Ice Climbing

As the autumn leaves fall, the days shorten and the temperature drops. Streams slow down, any precipitation falls as snow, blanketing the mountainside and streaks of blue-white ice start to form, marking out potential lines for the coming season.

- Adrian Nelhams

These complex, intricate structures of crystalized ice build over time as the temperature continues to fall. It needs to be a gradual process and it’s at this point that we start to tune into what’s going on in the Alps. A plummet in temperature for a week and the ice stops building; the ice may look great, but there’s no structure to it (it’s brittle and has little to support itself ). If it stays brutally cold, then perhaps the lower venues, where it’s a few degrees warmer, will start to come good.

Too warm for too long, then it’s a late bloomer with many of the lower venues possibly not even forming at all and climbing at a higher venue where it’s colder is key.

A dry autumn with no snow means it could be a lean season with little seepage and only the main water courses coming into condition early on. Early snow may offer a good feed to many of the ice routes if you get a good melt-freeze cycle of weather.

Every season is different and that’s what makes climbing the frozen waterfalls so special. Conditions change year to year and even day to day, so understanding how the ice has been formed, what the weather has been like during the weeks before you head out and what’s going on in the ‘here and now’ is key. Temperature is the biggest factor to the quality of ice and how safe the icefall is. Be mindful also of the snow that’s built up on slopes above the ice fall, the sun impacting on that snow and the wind that cross-loads any bowls or gullies you may be climbing, both before and on that day. Don’t plan too far ahead, but follow the weather and conditions and see how the ice is forming during this season.