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Getting Into Ice Climbing

If you enjoy rock climbing, winters can be problematic since most of your favorite climbs aren’t exactly accessible. Ice climbing may just be the answer to your problem.

If you have experience rock climbing, you may just think it is a hop, skip and jump to being able to handle ice climbing. Nothing could be further from the truth. Yes, some of the terminology is the same, but the technique is not even close. Your mastery of various finger holds isn’t going to be much help or even relevant.

Ice climbing is an absolute blast once you get past the fact you are essentially climbing water. The urge to just start doing it is something you have to be wary of. First off, you need the correct equipment. Much of your rock climbing equipment simply isn’t gong to cut it. Instead of climbing shoes, you need crampons and boots. Your handy dandy axe is going to be critical and you need to master the technique before even thinking of climbing.

Dressing warmly is obviously a major issue. You need warm, but flexible clothing. Whenever the surface you are climbing on is frozen, you need to dress to prevent frostbite. This is true for everything from the top of your head to the bottom of your feet. If you don’t dress properly, you can run into a situation where even minimal frostbite occurs. Once off the ice, the blood will start to return to the effected areas and it can be incredibly painful. How painful? Think of someone sticking lots of needles in the area in question.

Perhaps the biggest thing you need to accept is you need to climb with others that are experienced. Ice climbing is a unique technique. For experienced rock climbers, it can be hard to admit a little help and advice is a good idea. Unless you want to risk a major problem, you are just going to have to check your ego at the door. Find an experienced ice climber and spend a day with them. You will be surprised at how much you learn and rather shocked at the mistakes you would have made.

Much like rock climbing, ice is a blast. Just don’t assume skills in one niche translate to the other.

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Rick Chapo is with NomadJournals.com - makers of ice climbing journals.

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