Sunday morning we woke up early to climb Pick o’ the Vic, a 140′ WI4 ice climb that Will Gadd climbed for 24 hours straight for the Endless Ascent charity event.  We also headed into the Scottish Gully area to climb an interesting pillar called Popsicle that formed up pretty fat this year.  I was able to take some pictures and a video of the climb from across the gorge before we had to leave for home.  Short trip but getting about 10-12 laps in the park in a weekend made it worth the long drive.  Embedded Facebook video below, I also posted the video to Vimeo.

Before I left I seemed to have misplaced my trusty old Canon SD400 point and shoot camera.  I typically take this camera with me when I am climbing because it is compact and reliable.  After searching around the house for a month I decided it was time to buy a new one.  I ended up choosing a Samsung HZ15W for the nice lens (24mm wide with 10x zoom) and simple features including manual settings for shooting panoramas.

So far I’m happy with the camera, I think it takes good shots and I am especially happy with the wide-angle lens.  When climbing I think the lens will let me capture much more of the climb than I was able to with the standard 28mm lens of my old point and shoot.  The camera is a little bit bulkier but the only complaint I have so far is the noise when shooting video and using the zoom lens.  The video quality is great (720p) but having the microphone mounted on the camera lets it pick up the lens noise.

I tested out the camera last weekend when my uncle Garth came to visit us in Colorado.  He hadn’t been to the Moab area of Utah, so we took a quick weekend trip to camp and do a bit of hiking.  We drove down through Castle Valley just outside of Moab and then camped at Beef Basin in Indian Creek.  The next day we did a hike in Canyonlands National Park to the Druid Arch rock formation.  Twelve miles later we were back at the car and in the morning headed back to Colorado.  Uncle Garth liked it so much he drove back to Moab the next day to visit Arches National Park.

My buddy Jon and I had talked about doing the Casual Route, the easiest route up the Diamond at 5.10a for a few months.  This past week we committed to tackling the climb at the earliest weather window, preferably mid-week to avoid the higher than normal climber traffic this route has been seeing this season.  The forecast seemed to clear for September 2nd, a Wednesday with only a 10% chance of isolated thunderstorms – about as good of a forecast as you can get in that area.  We pre-selected the rack and agreed to meet up at 1am in Lyons for the drive to the trailhead.

Alpine starts always come sooner than you expect, especially when a bit of anxiety about the forthcoming climb exists.  I woke up five minutes before the alarm went off, turned off the alarm and stumbled downstairs to make my coffee and pile into my pre-packed car.  I met Jon at a parking lot in Lyons, arriving one minute before he pulled in behind me.  Loading the gear into his Jeep, we drove up through the foothills for another 45 minutes to the Longs Peak Trailhead.  Double checking our gear and shouldering our packs, we signed in to the trailhead register noting that another party had already signed in that day with intentions of climbing the same route.  They had signed in at 12:30am, and we were over an hour behind them at this point.  Hoping we would not get in each other’s way, we started up the trail and tried to keep a steady pace.

Alpine approaches are always the same.  Dark, sleep-deprived and tedious, with your world narrowed down to whatever your headlamp illuminates on the way to your climb.  No distractions, just one foot after the other while known landmarks and trail signs pass you by, your thoughts on the climb and descent that is far ahead of you.  We quickly passed one party headed for the Keyhole route, immediately identifiable as hikers because of the gear they were carrying.  At treeline we spotted another set of lights up ahead, quickly caught up with them and discovered they were the other party headed for the Diamond.  We chatted with them for a minute and continued up the trail to Chasm Lake, relieved that we would be the first party up the North Chimney – a 550 foot gully that splits the lower Diamond face.

As [Derek Hersey] downclimbed the Casual Route that day, he knocked off a little block and worried that he might have hit two climbers below him, but they were unharmed.  As he carefully climbed down past the two, Hersey said, “I knew you weren’t worried, boys – only men climb on the Diamond.” – Longs Peak: The Story Of Colorado’s Favorite Fourteener

The North Chimney serves as the approach to the Casual Route and is notoriously loose and chossy.  It was still dark by the time we arrived at Mills Glacier, a thin ribbon of snow and ice that stood between us and the start of the North Chimney.  We racked up, buried our packs under large rocks to deter marmots from snacking on the packs or their contents, silently thanked whoever had installed a fixed rope across the snowfield and prusiked up the line to the start of the route.  We simulclimbed most of the North Chimney, occasionally stopping and belaying through tricky sections that were steep or loose (or both).  Finally we stood atop the D1 pillar, a feature on the route where the difficulty begins and the climbing turns vertical.  Dead vertical.

