With the kids out of school, there are many activities that they could occupy themselves with. Hanging out at the mall, PS3, facebook, endlessly texting their friends, complaining that they are board and have nothing to do, the list is endless. When I mentioned to my oldest son how about ice climbing last Friday, he was surprised I had work off and was pretty stoked about the prospect. Fortunately no crisis at work to occupy my day off, and I was hoping that the ice was in decent shape. We’d had a nice cold snap for a couple weeks around Thanksgiving that had really firmed up the routes, but for most of December we’ve had warm weather with excursions into the mid to high 40’s.

Chinooks are wonderful as a piscatorial pursuit, but as a meteorological event I could do without them. We’d had a few days in the 20’s and even some evenings dropping down to the teens earlier last week. which I was hoping would have firmed things back up. The previous week my bouldering forays showed the ice to be starting to rot out. On the drive down the trucks thermometer was reading mid 30’s. Less than ideal conditions, but we might as well give it a go.

I’d never done this route, it’s called organ pipes. You can just make it from the anchors to the start with a single 60m rope, which makes it a good 70-80 feet long. It starts out with a short vertical section, then a low angle ramp for a bit, and the top 30 feet is vertical to slightly overhanging. The screws were going in very, very easily. A couple taps of a hammer to start them would drive them half way in. Place lots of screws and don’t fall. When I got to the top of the ramp my son said the ice looked better on the left side of the curtain, so I headed over that way. Naw, pretty rotten and soft so I elected to weenie off to a ledge and then groveled up over some mud and crud. I surprised a pair of mountain goats in the gulley to the left of the climb and they knocked some rocks down the scree slope. After my son followed and cleaned the route he got his first opportunity to rappel (I set him up then went first so I could give a fireman’s belay) and then we had a toprope set up.

My youngest son went first on the tr. His first time ice climbing a few weeks back when the temps were barely in the double digits resulted in his hands being numb and him backing off mid-pitch. This time with warmer temps, and hand warmers in his gloves, he fired off the whole thing no problem. I could see he was getting gassed at the top section, clumsy swings are a dead give away of a tired ice climber. He was pretty stoked at his ascent. I have pics, but apparently his bro didn’t post them on his facebook page.

Then my oldest boy gave the route another go. Not having to deal with pulling screws and not having to take dads weenie route was much more fun.

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Our dog simply won’t let us go on a trip without bringing him.

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Time for the old man to see if he could handle vertical ice on a top rope.

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I’m not sure if hanging out with the old man is a better influence than hanging out with friends, but I’d wager we had a better view than the mall.

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Hopefully the forecast holds and things start cooling down this week. We might have to search out a few of the longer smears.