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.

Shawn on Five Springs Falls

Andrea on School House

Shawn on School House

Descending back to the car

Hostile Takeover

Well, we tried.  Conditions were too much for us this day.

Sheep in the South Fork

The rarely formed first pitch of Slow Turning.

On the first pitch of Slow Turning.

Anya topping out Stringer.

Hellroaring 2012

Shawn and I went up and ran laps at Hellroaring. He wore khakis that zip off into shorts. Still think he has potential, didn't fall, or drop anyone. I felt stronger than I ever have on ice in the past two years. Think we're ready for bigger things.

Falls Between

January 8th Shawn and I did Falls Between in East Rosebud. He puked on the approach and got a speeding ticket on the way home. I think he has potential.

Turkey and Hellroaring

We spent the day after thanksgiving at Hellroaring Falls with my brother and dad. Two amazing things in these photos 1.) this photo was taken with an iPhone 4s and 2.) my dad climbs WI3 off the couch.

Jeff getting in some kicks and sticks.

Anya refusing to pump out.

A Slow Return to the Rock

Aaron working The Cave Route V10

After an 18 month setback due to health, I've recently found some success with a new drug regimen. I have a long way to get back to my peak fitness level of fall 2009 but at least I can climb again. Since July 4th I've been on multiple trips to Ten Sleep ticking of 10's and 11's. A new camera and some new blood in town has inspired me to start this blog back up.

Charlie working the Cave Route V10

Anna climbing Mulkey Meat V1

Charlie doing the move on Assassin V9

Chris on an unnamed V1

Greg Seftick Memorial Highight Reel

This past week one of my greatest climbing partners and good friend Greg Seftick passed away in an avalanche in Garnet Canyon near the Grand Teton with his climbing partner Walker Kuhl. The details are here.

After I moved to Montana in 2004, Greg made routine visits to climb mountains, rocks, and ice with me. I loved photographing our adventures, and Greg got to be the climbing model a lot. Most of the time our climbing partnership would be me leading up to some crux move, I'd state the dubiousness of the situation, Greg knowing full well he wasn't going to pull the move would tell me that "a top notch alpinist and climbing coach like myself" (which was a lie) should be able to get through the difficulties, I'd then turn back at the rock, tell him he was crazy, think about it again, and pull the move and get us to the belay.

Multi day routes were great with him. He was a portable talk radio built for the mountains. His stories were crazy, humorous, and endless.

What follows below are some of the best climbing photos I have of Greg. Many are re-posts but it's worth it to see them collected again. See you on the other side of the mountain Greg.

Mount Inabnit, Beartooths

Greg Seftick and I on our last summit together, July 4th 2010.

beginning the moderate snow couloir.

Greg topping out the couloir. He climbed it with strap on crampons over his running approach shoes. How local of him.

Greg coming up the couloir on Mount Inabnit.

Greg relaxing at camp, and journaling post climb with our summit in the skyline. I had been quite anemic the preceding months and hadn't been doing much climbing, and was still feeling ill when he came to town to get a climb in. I proposed this mountain because my strength was weak and this climb was less technical than what we normally would look for thus we could hike in with less weight. The climb still destroyed my body and it took me weeks to recover. WORTH IT. I always felt safer having Greg on a climbing trip. I haven't climbed much since this trip as I'm still trying to regain my health.