It was now my lead, and looking up at the crack and traverse ahead of me made me feel dizzy.  I felt like throwing up, due to the altitude, nervousness or both.  This was the highest, longest and most difficult climb I had ever done.  Unlike other climbs, I wasn’t sure of our success.  I racked the gear, took a drink of water, fiddled with the rack a bit more and finally unclipped myself from the anchor and moved onto the route.  As I moved from handjam to fingerlock, placing gear and getting into the rhythm of the climb I began to feel better.  Fourty feet from the belay I began to traverse left, finally feeling solid and in control.  I arrived at a belay stance and Jon followed the pitch, collected the gear from me and lead the next section up to the base of the enduro corner pitch.

The middle of the Casual Route ascends a 200 foot right-facing corner system that is vertical, clean and sustained through the entire length.  I headed up the corner, feeling much better than my first lead and comfortably running it out between pieces of protection to conserve my gear for the whole pitch.  This is hands-down the best pitch of climbing I’ve ever done anywhere.  I could not help but smile and sing to myself the whole way up, even though at this point I was feeling the effects of the altitude on my strength and breathing.  The pitch tops out on the most comfortable belay ledge of the whole climb, allowing me to take off my shoes and the pack and relax while Jon followed the superb corner.

I led the next 40 foot section up to the Yellow Wall Bivy ledge while Jon caught his breath at the comfy belay.  The crux pitch was next and we both wanted Jon to be fresh for the varied but sustained difficulties.  Jon arrived at the ledge,  racked the gear and took one more look at the topo before heading out.  Steadily I payed out rope to Jon as he moved higher and higher from the belay, always vigilant to not let him have too much slack in case of a fall.  As the rope passed the middle mark, I knew he must be very close to the top of the pitch.  At last, I heard a whoop, and Jon called “off belay”.  I followed the pitch clean, trailing the pack through a squeeze chimney that barely gave me enough room to turn my helmeted head inside it.  I arrived at the crux panting from the effort and altitude, and rested for a second before tackling the hardest part of the climb.  Pulling through the crux, I stood on a tiny ledge, over 1000 feet above the talus.

We were excited.  The hardest part of the climb was behind us and it was literally all downhill from there.  I congratulated Jon on a stellar lead but we saved most of the celebration for after we were down off the climb.  I led out across the Table Ledge traverse and found the rappel anchors that would allow us to descend back down to our packs.  Jon followed the pitch and we happily began the process of organizing the gear and ropes for the nine rappels to Mills Glacier.  The first rappel went smooth, and I paused midway to take some photos of climbers on Pervertical Sanctuary.

On the third rappel, I descended to the ends of the ropes without finding the next rappel station.  I prusiked up and swung around, trying to find where the bolts were located.  We saw from the topo that the bolts were around a corner, but I couldn’t see them and we were holding back the party from Pervertical who were now rappelling down the same route we were.  I built an anchor, clipped into it and yelled up to Jon that I couldn’t find the rappel station and he would have to find it on the way down.  Jon located the station with help from the other climbers, and we let them pass us so we could follow them down the rest of the way.  I was wrestling with a Camalot C3 that had become stuck at my stance due to a kinked/faulty trigger wire when the other climbers rappeled down past me.

“Hey man, are you doing alright?”, the lead climber asked me.  I replied that I was just working out the C3 with my nut tool because the trigger wasn’t working when I finally recognized who I was talking to.  “Are you Kelly Cordes?”, I asked him.  Kelly is the senior editor of the American Alpine Journal and a Patagonia ambassador.  Kelly was very helpful to Jon and I while we made our way down the rest of the route, and probably saved us a half hour or more on our descent.  We finally arrived back at our packs, sliding down a bit of the snowfield after the last rappel with only a nut tool to self-arrest with.  I experienced the relief that only a climber can understand -  taking off my climbing shoes at the end of a long day and changing back into my approach shoes for the descent.  We began the talus-hopping back down to the lake, looking back every few minutes at the Diamond.

The ultimate goal of Luke’s trip was an ascent of the Petit Grepon, an alpine rock spire in Rocky Mountain National Park that is on the list of the 50 classic climbs of North America.  Looking at the weather and noticing that later in the visit the chances of rain increased, we made the decision to go for the climb early.  We got a nice alpine start and motored on up to Sky Pond, at the base of the Petit.  Making good time, we climbed well and topped out just after noon, then rappelled back down to the base of the climb.  On the last rappel, the skies opened up and the rain started.  I dove into a bivy cave while Luke pulled the ropes in the rain, and we waited out the storm in the small cave.

After the rains stopped, we were able to hike back to the car in dry conditions and celebrate the ascent at Ed’s Cantina.  The last weekend of Luke’s trip was spent driving to Steamboat, camping out there and taking a much-deserved soak in the Strawberry Hot Springs.  A short side trip to Breckenridge and we were on our way back home.  Super fun visit and a good amount of climbing made this a memorable trip.

