I’ld heard “Way in the Wilderness” was in good shape, so good friend and climbing partner Bob and I decided to take a walk out there to attempt it. I had climbed this route a few years back as one of my first Grade 5 leads and was excited to get back to it.

As we started gearing up the sun really started to shine…

While Bob was racking up bits of chandelier ice starting coming down from above, indicating the effects of solar radiation on fragile ice… The crux looked pretty tricky, and with the added worry of something larger breaking off in the warm temps we decided it was not to be… we decided instead to explore some of the ice to the left of this route, closer to the Rainbow Slabs area…

 

Feeling good after a few laps on this we moved further left and found this great little route:

This short grade 3ish start lead to 200 feet of fun grade 2 with a little bulge near the top and great views of Rainbow Slabs all the way to the Covered Bridge…

 

 

A rope stretching 200 foot rappel got us to the ground, where we packed up and headed for the car (and ultimately the Moat Brewery of course).

While we didn’t get our ideal climb in, we enjoyed the exploring and time spent in a beautiful place, and who knows, winter is not over yet!