Ice Climbing Sunday

[ThomP]

Anyone heading out for ice this Sunday?

ThomP

[mike]

I'm outta the loop... gotta go wrestle a smoke stack... thanks for asking.

Mike

[Zamboni]

I'm out too. I get to play Mr. Home owner and insulate my basement.

[Seb]

Hey,

I’d be up for climbing on Sunday! I should mention that I don’t have a car though. A Hall’s Harbour session would be fun. Two things to consider: 1. I need to be in town for a dinner at 5:00 (this means that we’ll have to leave at 3:00), and 2. High tide is at 11:30. If we get on the go early neither of these points should interfere with our day too much. I’m thinking we leave Halifax at 7:00; this means we should arrive at Halls at around 9:00. This should leave us with enough time before the tide comes up to walk along the shore and find a route that will have some space to belay from when the water rises (I’ve climbed at Hall’s at high tide before and can say with certainty that such routes do exist).

What do you think? If you’re interested, send me an email at sebastian.launcelott@gmail.com to arrange further details.

Seb

[veronica]

I am up for Halls Harbour (or where ever) Sunday.

vern_s@hotmail.com

[peter]

Anyone heading out for ice this Sunday?
ThomP

Gotta work, so I can play later next week.

Peter

[ThomP]

Hey Seb -

Hope you got out. Life intruded, and I was unable to get away. Post a TR if you did!

ThomP

[Seb]

I managed to get out to Hall’s Harbour on Sunday, and was out on Saturday too at the Old Baxter Mill Road Area. This weekend high tide was at around 11h00. On Saturday Rich, Sean Cassidy (a.k.a. Seanrad Wanker), Chuck, and I waited until after high tide to climb. We walked in along the top of the cliff, set anchors for top-ropes on two different routes, and then rappelled down as the tide was on its way out. We climbed until dusk, with me doing the last climb of the day and subsequently taking the anchors down in the dark (I did have a headlamp however). The routes at the Old Baxter Mill Road area appeared to be slightly thinner than the week before, but the difference was negligible. Given the weather forecast of a mild day, we expected the ice to be quite plastic. However, we encountered much colder temperatures than anticipated, which resulted in fairly brittle ice.

On Sunday Sean Drohan, Veronica, Simon, Jeremy, and I ventured out to Hall’s Harbour West. Our approach to dealing with the tide on this day was to begin the day early (leaving at 7h00 and arriving at about 9h00) which left us time to walk along the shore, before the tide came up, to identify routes that could still be climbed at high tide (i.e. routes that would still have somewhere to start and belay from). We found two routes about 300 meters from the wharf where we had parked, which met our criteria (one grade 4, the other grade 5); Simon lead the grade 4 and top-ropes were then set on both routes. Sunday was very cold and windy, but where we had selected to climb was fairly well sheltered. The ice, to an extent even greater than the day before, was brittle and often necessitated several swings to sink tools into (although this did not at all detract from an enjoyable day of climbing). After we had had our fill of the routes we had initially set-up on, the tide had gone out enough to allow us to walk the shore again. Another route (about 200 meters from the wharf) was lead by Jeremy before we left at 15h00.