Back in the early 1970’s ice climbing was undergoing a revolution. It started with rigid crampons and new ice tools configured for steeper ice, as well as the game-changing ascent of Bridal Veil Falls by Jeff Lowe and Mike Weis. At that time the ice climbing community was still quite small and we few, we happy few ice climbers in Gunnison heard about new ice climbs mostly by word-of-mouth. When word came in of some newly discovered frozen snot-cicle somewhere we typically would pile into Jimmy Newberry’s truck and strike out for another frigid adventure. One such rumor concerned a multi-pitch gem plastered to the side of some peak in the San Juan Mountains west of Lake City. We (Jimmy Newberry, Jim Nigro, Tom Polaski, and I) found our joy way up Henson Creek in the form of the bluest ice I have ever seen.
This particular climb featured numerous short steep sections separated by longer lower angle ramps. The highest steep section was also the longest at 70 to 80 ft of vertical ice and comprised the crux of the climb. At this point in our budding ice careers we felt pretty confident soloing the lower angle stuff near the bottom of the climb, but roped up for the steeper steps as well as the intervening ramps. This and climbing as two parties of two allowed us to make progress quickly. The entire climb was probably +800 ft high in total elevation gain and climbing quickly was definitely an asset. I was roped up with my friend Jim Nigro, who was pretty new to the ice game at this point in his career relative to the extremely talented and strong climber he would become. I selfishly used his inexperience to claim title on all of the leads that we roped up for and Jim seemed OK with that.
A note about this particular climb is appropriate here, in that it was rather unique in our experience in several ways. First, it was the bluest ice any of us had ever encountered, or would encounter in four decades of climbing ice. Also, it was the smoothest steep ice I have ever seen. In my experience as ice approaches verticality it looks more like the drippings of candle wax, full of hollows and rugosities that lend themselves to hooking, single swing placements, and potentially dodgy ice screw placements. This ice just was not like that. Even the steep parts were relatively smooth, and the ice was so cold that it tended to “dinner plate” off, requiring multiple swings to get to trustworthy ice. The ice screw placements on the other hand were just bombproof. I often found myself just pausing to run my gloved hand over the surface of the ice and marveling at its color and smoothness.

The higher we went the more conscientiously we set up solid belays and placed screws along the way, although I still tended to run it out a bit on the steep sections in order to make quick progress. The crux pitch was everything we had hoped it would be, just a solid piece of steep ice climbing with no drama and solid pro. A couple of screws at the top for the belay and Bob’s yer uncle.
Above that crux pitch there was still a couple of hundred feet of lower angle ramps, short, steep steps, and abundant “ice hiking” before we got to a place where we could traverse off the climb and on to a slope that led us back down the mountain. Although it is possible that we were not the first folks to climb this particular bit of ice, we never heard rumors or tales of others beating us to it and it was certainly virginal when we were on it. The entire climb had been nothing but good wholesome fun, although a bit of a long afternoon. Our descent should have been a cruise, since it was all downhill and the deep snow was not that much of an impediment to downward progress. However, there exists a certain kind of person who can make an epic out of the most ordinary of situations. When my colleagues decided to take a meandering detour around a particular cliff band, I thought I could steal a march on them by proceeding along a small series of ledges to a little couloir for a more direct descent. My small ledges almost crossed this 70 degree sloping rock face that ended up being wider than the ledges were long. Thinking I could use a small aspen sapling growing out of a crack to help me bridge the gap, I ended up discovering just what a “more direct descent” could actually entail. The sapling it gave up and I was off like a shot, sliding down the rock for 20 ft and over a cliff for another 20 ft. I was fortunate that the sloping rock face had repeatedly avalanched all previous snow fall off it because the 6 ft of snow I landed in totally cushioned my landing. None-the-worse for wear, I elected to stay with my partners’ more rational route finding from that point forward. Back in Lake City some beers were applied judiciously for first aid purposes only.