Catskills Ice Climbing TR

Brett, Chloe, Joana and I headed up to the Catskills Saturday morning to meet Guillaume for our first ice adventure. We arrived in New Paltz in good time; Brett's driving skills overcoming our Scion's aerodynamic inefficiencies. We stopped at Rock & Snow as they opened to rent some gear, and after some discussion with the nice folks there we settled on Moore's Bridge or Stoney Clove as having the highest likelihood of decent ice.

Guillaume and I crossed some signals on where we were going, and before we knew it we were looking up at ice that looked like East Side Corner. Somehow, the hike up to the base didn't look too bad from the road, so we shrugged off the Guidebook's description of a "seemingly neverending hill" and "an approach that may be repayed by less crowding" and set off uphill. The n00b moments were just starting though, as by the time we were gearing up at the base of the climbs I had managed to lose a glove, Chloe had nearly died because she was carrying stuff in paper Whole Foods bags instead of her pack, and Brett and dropped his brand-new (like purchased where we rented our gear) helmet down the 150 foot hill. Go figure the beach-loving Brazilian would be the only one who ultimately did not fall or drop anything ...

Phfew. Ok, you'd think we had gotten all the early morning jitters out, eh? Nope, I managed to only rent crampons for half of us, figuring that only the climbers needed them (I'm cheap, what can I say). Well it turns out that walking around the base without them was an invitation to roll all the way down to the road (Brett was the only one heedless of this danger; he kept hopping around like a mountain goat). And to top it all off, there was no obvious way to walk up to set up top-rope anchors. Like I said, some n00b moments.

It didn't take Guillaume long to decide that rather than hike back down and move to another site that he would find some place to lead to the anchors (kind of crazy considering we had no screws, which wouldn't have mattered cause none of us knew how to use them anyways. I mean, fuck, downclimbing rock is hard enough, but downclimbing ice???). So he and Brett set off and within the hour Guillaume was at the top sending some rope down. We couldn't see what he had led to get up there at the time, but we could hear him cursing (in that childproof Guillaume sort-of way). Turns out he climbed a grovelly chute that ended in a short vertical section of ice, all protected by a sling thrown around a ~2" thick sapling and another sling around a column of ice (pretty sure Brett was just there for moral support). Uh dude, nice way to make your leading debut. Thanks to G's gutsy effort, we soon had two topropes setup (of course, only after dropping a pink nalgene bottle-which passed suspiciously close to Brett's head-and one of Kenway's new ice axes down the hill).

One rope was setup on the chute that Guillaume led, and the other was setup on what I believe is East Side Corner proper. Everyone had a go at East Side Corner (WI3?), which was a great start for us beginners. Soft ice, good rests, with a couple of bulges to keep it interesting. The flow was pretty wide, so there were some variations on repeat climbs (I think Joana made it to the top 3 times). Turns out that top-roping ice can be pretty dangerous; the rope kept sending shards of ice down, and at some point Guillaume got beaned in the shoulder by a big rock. Kept things exciting! I didn't try the chute route, but Brett and Chloe did, with Chloe taking a spectacular flip-over-your-harness fall. She managed to keep hold of her axes though, and finished off the vertical section at the top. Guillaume also climbed it again, using a variation that required a bit of mixed climbing.

We had time for one more route, which we had spotted earlier. It was about 50 feet further south, and a bit steeper and longer than East Side Corner. After a few hilarious failed attempts to get the rope past some branches, Guillaume managed to rappel down to the base (with no rope to spare, the ends barely touched the ground!). This route was my favorite, starting off in a dihedral which meandered over to a nice vertical section set next to another dihedral. I think Brett and Guillaume would agree that stemming with crampons is pretty awesome.

Some more pics courtesy of Joana, Brett and Chloe:

In the end, we made out just fine (although I think we came awful close to getting murdered by a spooky dude in the parking lot). On the hike out we managed not to die coming down the hill, recovered Brett's helmet (with nary a scratch) and found my lost glove. It was tons of fun in what-more-could-you-ask-for weather, and I'm most impressed we made it out with only a lost Nalgene bottle and some bruises! All-in-all an incredible introduction to the world of ice climbing. You know it's good when the cold-averse Brazilian is praying for more snow ...

Seems unlikely that the weather will permit another trip, but keep an eye out here and here for up to date ice conditions.