Cathedral Style

New Cathedralstyle and Cathedral Mountain Guides Website

2011-12-12T06:26:00.001-05:00

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Shell Pond

2011-11-08T07:37:00.003-05:00

Mark Richey on the Hardscrabble Road, 5.12c.

Pat Bagley sending the Sarlac, 5.12b.

Jed Piat, mid-huck, while onsighting Hardscrable.

Yeah boy..

Ass Kickin' on the Saguenay, part II

2011-09-08T09:54:00.000-04:00

I ran out in the dark, rain pounding, wind blowing and stumbled into a shaken Sarah. She yelled through the storm that the tree that almost took out Sam had hit their tent too. She said everyone was OK, but they were headed over to bivy with us, their tent ruined. Jim was shortly behind her, cool and collected. I mushed my way though the mud and puddles over to Sam's bivy. He was already inside reading and calmly asked me through the tent wall if I thought he was safe. I just reminded him of the obvious and mentioned we were all going to spend some time huddled below the boulder. He joined us shortly.

The storm continued the rest of the night as we huddled together, the pinned down tarp occasionally inflating as it was caught by a gust. Some of us lost interest in the cramped, rocky but protected shelter of the boulder and exchanged it for the flat elbow room of the unprotected tent; some buried deeper beneath the dripping granite roof. I chose both options at different points in the night, finally settling on a boulder bivy after our tent was hit by a second small rock. One of us had a soft cooler for a foam pad, another slept on a towel, inside a trash bag with a t-shirt pillow, another, maintained a claustrophobic dirt-to-rock hip-scum and constantly checked to make sure everyone else was protected, and one just sandwiched herself patiently and cooperatively in the middle. Unsure of what to do next, I drank beer and tried to keep smiling, and finally relaxed when we double checked the guidebook which described a climber's trail back the cars - only a two hour walk away. With a plan for tomorrow hatched, all we had to do was wait - and not get hit by another tree.

The Sarah-Anne Wrap Bivi. Sarah is in there somewhere...

At the first usable light we were up, checking on the canoes and assessing the damage. The brunt of the storm had hit at high tide and one of our canoes had been tossed around, the bowstring could be plucked like one string mega-bass, but it was undamaged. The other was fine, but the water was still far too rough to paddle. We needed to get back our static line, so, in a torrent of water cascading off the cliff, Sam jugged the fixed line to retrieve it. Exhausted after five days of climbing and a sleepless night, he pushed the ascender up with the palm of his hand; slowly, five times with his left, then five times with his right, trailing another soaked rope. The rest of us packed up while Jim bundled our gear in a two tarp taco that he said would last a week, but looked to me like 6 months of dry storage. We started hiking in the rain, packs light with little bivy kits.

The hike out was one of the most memorable parts of the trip for me; we scoped an amazing amount of potential for steep crack climbing (the drip line for a three pitch section of cliff was 40 yards out from the cliff base), and witnessed some incredible wind at the Notre-Dame du Saguenay statue at the tip of the cape that Cap Trinite forms. The storm had passed, but the wind at this exposed point was still so strong that I realized we had actually been sheltered from the full force of Irene by the steep granite of the Cap and our semi-subterranean bivy.

Arriving at a locked up and darkened waterside visitor's center, and a parking lot empty but for our two vehicles was a surreal experience. The national park was empty. We discussed the fact that they might have shut the park down due to the storm, but a persistent feeling of it-couldn't-have-been-that-bad convinced me the competing theory of "zombie apocalypse" was more plausible. After a quiet hour alone, just the five of us, we arrived at the park entrance and the backside of a closed gate. The first vehicles we had seen were parked on other side in front of the park headquarters. We went inside and found an English speaking park employee, obviously having a very busy day, who took the time to patiently explain to five American climbers who had the poor judgement to weather a hurricane in a boat accessed campsite below a huge tree lined cliff that the park was shut down, and had been evacuated. Looking for us was on their to-do list. She explained that the main road was washed out, gave us advice on where to find inexpensive lodging for the night and told us to check in with her in the morning. It wasn't even 11 AM.
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After a more traditional, just-the-two-of-us, 1st anniversary dinner at a fine restaurant in Chicoutimi, with a wonderful waitress, and a good night's sleep in a clean and modern hotel room, we headed back to the park. We had since learned how bad the storm had been, seen Facebook photos from home of friends' damaged houses - Sarah and Jim's place was just inches above the high water line - and had plotted our route back to NH to avoid the many closed roads and washed out bridges. We lined up a zodiac ride out to the Cap to clean out our kit, and Jonathan, our English speaker driver, gave us a high speed tour of the Saguenay we could have never gotten in our little canoes, including an up close look at some seals.

Seals taking a break the day after Hurricane Irene.

In the zodiac on our way back to the quay the wind was finally abating and we were provided with some comic relief when one of the towed canoes all but capsized and the three trash bags on board floated away. All was recovered with the exception of a shirt and some sun glasses, far less than many people lost to Hurricane Irene. We were fortunate, I later saw the crushed metal water bottle that had been between Sarah and Jim's heads when their tent was hit and shredded, but all we really had to endure was the shell shock of a near-miss and one uncomfortable night. Many others homes' were lost entirely or severely damaged, including an entire community here in North Conway and many more in devastated parts of Vermont and New York.

Despite the tribulations and the flaky rock, I did love the place. The effect of the water, the paddle approach, the careful and crumbly gear placements, the steep compelling crack lines and the amazingly friendly locals all combine to make a long weekend here feel like a far flung, and far more expensive, expedition.

Cap Trinite got under my skin and I can't wait to go back - and with any luck, actually climb something next time.

Ass Kickin on the Saguenay, part I

2011-09-03T10:37:00.002-04:00

Cap Trinite on Bay Eternite in the Saguenay Fjord, Quebec.

From our tent I heard two loud crashes of thunder and found myself trying to grab Anne's hand as she scrambled out of the tent to get below the boulder. She tore away, her better instincts telling her the thunder I had heard was actually something - big - falling off the cliff. Once out of the tent, it was obvious we were really in some weather. The tropical storm that had been forming as we headed north almost a week before had apparently turned into something. The tarp was flying high like a single wing, then crashing down, rain was blowing everywhere and we soon discovered that the "thunder" I had heard had almost crushed three of my best friends.

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My wife Anne and I rolled north, across the border, with Sam Bendroth packed into the jump seat in the back of my pick-up. It was freshly retrofitted with a cap that didn't fit, a 2x4 canoe rack and a silicon slathered and re-riveted plex-iglas back window. Sarah Garlick and Jim Surette were a couple of days behind us, canoe lashed to the roof of their Matrix. The weather was beautiful. It was the end of my summer guiding season and Anne had taken a break from her busy schedule so we could celebrate out 1st anniversary together - just us, and three ofour friends.

After a relatively easy drive, a few minor language issues and a good sleep we got our first load in the canoe at the Bay Eterinite boat launch - about three hours north of Quebec city and in a peaceful bay carved into the mountains which line the Saguenay Fjord - around noon. We were rolling heavy, it was our anniversary after all, and after a couple of trips all the kit was in place at a our bivi site below the stunning 800'+ Grand Galets on Cap Trinite.

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The first couple of days were slow. We had all been working a lot and this adventure, was as for me, as much vacation as climbing trip.

After a warm-up pitch that first afternoon, a rain day allowed us to paddle back and get provisioned for a week; fresh ice for the cooler, more beer, that kind of thing. The forecast for the next few days was good, a chance of rain a few days out, so we figured we would just get hunkered in and climb. As we paddled our loaded canoe back to the Cap though, the Fjord gave us our first little taste of it's constantly changing conditions. It started with the occasional gust we would watch travel across the otherwise glassy bay, one gust plucking up the flat water for spray. Further out, from the back of the canoe, I could just make out what looked like a wall of white caps out in the main channel. As we approached the bigger water below the cliff we could see clearly it was a wall of waves headed our way. We made a dash for it, but pretty soon we were being blown backwards; the gunnels of our provision laden canoe just inches above the water line.

Still barely out ahead of the changing conditions we managed to get our boat unloaded and up onto a rocky beach just before the real wind - and waves - hit. From the shore we watched a defined line of rough water overtake the calm surface we had paddled out in.

The coastline here is lined with ledge and boulders, the steep spruce and fir forest comes right down to the high tide line in an amazingly abrupt and continuous line. I scrambled down the little cliffs lining the coast, out of site of Anne, ecstatically relishing the isolation, the grey water's calming surface - and the taste of Molsen's Export. After a 1/2 hour conditions had mellowed, and we got it all loaded back up and Anne and I paddled back to camp, singing, in a soaking rain.

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Sarah and Jim arrived in the sunny afternoon of our third day, with a beautiful breeze blowing, while Sam and I were in the shade enjoying our second pitch of the trip; the first lead of Maree Houte. It is a beautiful piece of rugged architecture: a 100m section of overhanging rock that comes right down to just above the high tide line - where this section of cliff meets an accessible ledge which is only partly submerged at the highest tides. If there was ever a place to dry out after a rain day, this was it. Maree's gorgeous and steep 5.12a first pitch is variety pack of good climbing and good rock; it has a hard bolt protected boulder problem, a great finger crack in a corner and a splitter little off-width.

The lowest sections of steep rock seem to be weathered by the tide and waves, but after about a pitch the protected (overhanging) sections of granite are covered in a persistent flaky chunder; and the 5 pitch 5.12b, Maree Haute, was no exception. Luckily, my climbing partner Sam Bendroth and I are no strangers to choss farming after spending much of the past decade developing the cliffs of the bastard Notch of the White Mountains. While Sarah and Jim got right to work on a long and dirty 5.11+ called La Vire du cure Dallaire, Sam layed into the second pitch of Maree, pulling through here and there, sending down small flakes and generally getting it done on a scary lead. We fixed a rope to facilitate cleaning and photography, and retreated for a team briefing.

