Ice Climbing, take two.

Tip of the day: Always bring spare socks. No one likes wet socks.

So on the 24th of April we were paid a visit by Bill Bailey as he played a gig for the northernmost town in the world. But apparently that wasn't a fun enough day and so when faced with the opportunity to go ice climbing with Noel and Arnau, naturally I couldn't pass the opportunity up.

Our target was a frozen waterfall north of Longyearbyen at Hyperittfossen:

This required travelling about for about an hour by snowscooter. Of course by this point it's nothing new and we've been numerous places by such modes of transport. However the snow scooter that I was afforded the luxury of using was that of Jamie Rodgers. I was warned beforehand that the scooter had no suspension but oh my, that was one hell of a bumpy ride. I don't think I could have physically gone above 70 kph or so and that was whilst on the verge of being propelled over the steering after each bump. No surprise that I had a hell of a lot of fun doing so!

So we arrived and it was a grey day but nothing terrible, no wind so a win there. All seemed well until we got to the top of the climb and Noel unfortunately fell through some hidden slush and procured a very moist foot in the process. A spare sock later and Noel was fine and ready to do some route prep. Just look at this photogenic man.

So the frozen waterfall was a 2 stage fall, the first was more of a slope and the second was sheer. Whilst Noel and Arnau scaled the first slope I took the scooter down to the lower slope and waited for them to set the top of sheer drop. This of course meant that I had a little while to take some pictures:

Once the top anchor was set, Arnau took the first climb:

Followed by Noel:

And then myself:

So much fun! I can pretty safely say that this is something I wouldn't have been able to do in the UK and I can definitely say that it's something I will do again. Mind you, next time I won't go about doing the following:

Seems that crampons tend to stick to ice and thus I ended up the wrong way round on the descent, at least Arnau got his picture of me failing (Y).

After all that excitement I was content. Arnau had other ideas though and decided that he just had to climb some of the rock as well, I swear this guy is obsessed or something. But with good reason, he is a rather good climber after all:

Though turns out it wasn't only me to have a minor issue whilst climbing. Arnau didn't end up the wrong way round but he could have had a much worse finale. One of the cams decided it had a problem with the wall and slipped out, given that the cams are the thing holding the rope in place on a lead climb, that fall wouldn't have been fun.

Once Arnau had scaled this face, there was a need to retrieve the top anchor that had been set. Naturally I got in way over my head and required rescuing but, I like to think I had everything under control...

And then it was time for Bill Bailey, and damn he was hilarious. We were sat center front and thus, naturally, were the ones to be picked on. "Give me the groove?" (In-joke for the Svalbuds)

All in all, a good day :)

Time for a cuppah I think.

Ice Climbing, take one.

So the next few posts are going to be a bit of a catch up as I've fallen behind, yet again, on keeping everyone up to date.

So the best place to start seems like the time we decided that exploring the safe section of the Ice-Caves wasn't enough and that we simply had to strap ourselves into the ice and venture forth down to the bottom of the glacier.

The climb consisted of 2 main drops, the first of which was about 4-5 heavily inclined meters but nothing too troubling. Our anchors were 2 ropes buried and tied directly into the ice, each had a locking carabiner and connecting the two was a sling that auto equalised. From this we had a single locking carabiner that was attached to the rope that we rapelled on and before we began climbing we had to be locked into the anchor ourselves by a separate sling that was also attached to our harness. Safety first!

After rapelling down the first slope one by one we moved to the second location where the drop was somewhat more dramatic and sitting in the 8 meter range, also vertical. This run was somewhat faster than the first as we were familiar with the techniques and maneuvers required to successfully rappel. Crampons attached I nearly impaled my leg on the way down but I didn't which I'm counting as a win.

And we all reached the bottom in one piece, fantastic.

Then came the even more exciting bit, we had to ditch the larger bags and head for the tiny gap just a few more meters down the trail that required us to lie on our bellies and claw our way through, pulling smaller bags and supplies with us as we went. Not that I spent a huge amount of time pondering on it but there was an entire glaciers worth of ice above our heads, not something for the claustrophobic! Once through we entered a larger cavern where we decided we would have lunch, but not till after seeing just how far we could make it before getting stuck; turns out we could go quite a way further but not without again having to get on our bellies and squeeze through a gap just about big enough for my shoulders, so much fun! Once we reached an area that we could stand up, the ice nerds started examining the facets of snow that had formed in the belly of the beast, and postulated on whether they had been formed merely by the breath of explorers or whether there was some form of air tunnel leading to the surface that was allowing a supply of moist air to reach the lower depths. I'm not sure a conclusion was reached but I cared not so much as my feet were starting to get cold. No one likes cold feet. So we squeezed our way back to the cavern and had lunch, breakfast burritos! (confused yet?)

Once we had satisfied our curiosity and I had run out of batteries in my camera and GoPro, we decided to head back up. If you've never used ascenders, I highly recommend the challenge, you need impeccable coordination or you will, as in my case, successfully impale yourself on the crampons. Ouch. Fun fact and testament to my clothing was that I managed to break my skin and draw blood but didn't actually manage to rip the trousers. Bizarre.

Absolutely hilarious fun though, especially with the company, and I can't see me forgetting it / not jumping at the opportunity to do it / something similar again.

Anywho it's late here despite the fact the sun seems to have forgotten it, yep, midnight sun! So I shall bit you all farewell and do my best to write the rest of the material up in the next few days and I promise a video to follow!

Time for a cuppah I think.