Ouray
January 2004
After having such a great time in Ouray in 2003, the decision to return the following year was an easy one.
The house we
had rented before was no longer being offered, so we stayed in
the
Riversong Suite, which is also operated by The Victorian Inn. While
it didn't sleep as many, the kitchen and living room were huge, so there was
plenty of space for other friends to come and hang out.
We got in lots of climbing on this trip. In fact, Angela and I were
so busy climbing that we didn't bother to take very
many pictures. The first day was spent in an area known as South Park.
It snowed pretty heavily this day, and every thing got wet and icy by the end
of the day. Luckily we had a large, warm mudroom to dry out our ropes
and clothing.
On day two we climbed primarily in the Lower Bridge and Scottish Gullies
areas. We top-roped some fun, difficult lines, and I ventured out on my
first ice lead climb called By Gully (WI3). Much of the ice on the more
moderate climbs was in onion skin condition (layers of snow and ice built on
top of
one
another). These conditions made it difficult to get great protection.
Every time I picked out what I thought looked like good, solid ice, I would
hit a pocket of snow, which of course, considerably compromises the holding
power of the ice screw. I learned that finding and placing protection on
an ice climb can often be the crux of the route.
By day three there was talk on the weather reports of some nasty winter
weather headed our way. Half of our group decided it might be better to
head back home that afternoon instead of spending another night and driving
back the following morning. Angela, Will, Alison, and I decided to stay
and squeeze in a few more climbs. Besides, we really didn't like the
thought of driving home
through the night after a tiring day of climbing.
Things worked out well. Will and I totally burned ourselves out on some 30meter WI5 climbs at the end of the day. When we got back to our apartment we discovered that the rest of the gang had been kind enough to not eat all of the food that had been in the crock pot all day. Plus, we still had a couple growlers of Glenwood Canyon Beer that needed consumed and there were only four of us to do the job!
On the drive home the following day, we only had to drive on wet roads for about 15 miles around Glenwood Springs. Other than that we managed to slip in between the bad weather systems and made it back home without incident.