Sam Bendroth mid-briefing.

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Jugging up to clean some chunder.

After a morning spent cleaning the second pitch we were finally ready to try a little free climbing. Sam headed up the 1st 12a pitch of Maree, and crushed it. I followed and headed out on the second lead, making fairly quick work of the less steep stemming and liebacking of the gently overhanging lower half - gear still in from the previous day's effort and the morning's cleaning. Then it got hard. It's steepening stemming ends in with a powerful and crumbly move followed by a crumbly traverse out to the lip of a roof; all protected by small gear in the flaky cracks. It is a head-game that made for a careful attempt with many takes. The final jug haul up to the belay is a classic and exposed bit of glory climbing. The gear is hidden below the roof, the jugs are all on the same hollow sounding, but solid, flake and it is right out over the high tide line 50m below. Sam followed the lead, arriving at the belay in full freak out mode after tearing through the crux first go, only one hang before the business, excitedly spurting between breaths about how hard it was. Funny, from the belay he made it seem easy. What a crusher.

Can you take a picture while climbing? Only if you're hanging on the rope..

The gorgeous 2nd pitch of Maree Haute.

He made his way up the next pitch, more chunder raining down on the belay, finger jamming, off-widthing and taking up the steep wet crack. A burly little roof move and we were up to what would turn out to be our highpoint; a little hole of a stance half way up the route. I kept telling Sam the rock would get better as we got higher - being more exposed to rain and weather - but after three pitches, apparently, we still weren't high enough. Above was an off-width lined with more of those loose flakes, but at least it was overhanging.

We headed down from there, after all it was the day before my anniversary and Anne is a lot more attractive that Sammy.

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The 1st and 2nd pitches of The Beluga Belly.

On our anniversary, Sarah, Jim and Sam started up the straight-out-of-the-water, 3 pitch and wide Beluga Belly (5.11+), at low tide, while Anne and I took a quiet rest day together. By the time they finished and rapped the route the access ledge was partially underwater - no problem; through careful planning they had packed a 6 pack "bivy kit" giving Anne and I some more high tide enforced quality time together. While they sat marooned, the clouds that had been building all day finally started a steady rain and the increasing wind began to pick up white capped chop on the bay.

Just an hour or two after they polished off their kit, Sarah, Jim and Sam were able to make it back across the traverse ledge in good Bandaloop style, rigging a high anchor and using two different ropes to get across the incredibly slippery, rain soaked black rock.

That night we all had dinner together sheltered below a camo tarp strung between our tent and a boulder (a spot we would later become all too familiar with). After Sarah and Jim went to bed, Anne, Sam and I hopped in our tent for one last beer and a game of the classic southern NH card game, 45's. Now it was pouring. Sammy won and got up to walk back to his tent, the wind had just started to really blow. A few minutes later he was almost crushed by a tree ending it's 850' free fall just a few feet away from him. All we heard was two loud thundering crashes, and Anne was out the tent door to get shelter below the boulder.

Stay tuned for part II...

The Cycle Continues

2011-06-08T07:49:00.020-04:00

Spring time can rush pass with so many wonderful days out climbing in near perfect conditions that I can forget about the rest of the world. Right through April, and into May, rock climbing is so fresh, everything, from the warm sun on your arms to the grippy dry air, just feels so good. Routes and areas that may feel worn by October, are old friends and familiar benchmarks to check in with as the world opens up and comes alive.

But the world also catches up with me, maybe it's the blackflies, the humidity or just the fact that I've been a total slackass for two months.

Back down on earth looking around, I can see I've got a little catch-up to do, but it was a good run.. I wish I had pictures to share, the camera was in my pack everyday, but as fun as the shots are to have later, simply getting out climbing, and not thinking about anything else, seems to be a necessary part of my yearly mental health schedule. Well I checked that off, time to get back in line.

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I've got some exciting programs and trips coming up this summer, including two weeks of climbing with a pair of great teenage climbers from Toronto; we'll be traveling around the area checking out the best we have to offer in New England, hopefully then, a trip to Norway for 10 days of rock climbing out of a boat, sponsored by Outdoor Research and Fjords Norway tourist board (still working out the details on that one, I have my fingers crossed), a few weeks of guiding for the Kismet Rock Foundation, and finally a one year anniversary trip to the Sierras with my wife, Anne, come August.

I have a few weeks in July to still fill in with day guiding in New Hampshire, so if you have any questions you want addressed, if there is something you want to climb, or if you just need a day out of your busy schedule, you can get in touch with me through my guiding website here.

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(Anne did take some great shots of our trip to this spring's New River Rendezvous, have a look here. You'll note my conspicuos absence; I was laid up with a terrific cold between the clinics I taught. What a great event.)

The Richey Project

2011-03-28T10:19:00.001-04:00

The Richey Project from Bayard Russell on Vimeo.

The Ghost

2011-03-11T07:32:00.023-05:00

Elliot Gaddy starting up in the sun.
Mahoney Alpine Adventures photo.

There it is, it just happened.. it rained, it got cold and Cannon went off. If you just keep showing up year after year, eventually, you just might run into the conditions of a lifetime. Maybe. I didn't show up. Kevin Mahoney and Elliot Gaddy did though; early on a sunny morning after a ridiculous rain storm.

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It literally happened over night. Sunday afternoon was above freezing, but when those guys looked up at the cliff from the parking lot on a cold, clear Monday morning there was ice all the way to the ground; numerous 1000' smears.

Mahoney Alpine Adventures photo.

Now, there's a little more to it than just showing up, as we all know. These guys were the ones that did though and they looked up again at this ridiculous looking route from the base, packs in the snow, and still decided to give it a go. This can thin out the willing pretty quickly, too. But you gotta try, especially when it might not ever be around again, and you're actually there with a willing partner. It's the same thing pitch by pitch and actually, truthfully, move by move. It can all seem too much when you look at it all at once, but they didn't, and they never a had a good enough reason to turn around.

I have had a precious few days like this, we all have in our own ways, where pitch by pitch I simply cannot believe what is still happening, is still happening. It is a glorious feeling, flawlessly and safely passing pitches that just shouldn't be there, and didn't seem like they could be climbed. It is the beauty of ice climbing; all the million factors that had to come together to get this fleeting strip of ice where it is and where it probably shouldn't be. I can appreciate how those boys felt up there on the wide open center of the "Big Cliff", banging out pitches that would not be climbable even that afternoon as they rappelled; delaminated and turned to mush by the sun. But they were in a spectacular place I have never been. They were right were New England's best ice climbers have wanted to be for generations, climbing that top to bottom strip of ice up Cannon's Big Wall.

Congratulations guys, you sent the thing that was at the center of all this great climbing that has gone on around here over the years. I keep coming back to the feeling that everything else just seems peripheral.

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But there's more, after all that they went back Thursday and sent a line just right of Icarus, also to the top, in windy, snowy condition. Elliot slept for three hours the night before, driving to Franconia Notch after a short trip to central New York, a trip he had begun from the same parking lot three days before. That's what it takes though, the drive to get there (no pun intended) .

It should be noted, however, that all this motivation comes at a price. After climbing Icarus, Elliot, sound asleep in a chair, got his toenails painted by a couple of friends in Madison.

To the Top!

2011-03-02T07:58:00.013-05:00

Kevin Mahoney's blog is up and running again with a post about a memorable couple of days during a winter season I look back fondly on, 2001-2002. There was nothing to climb anywhere but Cannon, I had just gotten dumped, moved to the MWV and my good friend Josh Hurst and I had been climbing up there all season without seeing another person - until we met Kevin and Ben Gilmore one morning, before sunrise, in the parking lot.

I remember those two trying to get up to this out-of-this-world looking smear of ice on the "Big Wall" section of the cliff, and not quite getting there. They blew our minds with the speed they were climbing, the runnouts and their audacity; if they had gotten to it they would have had to try and climb it! My approach was different, I just looked away and wandered off to a turf filled corner with a good Lost Arrow crack in the back.

At some point in the afternoon Josh and I were scratching up Sams Swan Song's crusty first pitch when those two came running, and I mean running, by. Turns out they were calling it quits with the "Big Wall Smear" and headed south to the Omega amphitheater, but they stopped for a few minutes anyway to see what we were up to. Seeing the scrappy mixed pitch we had picked for ourselves they advised us we should go to Alaska - so we did (we figured these guys knew). A year later Josh and I landed on the Kahiltna Glacier, set up camp just like we saw in a Climbing magazine "Tech Tip", and I layed down for my first night, ever, of snow camping. I didn't manage to climb much during my first four weeks of snow camping, but eventually got up Mt. Hunter's West Ridge with a just graduated Freddie Wilkinson and our great friend, and total ringer, Dana "Maddog" Drummond.

Back in the predawn Cannon parking lot, the next day, Kevin and Ben told us how they had tried this awesome new route over by Omega, but had run out of time - it must have been 1 pm when they started climbing - and they were on their way back up to try it again. They did the FA of the still unrepeated Prozac that day. I have no recollection of what Josh and I climbed, I just remember him saying at some point when Kevin and Ben were out of earshot, "Those boys can dance...".

Still can to - check out this video Freddie W put together. That time lapse is Kevin Mahoney doing the first two pitches of Endangered Species in one, long go!

Surf's Up! from Freddie Wilkinson on Vimeo.

Endangered Species

2011-02-09T09:49:00.004-05:00

Endangered Species from Bayard Russell on Vimeo.

MWV Ice Fest

2011-02-01T16:40:00.001-05:00

This weekend come up and check out the showcase of the place, and the community, I call home at the 18th Annual MWV Ice Fest.

