The Corridor..

Ryan and I pulled into the Paradise lodge cabin at about 1 am, it took us about 6 hrs to drive up. We were in the small cabin this time, but it was perfect, the toyo stove had it at 77 degrees within ten minutes! Loving it.

We got a bit of a late start due to coming in so late, and then Ry's car broke on the way to climb. We macguyverd a wire back together with some duct tape and secured the battery, and amazingly enough the car started!

Finally we parked at Jack creek, officially now a part of the crack of noon club.

Awesome Tundra Walking

 

It took about an hour to get into the corridor and I was surprised at all the drips coming off the walls. A beautiful place for sure.

In the Corridor

 

We looked at the climb, a wing and a prayer, but the top pitch looked pretty ugly, and definitely not like something I wanted to be my first lead of the year. I like to warm up to ice climbing slowly.

The climb in the corridor was thick, wet and overall just lovely. The only downside to wet ice, is frozen ropes...which really suck.

Ry at the Base of a Step

 

We got to the top of route at about 6pm, just as the sun was leaving alpenglow on the mountains. We knew we would be in the dark soon, so we sat at the top for a little while and enjoyed the view.

Topping Out at Sunset

 

The last time I did this route I walked off across the mountain and down by spring fling. We decided to try and rap the route instead this time, and I think it would have been ok, except our ropes were frozen. It was a little dodgy, but overall fine for the rappel, but pulling the ropes around corners didn't go so great. It took us as long to get down as up, and it was much harder!!

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Kid's Corner Times Two: Nabesna

Day two dawned with soft grey clouds and whimsically falling snow...we parked and headed back up behind Jack Creek. This time we went for the largest cleft in the mountains on the lookers left. It was a pretty spectacular rock feature, especially with steep jagged daggers of ice looming high above. Again it took us about an hour to get to the bottom of the route(s).

Bill Walking up the Super Cleft

 

There is this climb back up there called "A Wing and a Prayer" and I think that is a very descriptive title....I pretty much took one look at it and in my mind there was no way it was happening....I'd love to lead it some day, but this day was not the one!! Maybe at the end of the season....maybe... instead we went up route that I have no idea of its name but was super mellow similar to Kids Corner in Caribou creek..

Top of One of Many Steps

 

I tried a new technique that Bill wanted to use, doing short pitches and doing blocks of pitches instead of swapping leads. I could see the possibility's of using such a method...the climbing was again deep in a narrow cleft, I love routes like this, they are super aesthetic to me.

Going up Pitches

 

When we got to the top we decided to go for the walk off again. Bill wanted to traverse across a slope, but I was disorientated and wanted to go to the ridge above. It ended up being almost a perfect loop around the entire mountain. Outside of the extremely slippery talus slope it was a fantastic way to get a feel for the whole mountain.

The Beautiful Walk Off

 

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