Hey Lambone!!!! (Cody Question)

[JayB]

...and anyone else that's been to Cody in Spring.

 

I'm heading out to Cody tomorrow morning and will be there for the next week. Most of the south facing stuff should be toast by the time I get there but the folks at www.coldfear.com have been saying that the north facing stuff has grown as fat as they've ever seen it for the past couple of weeks.

 

So - I need some recommendations. Looking for north facing 3's with a reasonable approach for the days when the g/f gets off of work at the hospital early (like noon) and for north facing 3s and 4s for when the homey from CO joins me up there from Friday-Sunday. Bozos Revenge and Mean Green are looking good at the moment but I'm open to suggestions as I have zero prior experience in the area.

 

Thanks in advance for the help - will likely be crashing solo in the Cody, WY Walmart's parking lot due to some unforseen complications for with the housing situation, but am pondering Bunkhouse Willy's for lodging when the said homey rolls in later in the week, but would be grateful for any other suggestions as far as lodging in the area is concerned.

 

Cheers,

 

-Jay

[lummox]

Looking for north facing 3's with a reasonable approach for the days when the g/f gets off of work at the hospital early (like noon) and for north facing 3s and 4s for when the homey from CO joins me up there from Friday-Sunday. Bozos Revenge and Mean Green are looking good at the moment but I'm open to suggestions as I have zero prior experience in the area.

high on boulder deserves the stars it gets. it will be interesting to get across the river though. moratorium if the first pitch has ice.

many of the north facing climbs look close. none of them really are. its like 45 minutes to walk to anything (that feels far to me when you can see the climb the whole way). and the ratings in southfork are the real deal.

tell us what you find.

have a great trip.

Edited March 21, 2004 by lummox

[Lambone]

Hey,

 

Yeah, cool...bring yer T-Shits and water proof gloves! No Some of the fattest, bluest ice I have climbed was in Cody during March.

 

Here's some fat 3's and 4's

Put these on your list first:

-Bozo's

-Duck Soup

-High on Boulder

 

-Mean Grean is long with 1 short steep pillar pitch, that you can walk around.

 

-Horesetail and Ice Fest are cool also, but harder.

-Moratorium is a cool 4 that is thin at the bottom, do it if it's in.

 

Don't bother walking back to the Love Stinks climbs.

 

Crossing the river to get to High on Boulder might be sketchy, or a wade fest. If you Follow the approach to Duck Soup and just keep going past on the South Side of the river, it is a little more walking, but not that bad.

 

The approaches are no big deal, don't bother with floatation. Don't jump any fences.

 

Have fun!

[JayB]

Hey - Thanks for the suggestions!. I'm at the Public Library in Cody right now, and will head into the South Fork to check things out in a few minutes. I was planning to do that yesterday, but the fly-fishing was just too good.

[JayB]

One more question that I'll post here for posterity.

 

Is it easier to approach Mean Green and H.O.B from the end of the road on the drivers left as you enter the Valley or the road that goes a bit further upvalley on the drivers right? The hike from the left side looks longer but with fewer river crossings, while the hike from the right looks a bit shorter but has several crossings to deal with.

 

Spoke with someone at a Ranch at the end of the valley on the left side yesterday and it sounds like they are cool with climbers walking on their land as long as they are quiet and don't litter, but get quite annoyed when people ignore the "Private Road" sign just past the trailhead and take their cars on their property.

 

Appreciate all the help. There's lots of ice up there, even on the South side, but it's freaking tropical out here right now and some of the higher volume falls are coming down on the North side. May end up looking at stuff and walking away if it stays this warm.

[Lambone]

Jay,

 

As I can remember, the main road leading into the canyon forks, left goes on the South side of the river, and right goes on the North Side to Deer Creek Campground.

 

For Duck Soup go left and drive to the end where you can park...it's maybe a 1/4 mile hike down to the climb before you head up.

 

For H.O.B. I have approached from both sides of the river. Driving to the end of the road on the North Side and crossing the river there is the shortest approach, but you will need to wade the river. It will probly be deeper than you expect this time of year, maybe thigh deep.

 

I'd recomend parking as for Duck Soup and walking down to the H.O.B. drainage. I remember it being about 2 miles, takes maybe an hour. The climb is well worth it.

 

I'd stay away from climbs on the North Side (south facing) this time of year. they may still look fat from the road, but you are bound to find sun-fucked ice and slush. No good.

 

Also, be carefull of pillars. Stick to the big blue fat flows on the South side, and bring yer Gor-tex and T-shirts.

 

Go climbing! Have fun!

[JayB]

Well - I had high hopes for this trip but well over a week of record high temperatures more or less put the kibosh on the ice climbing. I new that heading out there this late in the year would be a bit of a crap-shoot, and I brought along all of my fly-fishing gear, some rock gear, and a snowboard as back-ups. As luck would have it, I ended up using all of the "back-up" gear and none of the ice gear.

 

After rolling into town on Monday morning, I strolled into the local fly-shop, got wind of a killer blue-winged olive hatch, and bought a one-day license after explaining to the guy at the desk that I had come out to Cody for the ice climbing but was glad to have something to do on the days when I didn't have a partner. After coming in every single morning thereafter for the next four days, this had become something of a joke, and the occupants would have themselves a good chortle after asking me "How that there ice climbing'd been yesterday." Both my girlfriend and I thought that we might be able to squeeze some midweek climbing in together, but she ended up putting in far more hours than she had imagined she'd have to before the trip - so it was basically just me and the trout going mano y mano all week long. Thankfully, I was in the midst of the best dry-fly I'd seen since the late 80's, and found ample consolation while wading the Shoshone River. And this was right in the middle of town - amazing.

 

Anyhow - a pal from Colorado was scheduled to arrive Thursday evening, so I took some time early in the week to check out the ice. The last I heard Wyoming was the final refuge of the "you can have a drink while you drive but you'd better not drive drunk" philosophy, so I picked up a few and had a couple once I had more or less arrived in the valley.

 

Despite the warm temps, it looked as though there was still plenty of ice in the valley, even if most of it was looking a bit white and sun-rotted by the time I got there.

 

 

I was hoping to take a few shots of some of the ice in the distance and blow them up to see if that would tell me anything more about their condition

and even resorted to the poor man's telephoto (sticking a pair of binocs on the end of the camera) to help things along.

 

I spoke with one of the locals at the end of the Hunter Creek Ranch Road about access, saw the fractured remains of a route or two on the shady side of the valley, then turned around and spoke to the aftorementioned pal about the conditions, and checked in with some locals for good measure.

 

In the end we ended up heeding their advice, stayed away form the ice, and stuck to the rock in the upper Shoshone Canyon. We did find an incredible stash of ice the following day, but unfortunately it was carpeting the slopes out at Red Lodge, MT. After a kicked back day on the slopes there, it was time to head back to Colorado for a day or two to check in with a few friends from my time there, then catch a ride back to the PNW.

 

 

[Alex]

thats a lot of driving for a day of skiing!

[fern]

 

resize your pictures!!!

 

[JayB]

Never. You are hereby condemned to an eternity of left-to-right scrolling.

[JoshK]

In Montana you can still drink while driving too!