Sunday, 17 February 2013

Intro Winter Climbing Weekend

I have been working an intro climbing course over the weekend, and despite the warmer we managed to achieve a lot.  We spent the Saturday as a combined group with Phil's in the Gulch running a ice climbing workshop.  This was an excellent way to coach folks movement and technique whilst close enough to see and talk to each other.  We did a mixture of No axe and One axe climbing to really focus the feet as well as a couple of steeper route to test all the skills being coached.  Everyone showed a big improvement through the day on ground grade II-IV.

Yesterday I climbed Waterfall Gully IV,4*** quickly and early, then spent the rest of the day looking at building belays in rock and ice, as well as bucket seats etc.  There is still a massive amount to go at on the Ben, and now the snow has settled down and things are freezing overnight, conditions are going to continue to improve.  Sunday was a much better day, and people climbed all the ridges and the steeper face ice routes.

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