Another great weekend in the gorgeous Fireweed Hostel. Hard to believe a full month went by between these two camps, and how different conditions were! A great group of woman arrived at Haffner on day one from all over the US and Canada. Strong women attacked the ice and mixed climbs and despite the non stop snow that day, all climbed until their arms were tired!
So nice to step into the warm hostel and have a solid place to dry everything, since we got pretty soaked in the wet snow all day! WE knew it was coming…but we didn’t know just how bad the Pineapple Express was going to be…it was pretty full on! Just the day before I was climbing in low avi conditions in the sun with Lilla on Pilsner…and now, the world was a full on snow and rain globe. Roads were getting slick, snow was accumulating and the beautiful town and ice climbs of Field were quickly becoming unattainable due to avi hazard. Such a bummer!
The group was super understanding however and we all were psyched to try what we could. The following day Kris headed off to Louise Falls with Caroline, Leise and Kate. They had a pretty great day and good on Leise for her first multipitch climb! WE all joined them later in the day as we had to bail from our Golden objectives. Too much rain made rock and ice fall too hazardous, and so we turned our tails and also climbed Louise falls. A great climb in an amazing setting. Plus we got to watch some spectacular avalanches off of Fairview across the valley!
The following day we had ambitions plans to climb Murchison, Tokkumn and 570. The Murchison cars made it out of Field but we were the only ones to do so. Semi trucks that hadn’t put on their chains were crisscrossed all along the big hill making it a pinball maze for any cars to try and get through. We made it through but eventually had to also turn around on the icefields parkway due to major snow and wind. All good though, as LeeAnne, Andrea and I had Tokkumn pole to ourselves and got massively pumped doing laps on all sorts of fun lines in there. John, Diana and Sonja hit up Louise Falls and also had few crowds there. Kris and Eric saved the day with the remaining Field group by tromping up to Waterworks. An Avi free crag in Field where everyone worked on skills and did a bunch of leading. Yeah! Good motivation group and way to save the day Kris and Eric! That night, John did a great session on sharpening tools and crampons. No more asking those boyfriends and husbands!
The final day gave us a small reprieve from the nasty weather, and we had a nice overnight freeze as well! Kris went with Diana and Jen to Essondale, which sounded like it was in challenging shape! John coached Andrea and Dara as they led up Riverview. Marco went with Claire and Caroline as they both crushed the Tokkumn pole, and Kate led Leise up Grotto falls with myself and then cranked out some mixed routes on his and hers. Sooo nice to get a full day of accomplishing what we set out for! So proud of all the strong leaders and followers out there as well.
We all gathered up at the Georgetown for a nice final diner and everyone walked away with some new OR ferrosi jackets for the spring. Thanks OR!
Thanks again to Sonja, Kris, John, Eric and Marco for making the camp possible, and a HUGE thanks to Andrea, Claire, Jen, Dara, Diana, Caroline, Kate, Leise and LeeAnne for joining us for this fun weekend and being so understanding and flexible with the weather. So cool to watch everyone improve over the years and take on new challenges every year! Keep it up everyone!