I'll be teaching two mixed climbing clinics, one Friday, and one Saturday, followed by a steep ice clinic Sunday. Come on up and hang out for the day, we can talk climbing, laugh a lot and finish the day off with the free apres climbing beer and refreshments back at IME, IMCS's website is here. All this comes before the main festivities Friday and Saturday night at the Cranmore Gym - a film fest followed by the popular drytooling comp Friday, and Kelly Cordes's presentation followed by a DJ'ed party Saturday - all with beer and food.

Ice Fest Season

2011-01-30T13:01:00.019-05:00

That's me trying to fight off a deep pump. I just barely
managed to win; only on a technicality, and by time.

Two of Northeast's strongest, Josh Worley and Matty McCormick, threw one hell of a party up in Burlington, setting a great route for the Smuggs Ice Bash's first ever drytooling comp sponsored by Alpinist Magazine.

This young buck hadn't even ice climbed before,
he's just strong as an ox and almost won.

The stinger was after a bunch of steepness, trying to hang on while the log you were into, with your leg slung over your arm, just swung back and forth. Petra Cliffs climbing gym was a great site, with a perfectly set-up lead cave and a good and rowdy local crowd.

Only in Vermont.
Ivan Tighe is second from the right, he
put in probably the best performance, but
ultimately got docked for missing a clip.

The next day down in Woodstock, New Hampshire...

Congrats to the VICE Fest (Vertical Ice Climbing Enthusiast) crew for putting together a great event that got dozens of Tufts University folks out for their first taste of ice climbing. This is their second year running the VICE Fest, they were able to get about 80 people out climbing in 5 different area in NH last Saturday, and they still had a waiting list! The apres climbing festivities were a blast, they had me give a presentation about the winter climbing scene in the Northeast to the most receptive audience you could ever hope for, which was followed by a pull up contest, constantly broken up by spontaneous dancing and a gear raffle including donations from Outdoor Research. The psyche level was high.

Thanks to my wife Anne Skidmore for the photos, visit here website AnneSkidmore.com

Endangered Species

2011-01-20T07:11:00.005-05:00

When Matt McCormick, Matt Horner and I went to Poke-O-Moonshine on the Friday before the Mountain Fest, there were a couple of things that we did do, and a couple of things that we didn't do; here's the deal.

We did climb the corner system that is the first part of Gorrillas in the Mist. The ice was formed right of Gorillas in a beautiful, narrow and thin streak. We climbed it for two pitches, one of which being the most intense lead I have ever had, and then belayed. The ice continued above, but "dead ended" below an awesome roof. We took a right from the belay and climbed up into a dihedral, and around that roof, to a good ledge, and rapped off a tree.

We did not do the third ascent of Gorrilas, or even the third ascent of the "big wall" section of Poko. We rapped a pitch below the cliff top, and that pitch would not have been trivial.

Matt, Matt and I all feel good about what we did. Our climb felt complete enough and significant enough to warrent a name, at least as a variation. We climbed some really beautiful pitches, ones that you don't get many chances in life to climb, but there is room for improvement. There is potentially some really bad-ass looking climbing above our second pitch for a complete and really hard route. Where we decided to rap was an obvious break, the terrain above looked slow and time consuming and we decided to head down and proceed with the Mountain Fest festivities, instead of scrapping our way around another roof, in the dark, with one headlight.

I have read a little bit about our ascent online and it seems like there is a bit of confusion about it. I just want to make sure we are getting credit for what we did do, not what we didn't.

Hanging Gardens

2011-01-11T08:20:00.007-05:00

Its like the North End of Cathedral, but tilted up side down. They are both on the far right, in shady little, protected nooks that you have to walk right past on your way down from most routes at the crag. As a guide who spends a lot of his winter days cragging on the world class ice at Frankenstein, you tend to know know the conditions at the Hanging Gardens intimately; seeing the wild daggers and pillars that form here after every trip up Standard or Dracula.

I've been busy guiding over the past two weeks, and have been watching this one pillar grow, and grow and... It just looks really cool, coming out of a Jared Ogden route called Something About You Makes Me Wild, begging for an ascent that ended on a massive free hanger on the top of Joe Josephson's hard classic, Within Reason.

My wife Anne is making a short film with local ice climber, alpinist and all around great guy, Kevin Mahoney. Kevin keeps pulling the right size straw when it comes time to leading the goods this season, the next time I loose rock paper scissors I'm gonna have to throw some elbows and grab the rack first and go!

Anyway, courtesy of Anne Skidmore Photography, here are some stills pulled from yesterday's footage. Enjoy! See more of Anne's outdoor photography at AnneSkidmore.com and anneskidmore.blogspot.com.

It's all Coming Back Around, Sort of..

2011-01-11T07:47:00.005-05:00

Not quite sure how, but all the ice I've seen over the past week up in Crawford Notch has come back around. All the usual stuff is good to go at Frankenstein, including most of the sunny and high water volume routes routes in the amphitheater that got really hammered over the New Year (with the exception of the regular, pillar finish on Pegasus). This past Sunday, I went into the amphitheater for the first time since the melt out with a couple of great clients and did the direct finish to Chia, which I was pleased to find in great condition; including a newly reattached top out. Chia had looked pretty bad since those warm, muddy days around the 1st of the month.

Everything at Texaco, from the amphitheater over to Embargo is growing, something I just can't quite account for because the dry ground doesn't look like it should be capable of feeding anything other than squirrels and turkeys. I have heard from north country local, Paul Cormier, a reliable source if there ever was one, that things were looking really good up in Grafton Notch as well. Lake Willoughby looks to be pretty fat from some photos posted on NEIce recently, so it seems that things are looking good, you just have to get into, or north of, the mountains to enjoy it. Cathedral Ledge is pretty bleak, with the exception of the North End, which can somehow hold ice in it's shadey grip through any mid-winter thaw, and often later than I would like into the spring.

We have up tp 8" of snow forecasted for the valleys in NH on Wednesday, more in the mountains, followed by good, cold temps; so I see a good outlook for continued ice climbing conditions' improvements. Great news, I would love to get some climbing in at Cathedral.

This just in: Eric McCallister, of McCallister Photo, reported doing Remission on Cathedral Ledge this past weekend with Jim Ewing and found it "surprisingly good and wet". He also mentioned that Repentance was not in good shape, calling it, "brittle", "dry" and making it sound scary, a conclusion I have heard repeated a few times in the last few weeks.

Use Your Beater Crampons This Week

2011-01-05T06:50:00.006-05:00

I hope somebody out there has been climbing. Between Christmas traveling and some great friends' wedding, Janet Bergman's and Freddie Wilkinson's, I'm feeling like a slob and I'm wishing for snow.

It's a little grim in the NH mountains right now, I'd post a picture but my camera got wrecked at Freddie's bachelor party. The ice got pretty hammered over the mini-mud season that just passed, and it must have rained up in the notches cause the ground is brown. What ice is left though is coming back around and the water seems to still be running. Much of the ice that looks bad has rebonded to the wall since it cooled down. It's 17 degrees in North Conway this morning with mountain snow in the forecast for today and tomorrow. Temps forecasted to be in the upper 20's during the day and the teens at night will make for a good temperature swing to keep the ice growing, just as long as we can keep pulling moisture out of the dry ground.

There's ice to climb, just be careful getting around on the frozen gravel with all those leaves stuck to your crampons!

Pole Dance

2010-12-19T12:28:00.012-05:00

Click to enlarge.

Pole Dance, NEI 5-ish, gains the attractive pillar

hanging over the roof in the upper right of the photo.

Kevin Mahoney lead the business on the first ascent

on December 17th.

After an exciting afternoon on the ground dodging missiles in the south facing sun, Poledance went down. This new route at Frankenstein is right of the Bragg-Pheasant in a spot I had never seen any real ice before. The oblique afternoon sun cooled things off and we went for it. We all had a chance to lead the easy first pitch, but it was Kevin Mahoney's turn when we finally had a chance to do the pitch that mattered.

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What looked like M7 from the ground revealed itself to be NEI 5 or 5+ up and out a corner/roof and onto a hanging pillar, or pole - the route's namesake. Classy swings into an iced up crack, a good stance right where it mattered and a beautiful upper tube of bubbling, blobby steeper-than-it-looked ice climbing made this thing really fun to climb. I would say, "go and do it", but two days of sun and temps hovering around the freezing mark must have taken a toll.

Fun to break a streak of early season, getting-it-back-together shenanigans on a great new route with two great friends. Here are some shots of Matt McCormick following the business, and one of me up on the route's upper "pole".

Read the full account at MattMccormickClimbing.blogspot.com.

White Mountain Conditions

2010-12-19T06:48:00.009-05:00

All that rain did some good things up in the notches here in NH. The rare formers are super fat, while the more reliable routes at Frankenstein are suffering from too much water, and are undermined by the massive flow. This week's forecast of moderate temps hovering around the freezing mark will be great for shady routes, especially higher up where there is still some snow on the ground. I wouldn't expect too much of anything in the sun.

Here are some shots.

Frankenstein's south face.

Standard to Dracula, Frankenstein.

Close up of, from the left and in the sun, Dropline, Last Exit, Welcome to the Machine.

Snotcicle.

Elephant Head Gully

South Face of Mt. Willard

Diagonal and Mordor, Cathedral Ledge.

What's Happening

2010-12-06T19:06:00.002-05:00

I couldn't get a good read on what was going on with the ice up in the Notches so Elliot Gaddy and I decided to go check it out, and burn off the previous night's birthday party haze while we were at it. I hadn't expected much, but was surprised to see even less; there was almost no substantial ice at Frankenstein. There was snow on the ground, but nothing just south of the Frankenstein turn off. Should have gotten plenty today, though.

