Ouray Ice Climbing Trip

I made my goal of climbing Ouray. December 18th through the 21st was a good weekend of sharp steel and ice. Unfortunately I haven’t received any photos from the other group members yet so I don’t have any of me climbing. I went on the trip as a secondary leader/instructor as majority of the people on the trip were beginners. The first day was done in the Camp Bird Miners area. The next 3 days were spent in the ice park, which was very fun and safe. I got in some really good mileage. But the most interesting and exciting part of the trip happened on the first day. This is a long one, and sorry Mom, I’m not holding any details back, so you might want to consider not reading it. I don't want to get an earful.

For the first day of climbing, we hiked up the canyon to climb some natural lines because the park hadn’t yet opened for the season. Due to availability of climbs, I ended up on a climb called Skylight. I didn’t have the guide book, so I didn’t have any beta. I eye-balled the route to be a solid WI4 rating and said let’s do it. The climb consists of two pitches. The first being about 20+ feet of thick to thin ice with a “V-shaped” crack to negotiate as you pull yourself over the lodged boulder. For my first pitch of the season and first climb of any sort in about 6 months, it was a good warm up. I belayed the other two up one at a time due to the narrowness of the climb. (This is what the first pitch looks like. That's not me, I pulled this from the internet just for a reference. There wasn't this much ice when I climbed it.)

We then walked up to the next pitch. (This picture is what the climb looks like from the trail. Half of the second pitch, minus the top section is visible. Once again there wasn't even half the ammount of ice present when I climbed it.) I call this the “Devil’s Butt Crack.” The ice formed on the left side of a very narrow slot, about 5 feet wide at the bottom, to 3 feet, to 10 feet in the middle, and then to 1 ½ feet at the top before you have to pull yourself through another “V-shaped” crack, with this one being even smaller and more narrow than the first pitch. I reracked my protection and looked up at my line. There wasn’t much ice on the route, so I had to go straight up the middle. I started up at a nice slow pace so to not pump myself out. The cool thing about the Devil’s Butt Crack is that you can just lean against the wall behind you to get a hands free rest. I definitely took advantage of this going up. But since it was the Devil’s Butt Crack, things didn’t pan out as great as they started. Deception was present.

When I got to the middle section I noticed that the wall behind me started to get further and further away, making it impossible to use it for a rest, or even reach out and touch it. At the same time as the wall furthered from me, the ice started to steepen from almost vertical to dead vertical, to slightly past vertical. I was now on WI5 ice for sure. I wasn’t able to notice these changes in the steepness and wall aspect from the ground, and had miscalculated the actual crux of the climb. I now refer to the crux as the Devil’s Deception. I started to get a little pumped, as what happens at cruxes, and worse yet, I started to lose my cool. I was about 10 meters above my last piece and still didn’t have a good spot to stop and place a screw. I started to talk to myself. The fear and actuality of a possible fall in a narrow slot high above my last piece that was in thin ice, had worked its way to the forefront of my thoughts. I started to lose it. I began to rush my swings and my feet placement, which just added to my current forearm pump that was going on. At one point I lost my footing as my front points popped out of the ice. What made this scary was that I only had one tool in the ice as I was mid swing with the other tool. That is called a “one armed bandit” because you are hanging from only one arm. It’s now the third one that I’ve had to experience that on a lead. I think this is where I strained my left latissimus dorsi muscle, but I wouldn’t notice till later that night. I was sweating like crazy, partly because I was working hard on the climb and partly because of nerves. My swings were becoming more and more desperate.

By now I had thought to myself twice that I was not going to be able to get my tools in the ice, or even hold on, eventually peeling of the ice and get seriously hurt. I did not bring any cord or a 22 cm ice screw to perform a V-thread and lower to the ground, nor was I in a good place to be able to safely perform the maneuver. Here, as I realized that the situation had turned from floating in calm seas to teetering on the edge of a rogue wave, ready to go down in rough seas, I said the second quickest pray in my life: “Oh Lord, help. It’s not my time.” I now chuckle as I write this for two reasons: Primarily, because that it’s the second time I’ve been faced with this situation, and secondly, to push the feelings of the fear and helplessness from the experience out of my mind.

I was able to get my tools in, breathe two deep breaths, collect my nerves, and hurry up the next 3 meters of ice to where I could kick my leg out behind me, establishing a stem which helped give me a good stance to place a screw, and give my arms a much needed break. The crux was now starting to disappear below me. I then pushed the previous doubt, fear, and anxiety out of my mind with the top out only 10 meters above me. I took my time resting and finally yelled down to my belayer, “Whew! That was a little hard.” I don’t think that they sensed how sarcastic I was at this point. I hadn’t allowed myself to tell them that I was in trouble during the crux so to not unnerve their minds, causing them to act nervously, which would have lead to an increase in my anxiety, allowing a complete loss of my nerves. I left it at a one man show because it was all I could do to not crumble.

As I climbed to the top, the slot narrowed to the point where I could swing my tool back no more than 5 inches from the ice, and forced me to position my body to the left of my line, practically laying my side on the rock. I navigated myself through the narrow crack, topping out expecting to have the tree anchor a few feet in front of me, only to meet another 20+ foot section of vertical ice. No problem right? Not exactly. Well I had used all seven of my ice screws on the main part of the climb. I didn’t even care anymore. I quickly soloed up this section of WI4 ice and clipped into the anchor setting up the belay.

Wow that was fun. I smiled as the trial was over. I called Daniel on the radio and told him that I was now at the top of my climb, that I had gotten on the hardest climb I ever led, which was a little over my head for the first climb of the season, that it was a really fun route, and the details of what went down. Haha. I had overcome that crazy challenge. As I sat there with my sweat drenched layers now freezing to me, waiting for the strong beginners to struggle up this climb, I knew that I completed the hardest lead I’ve ever attempted. Here, I told myself not to let it go to my head, it wasn’t a good performance on my part.

After we got down and back to the car, I viewed the guide book. Skylight is rated at WI4+ to WI5+. The description said that in the early season the route is WI5 due to the steepness and the thickness of the ice, along with the scarcity of good placements for protection. I then smiled because I have now led a WI5. Once again, I told myself not to let it go to my head, it wasn’t a good performance. I’ve noticed a few more gray hairs since this experience.