northern happenings

Hillside Pillars is located in Hatcher’s Pass, AK. Ben and I left at 9:30 Wednesday morning and we starting the approach by 11:00.

The approach:

The ice:

The lower section is Water Ice (WI) 2 and the upper section is WI4. We soloed the lower section and kept climbing to the top.

Ben led the pitch and I followed then we set up a top rope and did laps all over the front curtain. It was an awesome day! 

It was around 3 degrees that day and oddly enough there was a column of water spraying straight out of a hole in the ice. It shot between 12 and 15 feet out from the wall! So as I rappelled down I had to take a sip. 

Needless to say, I was covered with ice when I finally got to the ground. It tasted great!! Just freezing cold.

After we climbed to our heart’s content, we down climbed and simul-rappelled down to the road. We were warm and laughed pretty much the whole time, certainly the best day of climbing in a while!

Cheers