Instead we took a run up Shoestring Gully on Mt Webster and had fun swinging the tools into the sticky, fresh stuff. The right had finish, up a three foot wide runnel, was in great shape.

It seems to me that by next weekend there will be plenty to climb in the White Mountains, and judging by some shots of Lake Willoughby I saw today on NEIce it looks like it'll be good to go in no time.

November Rain

2010-11-08T09:30:00.011-05:00

Early season drips on Cannon Cliff.

This is the time of year when climbers go from dismissing horrible weather by saying, "we've got the water, now all we need is the cold," to embracing it as we scramble to find a partner for a last second predawn start in the season's first sub-freezing temps. With all the holiday obligations we have this time of year, finding the time to get in some early season climbing can be really difficult, especially with the short warning typical of the changing seasons. The reward for the observant and flexible ice climber, though, can be some of the season's most interesting climbing, right when you're the least used to it.

Bayard on an unfinished early season stratch-fest on Cannon.

Cannon Cliff is where quite a few seasoned New England climbers' eyes turn this time of year; waiting for just that sort of weather pattern that disgusts most people, late fall rain. Not just any rain though, the kind that gets followed by a ferocious clearing wind and falling temps. The flash freeze. Cannon gets "locked up" in January's persistent cold, but in December it is still in transition, and long, hard-to-get-to drips can be the result, dangling up high over some obscure overlap above the Big Wall, off to the side of Omega or over the Old Man's dog.

Smaller, but subject to the same effects of bad early season weather is the cliff above Greely Ponds in NH's Mad River Notch; most well known for hosting The Drool of the Beast. It has been a productive, mostly single pitch, Cannon-esque, traditional mixed crag; complete with yellow drippy ice and requisite pin placements. One wall in particular, shown below, now has a couple of interesting routes, put up on the lead, still with a little more potential for bolt-free, back country, mixed routes.

Peter Doucette getting the ball rolling on Doghouse, M7. Visible on the left side of the roofs
is the prominent overhanging corner of Kevin Mahoney's Ironclad Reactor, missing it's icicle.

Kevin on the FA of Ironclad Reactor, M7+.

Peter up high on the Doghouse. We finished up the hanging
icicle above, a fixed pin now protects those final moves.

Both of these routes, and a third called the Drool of the Bitch, M6+R (Wilkinson/Russell/Mahoney), haven't seen a second ascent. Probably the same is true of a route or two on the east side of the ponds reportedly established by Joe Terrevechia.

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After the early season spasm of winter's first freezes, the most jaded of ice climbers quietly retire to indoor workouts and plans of trips to the south rock climbing. It is the interesting thin fresh ice that won't survive January's cold sublimation that parallels that rare individuals motivation. This recent spate of cold temps has me thinking we're almost to it's beginning.

Spring

2010-06-01T08:36:00.049-04:00

I packed up the computer with my ice tools and just found it again, buried under a stack of bills. It's been a busy spring, though, full of wedding planning, rock climbing and a little work here and there. Here's the fun stuff.

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The first trip of the season was down to the east side of the Sea of Cortez, to Guaymas, Mexico for our friends James and Marcia's wedding. The 12 piece mariachi band was a hit with the gringos.

After the festivities Anne and I were able to get some climbing in, in Cochise Stronghold, outside of Tuscon, AZ. One of the most easily accessible cliffs is a beautiful formation called Sheep's Head. The classic 7 pitch, 5.9, Absinthe of Malice goes right up a prominent buttress visible from miles away (just left of the thin shade line that runs from bottom to summit on the tallest formation in the photo, right above the horses).

The second trip of the season was down to the Red River Gorge, which is the perfect segue from ice climbing to rock climbing: it's steep, but the holds are good. Check my fiance Anne Skidmore's Bivuac Blog out for some great shots from the trip. After ten days there, staying in a house with a posse of 10 mostly from the Conway area, we rolled to the New and had a blast on the more technical, and unforgiving routes on the rugged Nuttal sandstone with our own personal local tour guide, Pat Goodman. We all really enjoyed the warm community in Fayetteville, very reminiscent of home.

A return to the climbing in New Hampshire is always exciting after a great trip, and the motivation is usually up. Promptly after getting back my friend Eric Eisle got me out to a cliff west of his beloved Berlin, and not Mt Forist. It's called Square Mountain, one of three "Squares" in the White Mountains, and it's way back in the Kilkenny Range. He had the 1 1/2 hour approach sussed and we marched right out there, taking a compass bearing from a small clearing for the final approach.

We got out there and repeated a two pitch 5.10 which had a good, steep, wide crack on the first pitch and rappelled off. Taking a walk at the base we spied a line that looked an awful lot like Cathedral Ledge's Mordor Roof. An old 5.8 approach pitch, complete with 1/4" bolts, got us to a great belay under the 6 foot roof, where I tipped-toed out to a hand jam over the lip, almost. My second try got me over the roof and into a perfectly clean, unclimbed 70m crack system! I belayed at a good ledge and Eric led the final 60m of 5.9 crack climbing, though some great features, corners and overlaps, to the top. Check out his blog, The Last Print Journalist, for more on the route and, more importantly, in-depth discussions of the life and politics north of New Hampshire's notches.

Taken from Eric Eisle's blog, lastprintjournalist.com.

Eric at the first belay on The Pikey, Square Mountain, NH

The next project of the spring was out at Owl's Cliff, another confusing name shared by multiple NH crags. This one is above Sawyer Pond, off the Kanc. Ray Rice and I tromped out there to find Brady Libby's single pitch crack climb that was rumured to be stellar.

Ray Rice on a slightly wet Crack of the Future, Brady Libby's stellar 5.12 crack.

It took me three trips out the 4.7 miles of mountain biking and hiking to finally send this dead vertical finger crack and face climb. This pitch is one of the best in NH.

Most recently, I just got back from a week in the Gunks, staying with and being shown around by local guide and friend Ryan Stefiuk. Check out his website at bigfootmountainguides.com for Catskill ice climbing beta, how to make your own fruit boots and a variety of other stuff including a recent big day on Cannon Cliff. Most memorable was doing Fat City Direct, 5.10d, at the Near Trapps, it completely blew my mind. While climbing it I could have sworn, continously, for about twenty feet, that the next move would be 5.12. It never was though. What an amazing pitch on an incredible route, on of my all time favorites.

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I'm back home on the first rainy day in over a week getting caught up with details, which include getting a suit picked out for my August wedding. Here's to good weather.

Another Square

2010-04-16T17:09:00.011-04:00

In my experience all the good granite in New Hampshire is close to the road, and I've spent quite a few hours testing that theory. Its not always the case, but most of the back woods cliffs just don't come together the way Cathedral or Cannon do. Their too blocky, too rotten, its always something.

My friend Eric Eisle told us to look across from Success where we were camping toward the Kilkenny range north and west of Berlin. There was a cliff over there I was familiar with from tight topo lines on the map. It looked like Cathedral just as he had claimed. And although it was hard to tell from about 15 miles away, it seemed clean..

I do enjoy hacking around the woods, especially up north were the spruce and fir conceal partridge and the moose droppings are deep, so when Eric said he was heading out there last week I took an extra day off from the two week climbing trip I had just taken and met him early. He had the approach sussed from an earlier recon trip, a huge advantage cause all I had to do was fall in line behind him for the hour and a half approach.

The cliff wasn't quite the dead vertical dream Eric had pitched it as, but I had been taking it all with a grain of salt and it really did look pretty good. He had a line in mind already, right up the profile you would see from Berlin, and he lead a good pitch up a wide crack to get us started. I could could hear a little disappointment in his voice when I yelled down to him about ancient looking rappel anchor on the second 70m pitch. We topped out and established the rappel line we would use again later that day.

Once on the ground we walked further west along the cliff to see what there was to see, and I quickly became convinced of the line to do. It had slabby, but featured first pitch, with an old 1/4" bolt visible from the ground, followed by a 6 foot roof that a hand crack made it just down to the lip of before blasting off, seemingly to the top of the cliff another 70m away.

Eric lead a slightly dirty, wandering and run-out Conway style 5.8 slab pitch up to a good ledge under the roof and got in a gear anchor. We reconvened below the roof I took a stab at a direct line and settled for a traverse left to the obvious crack system we had seen below that ran straight up to the trees. We fiddled around a bit figuring how to do the traverse, high or low, and I eventually crab crawled below the roof, back cleaning cams to straighted out the rope which had a few bends to make make still. Feeling like was at Cathedral Ledge, poking gear into the Mordor Roof, I eventually got something to stick and almost pulled the 5.11 hump up and over the lip until tight hand jam popped. Next go I settled into a better jam and was able to pull some surprisingly gymnastic trad climbing to get settled into a perfect, but sharp, clean hand crack. Another 30 feet of perfect hand jams got me settled into a belay stance with a good another gear anchor.

From here Eric lead a 70m 5.9-ish crack pitch that involved all sorts of minor obstacles from face moves between systems, a corner, overlaps and the occasional pocket when the crack would peter out for a bit.

We rapped down the rappel line we had established earlier, getting a core shot right in the middle of my brand new rope as it scraped over the edge of a ledge on the rappels.

Eric did a great job hitting the end of the flagging tape which marked the trail we had taken in, across half a mile against the grain of brooks and terrain. From there it was a almost a simple slog, except for the beaver flooded section of old woods road which wanted a pair of rubber boots, great grass hummock hopping skills of a lack of concern. Back at the car, still a light to spare I marveled at how well the day had gone. Thanks to Eric's earlier recon we scooted right out to the cliff, climbed two routes, one with two new pitches of clean crack climbing, at an interested grade, ground up with the same rack I would take for an after work cragging session on Cathedral's well worn routes. It was truly a rare opportunity.