On our way up to Maine we took a detour into New York City to spend a day seeing the sights.  We stayed at the Warwick hotel which was actually quite nice and just what you would expect if you were visiting the city back in the 40s or 50s.  We visited Rockefeller Center, Times Square, the Empire State Building and the Stature of Liberty.  We took both the subway and a cab to give the boys a little fun, then we were off to Maine.

We stayed with my brother in Old Town on Pushaw Lake for the first few days in Maine, and had a great time there.  The boys had a blast kayaking on the lake and jumping off the dock into the water.  We visited Acadia National Park and Luke and I went climbing while the rest of the family hung out at Sand Beach.  Luke and I got another day of climbing in the next day at Otter Cliffs before we had to leave and head north for The County.

The majority of our time we spent up in Caribou at my mom and dad’s farm.  It was great being able to hang out with family and old friends and catching up with my chores.  The boys loved being able to ride on the tractors and see all the farm equipment and we got to help mom and dad get some hay cut and baled while we were there.  After a great visit, we drove back home and finally are settled in!

• Outer Fabric Material – 7″ x 14″
• Bottom Fabric Material – 4.5″ diameter circle
• Inner Fleece Material – 8.5″ x 11.5″
• 2″ fine-weave webbing – 20″ in length
• 30″ of elastic cord
• Barrel lock for 1/4″ cord
• Grommet Kit

I make the inner fleece bag first. Take the fleece material, fold it in half and cut out two notches on either side. The goal is to create a square-bottomed bag out of the fleece material that will hold the chalk. I notched about 1.5″ x 2.5″ from either side, but you may have to play around with the measurements to get a good fitting bag. Sew the side, bottom and then the notches together to form an H at the bottom.

Next, sew the outer fabric material into a tube. I stop stitching the tube before the end to help with fitting the bottom onto the tube, sometimes you have to add or remove material to make the circular bottom fit correctly. Cut the circular bottom out (I found a Primus gas canister is the perfect size for this) and stitch it to the bottom of the tube.

Add a grommet to the outer bag with a grommet kit. The hammer and anvil type of grommet kits work much better than the style that use the pliers, and brass grommets seem to fit nicer than the aluminum ones. Add a small patch of fabric behind the grommet to add a bit of strength. Assemble the bag with a fleece lining and the elastic cord placed temporarily around the lining.

Cut the 2″ webbing into two lengths – 14″ and 6″. The 6″ piece is the belt loop and the 14″ piece is the rim of the chalk bag. Iron the 14″ piece in half and pin it onto the rim of the chalkbag. Place the 6″ piece at the back of the chalkbag, opposite the grommet and underneath the rim. Sew around the rim of the bag. I bartacked the ends of the webbing to provide some extra strength.

At this point, pull the elastic cord up around the lining until the cord follows the rim of the bag. Pin the cord into place at the back where it will be held by the belt loop. Bring the belt loop up from inside the bag, give it a fold and stitch it into place where it will hold the elastic cord and prevent it from coming out. Stitch the bottom of the belt loop completely through the bag and lining.

Install the barrel lock on the elastic cord and trim the cord to length. You’re done! I made several chalk bag belts using some 3/4″ flat webbing and buckles (hanging your chalk bag from a carabiner is weak sauce). If you are trad climbing, a length of 1/2″ supertape with a bail ring on it in place of the belt makes a great emergency rap anchor, and doesn’t weigh much more than the belt.

The last route that Dan and I planned to climb before leaving was Stairway to Heaven, a 900 foot WI4 line in Eureka, just outside of Silverton. We scoped out the approach beforehand and got up early in the morning to try to get there first. We were 5 minutes too late, as another party motored up the trail just before us. As we approached the base of the climb, I thought it might be a good idea to climb to the left of the first party where the next best line appeared. Dan and I rock-paper-scissored for the lead and I “won”. I began to lead up the left side of the first pitch.

I placed 4 screws in 100 feet of climbing, and my last screw was in some decently solid ice. The route pulled up over a bulge at this point and I encountered some snice, or consolidated snow/ice mix at the lip of this bulge. I was about waist-high with the bulge and moving my right foot up when the rotten ice I had been standing on with my left foot gave way and I fell. I dropped about 20 feet, caught my crampon on one of the double ropes (core-shot) which flipped me upside down. The Yates Screamer I had placed on the last screw was fully deployed after the fall. I hit nothing on the way down, but I could tell right away that something was up with my ankle, so I lowered off the climb and Dan retrieved the gear from above.

