Ice Fest 2012

Anya leading Five Springs Falls.  She's awesome.

The Ice Fest events went as usual.  Good to see some new and old faces.  I took away four significant thoughts from the event.
1. The event is getting big, the valley felt rather crowded on the weekend.  Numerous cars parked at all the main parking spots.
2. The approaches in the South Fork to the inexperienced can be more difficult than the climb.
3. Due to the nature of the valley there are really only a handful of moderates that visitors are comfortable committing to the approach, meaning you can see the route from the car.  This causes crowding issues because......
4. Coloradoans seem to have no issue with starting a 1 hour approach with 4 cars already parked at a route's designated parking spot.  Most routes can only handle a single climber at a time.  This meant parties were stacked on top of each other and big waits at route bases.