Snake Mountain, Vermont

2010-03-04T07:55:00.016-05:00

Doing the second ascent of a burly little Snake Mountain rig, Fang Shui.

Photo by Josh Worley.

There is this thing happening over in the up-side-down state. After driving past this cliff on their way to the Daks for years, huge icicles just hanging there, climbers, especially Josh Worley, started poking around up there, power drill at the ready. What they found has changed the way good wholesome Vermont boys are introduced to winter climbing. Lake Willoughby? May as well be in New Hampshire (I concur), these guys are climbing M10 before they ever chug up a WI 5 column and strap themselves into a screw belay. This phenomena has been on display at the MWV Ice Fest's dry tool comp, held annually in North Conway - most of the contestants are employed at the Outdoor Gear Exchange in Burlington, Josh Worley's recruiting ground for the dark arts of upside down mixed climbing. Pounding pins, and grabbing turf shots? Why bother when you can sip a latte bought in town while cruising through the Iowa like fields of the Champlain Valley on your way to your own personal mixed crag, complete with fixed draws on every route? Winter climbing now follows summer's lead west of the Connecticut River; instead of scaring the shit out of yourself learning to trad climb and ice climb, you can get as strong as a bull first and then slip into ice climbing and traditional mixed climbing (when it feels like a warm-up). Snake Mountain: the new gateway drug?

Note: I should be clear, all the developers over at Snake are hardmen who have put their time in freezing their asses off at places like Lake Willuoghby, and crankin hard rock routes in the summer time. I just love the opportunity thats afforded the new generation in the Champlain Valley by the proximity of a world class mixed crag, but not mich local ice. I probably should have written the above in the future tense.

Bayard on Solid Gold, an excellent Josh Worley route on great limestone.

Photo by Ray Rice.

The man, Ray Rice, on one of the best, and truly mixed, mixed routes you could find anywhere, Matt McCormick's Paradigm Shift.

Josh Worley checking out the moves on a great looking new line.

Paradigm Shift's upper icicle, not shown is the 50' of vertical ice above.

Photos of February

2010-02-22T09:40:00.006-05:00

Tim Keenan on the Unemployment Line, M9, Madison, NH

Lion's Head on a beautiful day.

Bayard onsighting Something About You Makes Me Wild, M8, Frankenstein. Steve House photo.

Ice Fest to mid February in Nothing Flat

2010-02-18T07:50:00.010-05:00

This happened to me last year too, February came, the MWV Ice Fest soon followed and the next thing I know its almost March.

After a great start to the climbing season, I've been taking it easy, guiding and resting some. The Ice Fest was a blast, with an estimated 300+ people attending the Steve House slide show/Face Off at the Cranmore wall. Steve's show focused on personal growth and partnerships and even included a public declaration of man love for his climbing partner, Vince Anderson. I love that sorta stuff. Steve rounded out his visit by soloing both Repentance and Remission before 11:00am Monday; one of only a handful of solos of Repentance and Remission's first ever. An impressive and bold feat that was harder on the man than he expected. Keep your eye out for Jim Surette's video of the ropeless climb, it's an incredible piece of north east history and we're lucky to have it for posterity.

The Face off was a success with participation ballooning from last year's handfull to 16 competitors. The Vermont sporto mixed climbing scene is largely responsible, with a whole host of young guys hitting it hard over at Snake Mountain, just south of Burlington, and getting good at this esoteric offshoot of something climbing related. I hear there were some strong showings, but could only hear the crowd blow up and the occasional thunk of a tool into the Ice-Holdz from the behind the scenes where they had the competitors in isolation, playing basketball.

Jim Ewing did a great job setting the route. I was the only participant to get to the top, although others got damn close, and was rewarded $100 and a down OR vest. Whit Magro came in second and also received another OR piece, an Alibi jacket. Thanks to OR for donated the prizes. We had a blast the whole weekend, a huge thanks to Anne Skidmore, Sarah Garlick, Rick Wilcox and Brad White for throwing one hell of a party. Great job!

Looking forward to seeing what next year offers..

See some great photos from the weekend here.

The Bossman

2010-01-21T10:33:00.073-05:00

The Bossman, M9, High Falls Crag,

Adirondacks, NY. NEice.com photo.

Matt McCormick and I hemmed and hawed a bit, looked at some other options, but couldn't resist trying the line. Some good climbers had been up there, and they definitely cast a shadow, but what the heck, you can always go down, right?

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I whined a little bit starting the first pitch, on unbonded thin ice, but pounded a specter hook in some turf and muckled up onto a ledge anyway. The other folks who had tried this route had all taken a right hand chimney/corner system, but the second pitch's crack we wanted to climb begun here, down low on the first. Matt and Steve House, who had been up here a few days before, had rapped over this unclimbed section and said there was gear. With that in mind I cautiously started up and found plenty of protection, some mungy, but it kept coming. The climbing was good too, thin ice, pick cracks, turf shots and steep for this kind of climbing; at one point maybe just past vertical. Things were melting though, including the turf - a clump of which blew out as I was making the crux move, leaving me dangling from the rope after a clean, short fall. "Damn," I thought, and finished the pitch.

Matt following the first pitch.

Matt followed, and we figured the pitch was about M7, well protected and a classy example of typically scrappy Adirondacks mixed climbing.

Now, however, we were below the business. I had reinforced the belay of two knifeblades, one not very good, with three more shitty pins, and felt good about strength in numbers. When I first got there water was only dripping from the outside of the icicle above, and I could lean inside to stay dry. This worked well for a while, but as Matt was putting in the work, finding the bomber gear and figuring out the hard moves, it began to drip from all over. Soon there was nowhere to hide. By the time he had it fully sussed and had done the crux move, he had been hard at work for an hour and a half. Tired, Matt lowered off he asked if I wanted to try. "No." was my emphatic response, wringing out the cuffs of my belay jacket.

Matt putting in the good work on pitch 2.

But, I quickly realized my error, pulled the ropes and tied in. Long, kinda dynamic moves are natural for me, so I was optimistic, and after watching Matt I knew where all the holds were. I got the gear Matt placed clipped, and down-climbed to the ledge. After a short break I got back up, hitting the hard move first go; a long reach to a tiny but positive hook with bad feet. A couple of more thin hooks, with worse feet, and I was looking at a sideways jab at the hanging curtain. I took a whack, a low percentage sideways swing, and my tool stuck in the soft ice. "Shit," I thought, "I'm in."

The ice climbing above was strenuous, but forgiving due to the temps, and very wet. After pulling one more hanging icicle I eventually found a good place to belay off right; tied to a wobbly cedar and a couple of small cams. Matt followed as twilight begun to settle in. From my perch I could see the final icicle above and off to my left, and I really wanted to finish up it - for the proud line and a third and final new pitch. I havn't had the chance to climb with Matt alot, and I knew that not a lot of people would have gotten excited about this prospect, but McCormick was all over it - despite the impending darkness and being completely soaked from his belay session. He squirmed through a tiny gap behind the icicle, chopping his way through until he was able to swing into the intimidating dangler. He managing to sneak in some good gear before topping out and bushwhacked into the cedar to find a good anchor. The pitch, while short, is memorable. One 70m rappel deposited us at our packs, in the dark.

We had some fun, laughed a lot and never expected much from the day. Sometimes that works out the best. I'm looking forward to some more adventures with this guy.

Check out more at Alpinist.com, and NEice.com.

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This section of the High Falls Crag, in the Adirondacks' Wilmington Notch, has a short, but interesting history. The corner systems right of the ice were first attempted by the prolific, and entertaining, Joe Szot with partner Will Mayo.Then it sat for a few years until Quebecois LP Menard and Maxime Turguon went up there on the recommendation of the Adirondacks' main man, Matt Horner. They got up the first pitch and tried to add a second, but bailed after a fall. Matt Horner decided he better have a look and finished the Canadians' second pitch, but headed down below the top, he told us. Inspired, Matt McCormick and Steve House went up there the Thursday before this year's Mountain Fest, this time trying a new and direct second pitch; up an overhanging and improbable looking seam. Steve approached it in incredible style, Matt reported, fiddling in tiny gear and going for it. He eventually fell and blew a piece, and zippered the rest - except the one that caught him, a small wire. After three more falls they opted for Horner's original second pitch and added a final one as well, topping out twenty feet right of what would become the Bossman's final icicle, thinking the line was about M6.

The Tuesday after the Mountain Fest Matt McCormick and I had a chance to head up there. We added a direct first pitch, with some effort lead Steve's second pitch clean, and added a direct third pitch up the final icicle. I just wish I hadn't blown out of a turf shot on the first pitch!

Cocaine and Strippers?

2010-01-13T17:50:00.027-05:00

When this line, next to Cocaine,
came in this season at Frankenstein,
it already had a name.

My buddy Steve used to always say, "Strippers love cocaine, man. Its not their fault, they're just strippers!"

He would know, he moved to L.A. to live with one that he met on his credit card company's customer service line.

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Josh Hurst and I humped the whole kit up the hill, and got to work. The route looked beautiful, fatter than I had ever seen it, and I had taken that hike a few times before with my eye on this usually sunbaked and poorly formed, hanging tube. Guiding the previous week, I had seen what might be a good start to the main icicle, connecting blobs and smaller hangers coming in from the right. On closer inspection last Saturday morning it looked like the way to go.

Drilling away. Josh Hurst photo.

I headed up and drilled the first bolt, hanging off a good tool in an icy crack. Josh got in the next, off a bad cam, and I aided up a blade crack high enough to get in the third, to protect the transition onto the ice. Most of the day gone at that point, I headed up on the lead, firing the initial sequence of overhanging mixed climbing, feet on crumbly rock, and tools in little blobs of ice. The transition to the coveted column was so classy that afternoon. The sun had been just strong enough to soften up the surface, making for some great ice climbing.