After hiking 3/4 of a mile back to the car we drove back to Ouray and then the next day back to the Front Range. During the fall I fractured my talus and had to have surgery to get the bone repaired with three screws and a small plate. In retrospect, it wasn’t a good idea to climb a sunbaked, alternate line on the first pitch where I did not have solid ice the entire way up. We should have waited for the party ahead of us to complete their line and then followed. I also think that I was trying to make too big of a move (highstepping) to get over the bulge and a few smaller moves to pull over that particular obstacle would have been safer. I’ll get to think about not falling on ice for 3 months while I recover!

Yesterday afternoon I finally reached a meager goal, aid climbing Country Club Crack at Castle Rock in Boulder Canyon. It goes free at 5.11c, but I wanted some aid practice and the 170ft route was a perfect site for testing out my aid system. It took me 2 hours for the lead, I really need to get faster at aid before heading onto something bigger. I felt better at the top and things were starting to click, so more practice and I should be good to go.

Flickr has the option to upload videos to the site, so I’ve uploaded a few videos that we took here at home and on our hike in RMNP to my Flickr page. The quality is much better than YouTube, and it will convert the videos directly from my camera just fine. Seems to be a great way to share videos with friends and family members, hope you like them!

This weekend I was a bit iced-out, and the weather was going to be nice and sunny. We headed down into the South Platte to do a bit of crack climbing at Turkey Rocks. Turkey Rocks is known for great crack climbing, and it didn’t disappoint. I climbed a few routes to warm up, then we headed over to Dan’s project, a 5.11- crack climb called Whimsical Dreams. I scrambled up over the top, and rapped in from above to take some photos from above. It was a great day with good weather at a super-nice crag.

Over the past month we’ve been able to get out with the kids and have a bit of fun. We’ve been hiking in Rocky Mountain National Park a few times, visiting Alberta Falls and Emerald Lake. On a hot day in August we took the boys to Lyons to tube the South St. Vrain river. Samuel and Benjamin both loved running the mild rapids in the whitewater park and floating down the river.

Samuel has started kindergarten and doing well, he’s active in his class and likes recess. Benjamin is growing every day and imitates everything his brother does. We took the kids to a local farm attraction in Longmont for the day that had a zip line. Samuel waited patiently in line for his turn, then jumped on and flew down the line. When Benjamin saw that his brother had a good time he wanted to do it, too.

Mike and I went up to the Park on Wednesday evening to start BivyFest ‘08.  We had planned on bivying for three nights and climbing three alpine rock routes, but the weather was not cooperative.  We were able to bivy below and climb Spearhead, but bailed on the trip after that climb due to weather.  It’s gonna snow up there today!  We got a bit wet on the hike out, but luckily we were able to avoid the worst of it.

On our hike out from Spearhead, we saw a small herd of elk grazing above Black Lake.  After seeing several smaller elk, we spotted the big daddy of the group – right in the middle of the trail!  We snapped some pictures and waited for a while (as we were being eaten alive by mosquitoes), but he stood his ground in the middle of the trail.  Finally we made enough noise that he moved off to the side and we were able to quickly pass.  His horns looked sharp!

This weekend my friends Matt, Gregory and I climbed the route Martha on Mount Lady Washington in the Park.  This year we’ve seen record snowfall and cold temperatures, and we thought the route might be in a bit longer than usual.  It was fairly melted out and we ended up climbing the difficult sections with our bare hands instead of our ice tools.  Even though the conditions weren’t ideal, we had a great day up above treeline.

Samuel and Benjamin are growing up every day, they both love to go swimming and dive into the water with their swim goggles. Benjamin is especially fearless, Monika and I have to constantly keep an eye on him because he’s always diving underwater. As brothers, they alternate between war and peace, one moment they will be playing nicely and the next fighting over a shared toy. I finished building a loft bed for Samuel, and now Benjamin and Samuel share a room.

This is a view from Mills Lake, with the ice climb All Mixed Up on the right Pagoda is visible at the end of the gorge, and Longs Peak is barely visible at the center of the picture. I was able to cross over the middle, but temperatures will soon begin to melt the lake and make things a bit messier. The freeze-thaw cycle that comes every spring will help some of the higher elevation ice climbs form up and stabilize the snowpack to allow for safer avalanche conditions.

Spearhead is the rock formation at the very left, McHenrys Peak is the mountain in the middle, and Arrowhead is the formation on the far right. The ice climb West Gully is formed up just below McHenrys in the picture. Directly behind where this photo was taken is the Trough and Longs Peak. Black Lake is about 4 miles from the trailhead in winter, in the summertime the standard trail adds another mile to the trip.

These are the Black Lake Slabs, a nice, long, easy ice climb that doesn’t see much traffic due to the long approach. At the moment, a lot of the ice is covered with snow since we’ve had some heavy snowfall in RMNP recently. When I camped at Jewel Lake last weekend, I had 16 inches fall on me overnight.