but sometimes it’s nice to discover an area fresh without any previous knowledge of what to expect. So mid last week I received word that a friend wanted to explore the “Hurley Silver Mine” area and potentially summit “Hurley Silver Peak”. I’d remembered reading something about it, and vaguely knew it was off the Duffy Lake Road so I agreed. I’ve never been on a bad hike that started from the Duffy Lake Road. Saturday morning seen four of us heading North, past Whistler, then Pemberton and along the Duffy. We passed the pullouts for all the popular weekend spots for sledders and skiers and they were packed. Why wouldn’t they be, conditions were awesome and the weather was forecast for bluebird skies. I worried that our chosen area would also be overrun by skiers and sledders also. Nearing our parking spot I seen it was empty with only an old pickup parked up the road. My friend, Adrien, mentioned that we had to be dropped off at the parking area and that Ben, the driver, would need to park about a kilometer away as there was rumours that a First Nations man might vandalize our vehicle if we parked nearby. Turns out there used to be a proper, drivable bridge that crosses Cayoosh Creek which runs parallel to the Duffy Lake Road for a while, but it washed out some years back. Since then a new footbridge has been installed, purportedly by this First Nations man who lives on the opposite side of Cayoosh Creek, the side we’d need to cross over to before heading along the Hurley Silver Mine road towards our objective. He has been reported as blocking peoples attempts to cross this bridge. Whether or not these rumours are lore, past tense or true didn’t matter. It was better to err on the side of caution rather than risk a possible confrontation. We unloaded, moved the car a safe distance away, geared up, then quickly scurried across the footbridge and along the road. The footbridge instantly meant we wouldn’t be listening to the obnoxious sound and smell of sleds for the weekend. We...