Good mixed climbing down low. Josh Hurst photo.

The daylight dwindled as I tried to figure a way through the roof above, and we decided to come back in the morning and have a closer look.

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The next day we climbed up Cocaine and rappelled over the, soon-to-be, Strippers roof to check it out from above. Convinced of the proper path, and it's thuggishness, we headed for the ground to give it a go. I was feeling lousy and popped off down low a time or two, and just couldn't muster the mojo to really go for it up high where it counted; pulling the roof through one of its offerings, a small nut crack which turns into a slightly vegetated seam. I did get fired up though when Josh took over and sent the pitch on is first go of the day - it was impressive, the final roof suiting his style of climbing - extra burly pull-ups.

Josh Hurst about to fire the FA of Strippers.

I headed up next, and popped out of the roof. After lowering to a good ledge atop the ice I tried again, this time hanging on through the powerful sequence. Above the roof I was forced to remember what a good climber Josh is, as I performed the mandatory turf-shot-mantle, on bad feet, above a spooky fall.

Nice work Josh!

Check out more at Alpinist.com and NEice.com.

The Painted Wall Icicle, part II

2010-01-07T16:16:00.025-05:00

The Painted Wall Icicle M9 NEI 5+,
in unusually fat condition. Peter Doucette following.

"I had this little feeling, and started back aiding away from the ice. Then I heard that noise, you know, that sound, and saw what I thought was a little chunk falling. But it was the whole second pitch," my friend Josh Hurst related to me after an unexpectedly sunny day at the south facing Painted Wall, trying for the second ascent of the cliff's now infamous icicle. "It was like getting passed by a tractor trailer!"

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Luckily, a couple of days before, the high clouds that had persistently been lingering over the White Mountains all weekend held their ground. A longer than usual ski out to the Painted Wall, due to some bridge work crossing the Swift River, worked me over. We had come loaded for bear, all the usual winter kit, plus extra tools and even a drill. But when we got there it was all forgotten. The ice looked amazing.

My phone had been ringing all weekend while I was out guiding, "Man, I saw a picture of your route on the web, you been on it yet?", "I drove past the Painted Wall, that icicle is huge!". Tuesday came, my first day off, and the posse had grown to four people, Doug Madara, Kevin Mahoney and Peter Doucette and me. We all trudged out there together.

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Some thin moves down low on the first pitch. Kevin Mahoney photo.

It all went really smooth. After a warm up hanging the draws, I got on the wall, breathed more than my usual share of O2, and fired the first pitch; this year grabbing soft ice well below where I had ever seen it before.

Approaching the ice on the first pitch. Kevin Mahoney photo.

Now, back at my previous highpoint, clipped to the bolted anchor on the ice ledge, I was back in a familiar position; confronted by the prospect of leading some really intimidating, steep-ass ice. This year though it was huge, the ice was soft and I had a three man cheer-leading crew. They tagged me up the necessary gear for the ice pitch above and Kevin followed the M9 pitch below, still learning the moves himself.

Peter Doucette photo.

Up I went. What a pitch of ice climbing that was, forced out early onto the front side of the icicle, there was nothing to do but plug away, way up and out over the Swift River valley. The ice was featured and the column, that just below dropped away into space, was bonded and solid.

Peter Doucette photo.

I topped out and everyone got a chance to follow, which was humorous to say the least; like a steep, cold, hard version of Thin Air on a busy summer Saturday.

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We had gotten unbelievably lucky with our timing, the next day the south facing cliff baked in the sun and the icicle fractured below the belay ledge. The following day, despite a forecast for clouds, the sun came out again catching Eric McCallister and Josh Hurst off guard. With Josh clipped to a bolt just feet away from the sixty foot, unsupported column that is the second pitch, he watched it just slipped away, and crash to the ground.

Check out more at Climbing.com, NEice.com and Alpinist.com.

Not Yet...

2009-12-02T19:39:00.005-05:00

Looks like a slow start this ice season, but warm temps, some rain and a good amount of sun have been great for late season yard work. We'll just have to consider tonight's forecast, a blast of wind and 1-2 inches of rain, money in the bank. Its supposed to begin to cool down over the next few days - maybe even some snow over the weekend and early next week.

I'm beginning to hope for my early season favorite, a good old fashioned rainstorm and a cold snap - the formula for the best adventure around. We'll see if it gets cold enough to make Cannon go off, then I'll see if I can find my crampons. That first early morning mission to scrape around in the cold after scrambling all night to put together a full winter kit is priceless. All the annoyances are quickly forgotten at first light on a clear morning. Especially a first light that reveals long, thin drips of yellow, twisted Cannon ice where you had been debating there might be. It often reveals something that makes for a change of plan, sometimes even a change of venue.

I've admired Cannon's medieval, green masonry from random belays all over the cliff. Sometimes those long, cold belays were enough to make me promise to quit climbing and ponder getting a real job. But it never took much; a sip of tea, a look from a partner, or the sudden shift to an engaging lead to straighten out those misguided thoughts. Each December unknown drips, torquing picks, turf shots, pitons, bright cold moons and pitch black drives across the Kanc reenergize and refresh me. If its not this one, maybe the next storm.

What's Next?

2009-11-18T07:13:00.008-05:00

There is a taste of winter on these cold, clear mornings, only to be erased by the 50 degree sun come afternoon. Its the perfect time for late season rock climbing; getting tucked away at a south facing crag and enjoying the relative quiet in the low, direct sun.

I can't remember a year when there hasn't been some good ice climbing in December, although it seems unimaginable right now, but a shift of just a few degrees and, boom - put away the chalk bag and find the v-thread tool.

Here's some shots to help get psyche up...

Cathedral Ledge

Snow for sloggin'

Toko Crag

The Laughing Lion

2009-07-30T11:32:00.019-04:00

The second pitches and up.

The routes are from left to right:

Unamed 5.11c, FA Ray Rice, sport

Mane Line 5.11d, FA Bob Parrot, mixed gear, four pitches

Unamed 5.11d, FA Ray Rice, sport

Rainbow Route 5.11d, FA Bayard Russell, Maddog Drummond, Chris Bassett, mixed gear, three pitches

Unamed 5.11a, equiped by Bob Parrot, FA probably Bayard Russell, Freddie Wilkinson and Maddog Drummond, mixed gear

Acid Wall 5.12d/13a?, FA Bayard Russell, sport, three pitches

Unamed 5.12c, FA Bayard Russell, equiped by Dave Sharrat, mixed gear

Oracular Vulva aka Whiteboy 5.13a FA Dave Sharrat, equipped by Bayard Russell, sport

The Pitchfork 5.9 R, FA Ray Rice, trad

Far, Far Away 5.11c, FA Bayard Russell, sport

Lazy Boy 5.11a/12a, FA Ray Rice

The First Day of Summer

2009-07-29T08:46:00.007-04:00

Summer is finally here. Wow, what a wet, nasty - well anyway way, no news there. The sun came out yesterday and I realized how much I missed the hot, humid, go-jump-in-the-river kind of summer day I normally spend July and August complaining about. Sweat hoggin', it burns the gunk out.

All the wetness has lingered around my forested home. I've been whacking back the underbrush and scraggly hemlocks that clog up the air, looking for some elbow room and some sunlight to dry up the dankness. I knew yesterday was different from the minute I pulled open my underwear drawer in the morning and its swollen wood didn't offer up a fight. The sun dried everything up in the yard, too.

All this coincides with the beginning of "Lion season". Its like big game hunting, but without the danger - all the bolts we placed make sure of that. At the height of land in Evan's Notch sits the four pitch Laughing Lion, on the eastern slope of East Royce Mountain. Due to a family of peregrine falcons the cliff stays closed through the spring and most of the summer.

This year they had successful mating season and we got up there before the usual August 1st cut off. And what a treat. At roughly 2000' it stays fairly cool, and with this south westerly flow a breeze snuck around the corner of the east facing cliff. A pitch off the ground and the overhanging wall was dry and the sharp edges felt crisp. The peregrines put on an ariel show including a tumbling fight over some carcass's thigh. They were repeatedly flying into a protected nook, forty feet from our belay, completely ignoring us, and pulling out animal parts, all the while screeching with their shrill call that proves to me they are the direct descendants of pterodactyls.

Ray had put up a new pitch up there that I hadn't had a chance to try - and it was a beautiful. Typical Laughing Lion technical, gently overhanging face climbing with all the requisite exposure and excellent friction. The mutlipitch cliff has really become a climbing area and I'm looking forward to sharing it this fall.

The Other Side of the Coin

2009-06-09T07:51:00.012-04:00

Every time something happens around Cathedral, something major, like the recent retro-bolting of Thin Air and its subsequent chopping, I find myself climbing there more often. There is a need to look after the cliff, to see whose around and what's going on. I may solo Thin Air when I would normally go up Fun House, or just go cragging there when I might otherwise go work on my latest sport climbing project or new route. Events like this, while divisive on the local website, bring large parts of the community here closer together. Most of my good friends, whether 23 or 60, are people that I see at the cliff after work, on the weekends, on a Tuesday. They own the cars I recognize that are parked in front of the kiosk in the dirt. They are the people I spend my free time with, I will invite to my wedding and share a rope with, and for the most part we all have very similar opinions about what the future of style on Cathedral Ledge should be.

