It's been a rough year to be an ice climber in the NW. Which by NW standards means you might as well sell your gear and take up kayaking. Reason #576 of why I'm leaving the NW.
Chad topping out on Bourgeau Left
Overview of Bourgeau Left
Bourgeau is actually a pretty big climb with three rope stretching 70m pitches. After climbing it, I can see why it is many people's favorite Wi5 in the range. Also, due to its popularity I probably won't be on it again.
Roof on Suffer Machine
I couldn't let stable avalanche conditions pass me by without getting on something big. We decided to head to Nemesis but got scooped by Yamnuska. Fortunately I had the foresight to pack the rack as well. This gave us the option of getting on Suffer Machine instead. I have a habit of building up some climbs in my mind and they never seem to be as big and intimidating as I've imagined. That being said, Suffer Machine is pretty freaking cool, even if it is quite a bit tamer than I would have thought.
Suffer Machine starts on the right side of the ice and traverses in left just above the hanger. Teddy Bear's Picnic takes the direct line at just one grade harder.
Suffer Machine goes free at M7. Unfortunately the crux is missing three hangers and those that remain wouldn't do a fantastic job of preventing injury in the event of a fall. Even so, if you're solid at the grade I think the roof would be hard and heady but would go. After the roof the climbing is just fantastic. The ice had receded so that I needed to tension traverse and then gun it 40 ft. unprotected to the belay. After that its nothing but steep plastic ice.
Thankfully I have a post-NCLEX, post-nursing school Canadian Rockies trip coming up shortly. I'm hoping that six months of climbing and three expeditions can wipe away the memory of nursing school. Time to get out there and take some cuts.
1 comment:
Awesome! Great pics!
Decide on where your exodus out of the NW will take you?
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