Ouray Ice Climbing is in!

Writ­ten by MM guide Jesse Selwyn/​pho­tos below Sel­wyn collection/​image above by Anna Nicole Arteaga

Glanc­ing up high to see a frozen path cas­cad­ing down a cliff band can be as excit­ing as any untracked bowl of pow­der. Fol­low­ing the sound and feel­ing of ice tools find­ing sol­id place­ment in blue water ice often becomes addict­ing for those who give it a try. Then there’s the moun­tain doors that open once ice climb­ing is added to your skillset: the North Ridge of Mt. Bak­er, North Face of Shuk­san, the Moose’s Tooth in Alas­ka, Alpa­mayo in Peru, and many others.

Learn­ing to ice climb does require ice and lots of it. The best place to find an abun­dance of ice to climb at any dif­fi­cul­ty is in the small town of Ouray, CO. Sit­ting at the base of the San Juan Moun­tains in the south­west cor­ner of the state, Ouray is home to the world famous Ouray Ice Park. Start­ing in Novem­ber, the park’s mad sci­en­tists aka Ice Farm­ers, begin run­ning over 250 show­er­heads above the Uncom­pah­gre Riv­er Gorge to cre­ate over 150 ice climbs and is open from mid-Decem­ber through mid-March every year. There is ter­rain in the park to suit climbers at every abil­i­ty, be it their first time wear­ing cram­pons and hold­ing an ice tool to pro­fes­sion­als look­ing to test them­selves on ver­ti­cal ice pil­lars. It’s also an excel­lent place to spend a day brush­ing up on your skills before head­ing into the local back­coun­try to ascend some of the dozens of climbs that include world renown clas­sics such as Stair­way to Heav­en and Whore­house Hoses. 

Some Moun­tain Mad­ness cours­es and climbs for you in Ouray:

Cours­es — from begin­ner to advanced mixed rock and ice instruc­tion, we have it all for you

Guid­ed Ice Climb­ing — push your lim­its and tick off some area clas­sics with our guides

While small, Ouray’s hot springs, choco­late shop, brew­eries, and restau­rants pro­vide a great apres-climb atmos­phere. Then there is the Ouray Ice Fes­ti­val that occurs over 4 days in the sec­ond half of Jan­u­ary every year. This fea­tures clin­ics with guides and pro­fes­sion­al climbers, a mixed climb­ing com­pe­ti­tion, raf­fles, slideshows, and oth­er ice climb­ing relat­ed fun.

Need we say more!

Notes from a guide:

What’s the aver­age day look like when you come to climb in Ouray?

Most days begin around 7:30, when we’ll meet and go over gear to make sure every­thing fits and you’ve got enough warm lay­ers. After that, we’ll walk into the OIP and get to climb­ing! This usu­al­ly starts with a few laps on top-rope and basic instruc­tion to get the blood flow­ing before pro­gress­ing to more in depth train­ing depend­ing on your goals. We’ll wrap up around 3 or 4pm, then rest up for the next day!

What’s a Moun­tain Mad­ness guide’s favorite route to share with guests?

There’s a local, semi-secret climb named the Charmin Tube that is hid­den in a rock amphithe­ater just above town. It’s 2 long pitch­es sep­a­rat­ed by a hike in a slot canyon and a few small­er ice steps. Then we rap­pel back down. It’s a great intro to back­coun­try ice climbing!