In an ideal world, I would love to see every retrobolt on Cathedral and Whitehorse removed, but I realize that's unreasonable. So we, the elitist locals (as we are often referred to on the local website), pick and choose our battles, and Thin Air is the obvious choice. Before I chopped four bolts on it in 2003 its sorry state was used as an excuse for retrobolting other routes, "Look at Thin Air, its got bolted cracks all over it, fuck it, North Conway doesn't have any ethics anymore". For almost six years the bolts stayed away, and with a lot of quiet support from the local community, making the point that this is a climbing area where you can actually learn to climb traditionally, practice the skills and then go to the mountains having a clue. It was an uncomfortable silence though, one which no one thought would actually last after the pendulum swung the other way for so long. Then, one day this spring, it was over. The bolts on the so called pedestal belay reappeared, and they reappeared in a manner more typical of a Ken Nicols style bolt chopping, quietly and without any ownership of the action.

It was a sad day for me when the anchor reappeared. In our little community of Cathedral climbers, those ones with the cars I recognize, the frustration built up quickly. No. There is simply too much pressure on the cliff from its proximity to Rumney. Convenience has become expected, people can't even be bothered to take their gear home with them at the end of a day. In this sport climbing world, all we are looking for is a little niche where protection skills are a part of climbing. A place in a state park in North Conway, NH where climbing is not just about gymnastics. What we are asking for is actually pretty reasonable, especially on the granite crags in the White Mountains, let the perogative of the first ascencionsit stand. Let that person choose how to establish the route and then let it be. If we're talking about a sport route, whatever, but on a granite route, established at least in part as a trad route, let it exist as such. The gear might be a bit sketchy, but so what, climbing doesn't have to be all about movement and safety. There are plenty, plenty of safe places to climb. Let the mental challenges of protection and its associated skills have a place to flourish. That is why New England climbers do so well in the mountains and in other climbing areas, we have a variety of climbing skills - variety is an asset.

I have drilled hundreds of bolts on new routes all over the White Mountains, I have chopped quite a few retrobolts too. In Britian they have a well known ethic concerning the gritstone, no bolts. That works for them, but they have tiny cliffs and need to perserve their adventure. Our cliffs are lot a bigger and we have a long history of using bolts. A history that no one, but maybe Henry Barber, has a contention with. With the exception of one unfortunate and isolated incident at Crack in the Woods, that, in hindsite, even the chopper admits wasn't a great idea, no one is talking about chopping other people's routes. Its not even on the table. The only problem anyone up here has with bolts is with the ones that appear on established climbs. Thats it, its simple. If the established routes are left alone, those of us who have chopped bolts in the past and would in the future, are happier to just go climbing.

Quiet Cliffs, Turkey Hunting and Black Flies

2009-05-17T06:52:00.010-04:00

Early spring, right until the black flies swarm in early May, is probably my favorite time of year for rock climbing. The winter season gives all the tendons in my fingers a chance to rest while the large muscle pulling of ice and mixed climbing leaves me feeling healthy. The psyche is high too, after months of gloved hands and belay jackets the simplicity of rock climbing is refreshing. After so much time sitting saturated in the absurdity of modern mixed climbing, rock climbing feels authentic and real.

Its been a great spring since then too. We've been quietly plugging away putting up new routes at an undisclosed location in western Maine, I shot a turkey on a beautiful morning with my father at our family place in Jaffrey, NH and the neighborhood here in Madison keeps growing as a couple of good friends finally bought a closeby farm, and stacked it with itinerant climbing bums.

The weather has been great, the black flies are only just now starting to get bad, and the forecast is still good. June is settling in and the next guiding season is approaching. Soon we'll be wrapping up a day of guiding with a dip in the Saco, cooling off before the evening cragging session at Cathedral.

John Henry: The Hammer Swinger

2009-03-06T19:25:00.056-05:00

Leaving the ice. Freddy Wilkinson photo.

When we started bolting routes in the quarry in Evan's Notch it was a free for all. In two days we had four mixed lines, all with substantial sections of ice climbing. No one was hurt, there aren't any plants to kill, and after the dust settled we had some great projects.

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To make a good mixed climb you don't need much more than a chossy overhang and a little dangling ice. Steep terrain is the important part. I've had visiting friends from out west tell me the overhanging choss we were climbing was really good compared to what they had at home, so its all what you're used to. But, when Ray Rice took Eliot Gaddy, Freddy Wilkinson and I out to this abandoned quarry in Evan's Notch I thought we might be on to something, and as it turned out, the Mica Mine, had some great choss.

It also has ice, so when we first rolled into the cave it didn't take long to put together the line that would become John Henry. There was a twenty five foot flow of shoulder wide grade 3+ ice in the back of the cave and a hanger at the lip, separated by twenty five feet horizontal dry tooling. There were other options too, and Ray Rice had already begun equipping one of the best, a hard M7 pitch that came to be called Gold Rush. A true mixed climb with an easy ice start, some mixed climbing around an amazing hanging blob and steep drytool moves out to a free hanger. One of the best pitches of the grade around, complete with a bit of up-side-down dangling.

The line that was to become John Henry was all dangling, and it took a few days of effort to finally to send, and an uncomfortable morning to equip. There is only one way to bolt such a steep route, from the ground up (and over, as the case may be). Me, an aider, a home-made daisy chain, my ice tools, my Bosch and a two hour belay from Freddie got most of the route equipped. Make a couple of hook moves hanging from your tools, drill a bolt, repeat. I aided as far as I could but the hooks ran out and my kidneys were bruised. After a break on flat ground, I jugged the fixed line up towards the hanger to drill the last bolt, feeling really nervous there wouldn't be any holds out there. There were, they were just hidden, and really far away.

Its a long way up.

Freddie WIlkinson photos.

Most of John Henry is fairly straight forward, positive drytooling; fluid and fun, right to the lip of the cave. Outside of the cave, the wall is about forty five degrees overhanging and there is body length section of blankness. Its a funny moment, dangling from a figure four at the end of the traverse of the concave roof, no where to put your feet and looking up to what seems like completely blank rock. The shallow hook you're hanging from, with the inside of your knee locked over your opposite wrist, is positive but not huge. There is nothing else to do but swing. With a bit of momentum, and lots of flailing learning the move, I could eventually grab it, a good positive hidden hook in a quartz pocket. The climbing isn't over yet, a couple of drytool moves followed by the thin ice of the hanger, but it definitely gets easier.

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John Henry is a great route to work, the climbing is fun and unique, it's in a beautiful, quiet cave. It's an ideal modern mixed route in that you begin on ice and drytool to some more ice. Hopefully, we'll continue to find good conditions at the Mica Mine. It takes a few years to develop a sense of what a crag needs to form, but this one has the right ingredients; its wet, dark and cold.

I'm not really sure of how hard the route is, New Hampshire routes of comparable difficulty are mostly in the dry Cathedral cave where I haven't spent a whole lot of time. Some well traveled hard man will have to swing by, onsight it and tell me what the grade actually is. I figure it to be somewhere in the M10-M11 range. Let me know.

The Mica Mine

Busy February

2009-02-27T12:04:00.024-05:00

The middle of February is when most of New England gets time off, and that's when we get really busy, and thankfully so! There have been a few days on Mt Washington and a bunch of days guiding around the ice crags of New Hampshire.

Eugene Kwan on Supergoofers, Cathdral Ledge, NH, NEI 5

Euegene on Dropline, Frankenstein Cliffs, NEI 5

Amos Beninga on an unnamed mixed route in Madison NH, M6-ish

Aurthor from Cincinatti ice bouldering on a beautiful day in Chamapney Falls

Its been a beautiful year. Right now the north facing routes are growing fatter with the current freeze-thaw cycle, but the sunny routes are starting to get blasted. The truly fun spring mountaineering and skiing season is just ahead, and Mt Washington has tons of snow. Should be a great spring of sunny sport climbing and skiing on the mountian, but winter is not over yet!

Love Diet

2009-02-03T16:17:00.023-05:00

Leading out on the second pitch of Love Diet.

Bob Baribeau's route, Love Diet, is incredible. All I know about the history is that he rope soloed the route in the mid 90's, but I can imagine it might have been a lonely day.

Love Diet is on a 350' seldom visited, beautiful and steep cliff called the Laughing Lion. The yellow drips that are the route's second pitch hang from the left side of a twenty five foot roof. It usually takes until January to come in. Unlike a route like Dropline, where ice bonds to a vertical wall, Love Diet drips off the edge of the roof, its water droplets free-fall over a hundred feet, building up a mushroomed pedestal and dozens of icicles. On some years a continuous line of ice develops, on many years not. The top of the second pitch overhangs its base.

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Its lucky we even got to the cliff that day. At 10:30 the night before, after what wasn't our first beer, Freddy Wilkinson and I hatched a plan to try the route. We were in the middle of a 20" snow storm and its a five mile ski out there, but that never really crossed our minds. The next morning, after digging out our respective houses, we got on the road at about a quarter to nine. After an hour's drive to the trial head, the first few miles of skiing went smoothly, thanks to a snow machine packed and groomed trail. Once away from the Ski-Doo trail though, the snow got deep. One of us would break trail, plunging knee deep on skis, while the other would hang back and have a snack. After a ten minute break you could catch up in two minutes only to take the lead. The usual two and a half hour approach took four hours.

Somewhere along the trail, where it had seemed especially bad, we had decided that we should call the outing a cardio work out and just try and get to the cliff. Josh Hurst and Ian Austin were coming out the next day, so at least they would have a good trail and somebody would have a chance to send the route. But, after a sandwich and some hot Tang, we got psyched.

Fred sent a variation to the first pitch, called Love Diet Direct, one of three excellent NEI 5+ pitches that are within fifty feet of each other, and the only one in good condition.

Freddy Wilkinson on the Remission part of Love Diet Direct.

The pitch is like climbing the Remission column right off the ground only to end up right in the middle of Repentance. He casually fired the candled and impossible to protect first twenty five feet of the pillar, chatting with me the whole time. When he got in the chimney I could hear him hooting with excitement over how good the pitch was.

