Calum Kenny (UK/Hong Kong) and I climbed the North Ridge of Vallunaraju in Peru’s Cordillera Blanca on July 10, 2024. We successfully completed the route, although we found it in much harder condition than reported in many sources. We carried our camp up and over and descended the standard route to moraine camp, and then the Llaca refuge.
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Colorado’s ice climbing scene is a little secretive. Numerically, we probably have the most ice climbers out of any state in the USA. As an informal way of controlling those crowds, information about where the ice is located is pretty hard to come by. Conditions, too, are often hoarded.
Facebook groups exist, and are probably the best source of current info (as well as drama). If you know where to look and what the names of the climbs are, Mountain Project can be an ok resource. But there’s plenty which is not online or is intentionally obscured.
This post is just intended as a primer for the guidebooks which exist for Colorado ice. It points you towards a few resources, if you care to track them down. I’ll link to Amazon where possible, but keep in mind that the prices on these things change algorithmically according to supply and demand, so it’s hard for me to know what type of price you’ll see.
If you don’t want to buy these books, the regional Colorado libraries have some copies, and the American Alpine Club has a spectacular guidebook library, located in Golden, which AAC members can take advantage of. I have also personally installed a few of these books at the Ice Coop in Boulder. Don’t steal ’em.
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Although once a hip and trendy book, few people today seem to read and connect with “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” by Robert M. Pirsig. First published in 1974, this philosophical novel celebrates its 50th birthday this year. My attempts at forming an anniversary book club within my family have been unsuccessful; only I have done the readings.
I read this book at the crag in Indian Creek, suffering through a sandstorm. Every time I come to the Creek I promise I’ll read at the crag – this past trip was the first time I’ve ever done so. Conversation in Indian Creek, when not being made impossible by howling wind blowing sand between your molars and into your cavities, consists of general ego stroking: “Oh you did that crack? Have you tried this crack? Someday I want to try this other crack!” And so on.
It’s tedious, and unavoidable.
In that context, this excerpt felt appropriate. What do you think?
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We snuck in a quick weekend attack on Mount Shuksan, in the North Cascades National Park, Washington. Shuksan was described to me as a “little mountain with big mountain terrain,” which I think is apt. Although the summit is not high, the climb packs quite a punch.
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Information about this peak is a little scarce or outdated online, so I thought I would provide a 2023 update. (2024 update: the glacier tongue shrank and technical ice section is now subject to bad rock/icefall. Guided groups are attacking it in the middle of the night to mitigate risk. As you’ll see if you read this post, that was not at all the case last year, we climbed in full daylight. For more on this topic, see my 2024 post, Climate Change in the Cordillera Blanca.)
Huarapasca is a mountain at the southern end of the Cordillera Blanca, in Peru. It is notable for an extremely short approach, by Cordillera Blanca standards, as well as a 100-140 meter section of AI3/WI3 – legitimate ice climbing. It is one of only a handful of peaks in the area which you can do in a day and back from Huaraz.
Although once considered an obscurity, it saw quite a bit of traffic this season (2023), with several agencies in Huaraz promoting the mountain as a guided offering. People who have climbed it in years past say the mountain is becoming icier.
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