Jason Nelson, Skylight WI5, Camp Bird Road, Ouray, CO
We love the Ouray Ice Festival! It’s a fun two weeks of socializing, climbing, eating, drinking, breathing… OK, I’ll leave it at that. This year I was fortunate enough to go out on a couple photo shoots with photographer Andrew Burr (http://www.andrewburr.com/). I’ve been photographed by Andy before, and I’ve always been pleased with the results. He’s competent and fun to be around.
Our first stop was Skylight (WI5) at the Skylight area on Camp Bird Rd. I teamed up with Caroline George, another talented ice climber. Andrew hiked around to the top (read post-holing) while Caroline and I warmed up on an easy dry-tooling route.
I overheard some chatter from other climbers at the base of the route that the second pitch of Skylight was “not in” and that someone had just backed off of it a day or two before. Sometimes this kind of talk will persuade me not to do a particular climb, but I’ve learned not to rely so heavily on such “facts” (read opinions) over the years. I could see that there was ice in the chimney, and that was all I needed to know.
I got first lead, and up into the chimney I went. I started laughing, it was all chandelier ice with a heavy flow of water running over it. If I wasn’t getting my picture taken, there would have been no way I would have bothered with such nonsense. Fortunately, I had my Outdoor Research, Mentor Jacket which is Gore-Tex, as it was the most colorful one for the photo-shoot. I tighten up my cuffs and collar, and up I went. I was only about ten feet into the climb but I was pretty soaked, mostly just on the outside thanks to the Gore-Tex. I was very happy to have Gore-Tex gloves on as well. There was plenty of hydrating to be done on the climb, all I had to do was open my mouth.
Skylight is a good example of how ice climbing ratings really don’t say much about a climb. It is given an WI5 rating which normally means extended sections of vertical ice. That’s all well and good, but there are few places on the climb where you can just lean on the wall behind you and get a no hands rest. That same comforting back wall also restricts your swings into nothing more than a tap at times and getting through the constrictions can be awkward at best. Regardless of grades, it’s a classic climb and although a little claustrophobic, it’s a must do for anyone. But consider wearing Gore-Tex or some other waterproof fabric.
Andrew also got some great shots of Caroline and they are on her blog (http://carolinegeorge.blogspot.com/2010/02/andrew-burr-eye-candy.html)
You can click on the below images to see larger versions. These are some of my favorites of what Andrew shot on this climb. Photos are the copyright of Andrew Burr (http://www.andrewburr.com/).
“Going Retro” (M6) is sort of an amusing route for me. We called the route “Going Retro” because the first clip is actually some old mining chain or something of the sort. It’s pretty amusing to clip a piece of chain link that is so big you can fit your hand through it.
