ice climbing in the adirondacks
Hello world. Welcome to my new blogsite and digital diary, rescued from the cruel clutches of Weebly. In this installment, I want to review the sport of ice climbing.
This February, I received a scholarship to attend the Adirondack Queer Ice Fest in Keene Valley, NY. At the time, I was experiencing intense cabin fever living with my family in Virginia, so this was a nice break to keep me from going completely insane. I had never ice climbed before, nor really had the inclination to, but I was excited to try something new, and more importantly, get the fuck out of Virginia.
My first problem arose when I would consider how to get there. I live 10 hours away from Upstate NY, and I had just driven to New Hampshire in September, a harrowing journey where I got stuck on a bridge in NYC. I was not thrilled to re-live this experience, so I decided to go the long way through Pennsylvania and car camp in the cold. I was still not happy about this arrangement, but then... I saw someone in the group-chat named Hunter asking for a ride from Maryland. Upon contacting him, I realized that we had actually met- I had been their guide on the Via that summer! Me and Hunter became fast friends, and I got to meet their thirteen cats (well fourteen, at the time of writing this...)
Now for the climbing: my designated group climbed at the crag Pitchoff Right. I began my climb with confidence, but was immediately humbled. My guide told me that my instincts in rock climbing was what was holding me back! The way I see it, rock climbing is a very elegant and soft sport, one where you dance with the wall, and half the climb takes place in your mind. On the opposite end, ice climbing is a sport where you violently stab the wall with giant knives on your hands and feet. A big beginner mistake is overthinking it, when the process is stupid simple: Stab the ice! Stab the ice again! Kick the ice! Kick the ice again! And that's it. It makes me feel like a Victorian-era starving nine year old in the coal mines, doing physical labor and getting paid pennies a day. The less I though about it, the faster I'd cruise up the wall. It's definitely different from rock climbing, and I can see how this would be an amazing way to let off steam from a stressful 9 to 5. Would I do this again in the future? Maybe, once I financially recover from buying my trad rack... but it's definitely going to the bottom of my ever-expanding hobbies list, somewhere in between customizing mechanical keyboards and spear-fishing.
Although ice climbing was cool, the best part of the trip was getting to meet a bunch of cool people. I got to meet an online friend, practice my ASL, and had some good times with Hunter. On the drive back, we got to have some satisfying hour-long talks about being trans-masc, something I've never really verbalized before. But the best-best-best part about the trip was that adding gas, gear, housing and everything... I didn't spend a dime :3.