Three Ring Circus

I was complaining to my friend Kellie one day about a lack of climbing partners and she immediately was on board to hook me up. Kellie knows a lot of people, I've lived here forever and know far less. This is how I met Bill my climbing partner for the day out in Eagle River valley.

The morning started off great, Bill was already at the Wal Mart parking lot when I pulled in at 7am. In ten minutes we were driving to the nature center, 2 hours later we were at the base of the climb at first light. I wasn't necessarily over motivated this day, it was that Bill needed to be back to the car by 3pm....a narrow window for an Eagle River day.

Fog Covering the Valley

 

At Rapids camp we opted to get on the river and it was fairly smooth travel until a long section of overflow. We took to the trees for about 20 minutes than got back onto the river. Pretty fast traveling overall.

It was very cold out, frost coated all the trees in the cold air sink of the valley bottom. Despite this the climb was not as solid as I anticipated. There were lots of section with low angle bells of clear inch thick ice and water underneath. Very pretty to look at, and it made this very moderate route much more engaging.

 

The Third Pitch

 

This was my first time out since Lasix eye lasering in November, and so this is why I was sporting very stylish safety glasses.

 

T.6:D.7