Ice, Ice Baby

While most folks were captivated by the humangus snow fall over the weekend, Bob Cornez and I headed to Redstone to see if we could find something to swing our tools at. Over the course of the past week I’d been watching a line get fatter and fatter, and it seemed that by Saturday it would be in good shape. The route is up high on the east side of the valley, known to some as Passion for Post Holing, to others it’s the Tomato Chimney.

Friday night we went to bed to rain in Carbondale, and woke up to the same. Hmm, that’s not good, Redstone’s elevation isn’t much higher. I couldn’t see snowline due to the low hanging clouds, and wondered if there would be anything left with all the moisture. I packed my bag anyway, hoping for the best, and soon caught a glimpse of snow, which appeared low enough that I figured there might still be ice to climb.

We drove up the valley, anxious for what we would find. Soon the climb came into view and we pulled over to take a look through the binoculars. Yep, there was ice the whole way up, and it looked pretty good. At the very least, we’d get a good aerobic workout, so we parked and set off towards the route. Last season when I did this climb, it took us over three hours to reach the base, due to heinous snow conditions that made for slow post holing. This time we cruised up the frozen creek bed, and little over an hour later were standing at the base, looking up at a nice pitch of ice.

It turned out to be wetter than it appeared, and we both had to deal with wet, cold hands, though Bob had it the worst, at one point thinking he might puke from the pain of the blood returning to his digits. Still, we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, psyched to be out climbing and enjoying a great winter day. Everything went smooth, we got down easy and made it back to the car just as it was getting dark. The outing was made all-the-sweeter given the uncertainty of the morning, not being sure what we’d find when we first set out.

With all the new snow, there’s a lot more moisture and hopefully some other climbs will being showing up soon. I’m in Jackson getting my WFR, so posting might be a bit light the next couple of days.