By the time I got to the belay he had the next pitch all mapped out for me, or so we thought.

After pulling over an ice roof the climbing got dicey. It was the narrowest neck of the route, sunbaked and poorly bonded. If I hadn't seen gear past this section of a couple of body lengths I probably wouldn't have done it. But once past it, with some good rock gear in, the ice came back around and eventually I was able crawl into an ice cave big enough to stand in. This was an incredible position, half way out a huge roof, standing on a perfectly flat blob connected to the back side of an enormous icicle. Off to the right was nothing but air.

As I began to down climb to get back in position to finish the pitch, I could see higher up behind the enormous curtains of yellow ice. I noticed a good crack and what looked like a way to get out from higher up. After some wild climbing that sometimes resembled caving more than anything else, I found myself behind a pane of ice thirty feet higher. A few minutes of chopping and I was back out on the front side of the ice, way up high on the cliff with only fifteen feet of bombproof vertical ice between me and the trees.

Poking my head out the freshly chopped hole high on the route.

We got back to the base of the route as it got dark and had a horrific ski out in climbing boots with fifty pound packs in deep snow. It was a beautiful night, but it went unnoticed while I was buried in a bush up to my ears in powder, not able to get up. Luckily the guy who grooms the snow machine trail passed, and by the time we got to the height of land we only had to stand there and slide the remaining few miles back to the truck.

The Painted Wall Icicle

2009-01-22T08:29:00.001-05:00

Kevin Mahoney working the 100' of M9 drytooling up to the base of the ice.

People have been looking at this route for years and and it was a multi-party effort just to get up to the ice. Dave Moore and Jay Sterner were the first, they put in an aide route with the goal of eventually reaching the ice. They ended thier line at a hanging belay roughly half way. After some hairy aid climbing and a string of hand drilled bolts, the pair left behind a perfectly bolted stretch of rock climbing and drytooling up to a chain anchor. They didn't get out unscathed however, a RURP popped on Dave, and he took a twenty foot fall and seriously hurt his ankle, leaving Jay to carry out two backpacks while Dave slid out a couple of miles on his ass. They called their effort Borrowed Time.

Two seasons ago Doug Madara got the ball rolling again on trying to get up to the icicle. We had all been thinking about it, but it took someone like Doug to break the ice on this intimidating project. Eventually, Peter Doucette, Kevin Mahoney and I hauled a drill up to the Painted Wall to try and get all the way there. I aided and drytooled to the previous highpoint on Borrowed Time, then bolted the remaining unclimbed 50', aiding off ice tools, to gain the ice covered ledge at the base of the free hanging pillar, and installed an anchor.

A slew of people tried this first pitch as a mixed climb that season, but tricky sequences, small footholds, hidden holds and a deep pump kept us all from climbing the pitch with no falls. Last year the ice only briefly came in, and I don't think anyone had a chance to get on it, so when it formed this year Josh Hurst and I quickly headed out to give it a try. We had a great day in the sun, stayed relaxed and I surprised myself, sending the pitch on my third try. I was psyched, but it was still only one of two pitches.

Josh followed, almost sending it, and we reconvened at the foot wide belay ledge at the base of the icicle. Unfortunately, the ice was in awful condition. It was poorly bonded, candled, and tiered in a series of overhanging icicles and curtains; not the more solid column of two years previous. The icicle's right hand sister flow offered the best chance, but was detached from the wall, although the climbing looked like straight forward grade 5 ice. As the sun started to set and the temperature dropped, we started to rig a rappel as the ice began to make very strange hollow, popping and creaking noises, affirming that bailing was the right decision. There was still one last option though, the only problem was it would take a bolt to get from the ledge to the first piece of gear.

Josh Hurst following, about to gain the belay ledge.

After a rest day we went back out to finish off the route, this time carrying the drill. Still feeling the effects from the effort a couple of days earlier, I started hanging the draws for Josh to try and send the first pitch. When I got up to the base of the ice though, things looked different. The day before had been warm and the ice had taken a hit. The little ice ledge where we had belayed was falling apart as I swung into it. I tried to get on it one last time, high stepping my frontpoint, and a huge chunk of the ledge feel off on my other thigh, not leaving much behind. The ice above looked worse. I lowered off the pitch's last bolt, having been within five feet of the belay.

I drove past the route yesterday morning and half of the right hand sheet had fallen off in the sun. So it goes, at least nobody got hurt. A couple of years ago we couldn't climb the rock, but the ice looked relatively good, this year, the opposite. We'll see what next time has to offer.

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Take a look at this shot of the route from Peter Cole's website taken in 1978, photo 2857.

http://petercolephoto.com/gallery/results/list_records.php?CAT=5&AID=63&LOC=2&YR=1978

Look for a pair of huge icicles visible on the far right hand of the photo of the Painted Wall. Those years in the late seventies saw the biggest ice ever, and the route looks huge!

Big Expedition for Cancer Research

2009-01-19T06:46:00.000-05:00

From left to right: Matt Farmer, Bayard Russell, Kevin Mahoney and Dawn Glanc just below their highpoint on peak 8290', Glacier Bay National Park, AK.

This past June, after a year of preparation, Seattle's Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center launched its first Big Climb to Conquer Cancer. This is a unique and unprecedented PR tool for raising awareness about the challenges of cancer research which was built on the similarities between cancer research and, not just climbing, but climbing an unclimbed objective. The unknowns, tedious hard work, sometimes overwhelming challenges and occasional successes all combine with the broader simile of knowing right where one wants to get, but not exactly how to get there. Whether the goal is finding a cure for cancer or standing on a virgin summit the path is full of dead ends, unsuspected complications, surprises and you may end up somewhere you didn't anticipate.

The climbing team consisted of four guides, two whose home base is in Washington state and two from back east, Madison, NH. Dawn Glanc, who just won the Ouray Ice Comp, and Matt Farmer, an IFMGA mountain guide and rock solid climbing partner comprised one rope team. Kevin Mahoney, another IFMGA guide and accomplished alpinist, and I formed the other. In the end, we bailed off our route due to snow conditions, loose rock and lack of anchors. We had gotten to within a few hundred feet of the pyramidal top of the mountain known only as 8290', and although we would have loved to stand on that summit, realty set in and we had to adapt. As is the case for cancer researchers, who in their massive task of finding a cure for cancer are faced with unforeseen complications and simply must, on occasion, start over. In either case, however, lesson are learned that may help in the future.

Find out more at fhcrc.com

Breaching humpback whale.

Getting dropped off at the head of the Reid Inlet, Reid Glacier in the background. The beginning of the 16 mile approach to base camp.

Dawn hauling one of three loads up onto the ice on our first day.

Grizzly bear tracks.

More grizzly tracks, this time eight miles from the beach.

Taking a break with our objective, 8290', in the background. Its the pointy summit directly above Dawn's head (pink hat).

Farmer skinning up to the col that separated our basecamp from 8290'.

We climbed in relative darkness, so the only actions shots are of the descent. Bayard and Kevin down climbing, Kevin is in the background.

More down climbing, Kevin and Bayard.

The base of the ridge we attempted, 3/4's of us assembled.

Heading home in perfect travel conditions.

Our last night on the glacier was beautiful, Glacier Bay in the background.

Kevin and Farmer relaxing on our way out of the Reid Inlet, starting the fifty mile boat ride across Glacier Bay and back to civilization.

Neihborhood Craggin

2009-01-14T18:08:00.000-05:00

On the most blustery of days its time to go mixed climbing. It just works out that a surprising amount of the single pitch mixed crags we frequent are sunny, and sheltered from the NW wind that tears across NH this time of year. Its perfect. Hike out in a pair of warm Sorels, slip on some "fruitboots" and have some fun in the sun, knowing full well you could be shivering in the wind while your partner rains down hunks of brittle ice.

Neighbors Kevin Mahoney, Freddy Wilkinson and I spend a lot of these days at the local crag, tucked into the hills of East Madison, NH on Kevin's family's own land. Today, down there in the sun, the climbing was comfortable and the ice was growing, despite the single digit temperatures.

Freddy Wilkinson on an unamed mixed route, Toko Crag.

Cathedral Style?

2009-01-10T20:01:00.000-05:00

In a town surrounded by dozens of crags you only have to tell a North Conway local, "meet me at The Cliff" and they'll know right where to go. And getting there is easy; park a few hundred feet from your route, or drive right to the top. Convenient it is, but Cathedral Ledge is also packed with more than its fair share of year round adventure.

Bayard on Refusal, Cathedral Ledge (NEI 5+ M7+)

Its the hub and a better home crag couldn't exist. Its where folks figure out how to make an anchor, handjamb, use their feet, fiddle in a nests' of RP's, and finally, how to go for it. The climbing is cerebral and technical in the summer and it retains those qualities throughout the winter, but with the added excitement of verglas, spindrift and the heavy metal rhythm of steep, fat, blue ice.

A long climbing history and a passionate group of devoted locals form the backdrop to the slabs and cracks of the cliff. The community is real, hardworking and littered with characters. Its a hard group to leave, and it's open to whomever is ready to trade an ordinary existence for a climbing life in a place without ready made careers. On a summer evening after a route and after dark, you sit and have a beer in the dirt with three generations of climbers who have made similar decisions and sacrifices for this way of life.

Anne Skidmore photo of Bayard on LA Bubblebath (5.11d), Cathedral Ledge

"Cathedral style" is a way we describe a type of thin, balancey, thought provoking climbing with fidgety gear and technical sequences. Its old school and usually less than vertical. But, when away on a climbing trip and a friend tells you, "don't worry the next pitch is Cathedral style, you'll be fine," more than just the slow, cerebral tic-tac of Cathedral Ledge footwork comes to mind. I think of summer nights, great belay ledges and PBR in the parking lot with friends.