Raphael Slawinski

Yesterday Eamonn and I came back for the last route in our Tangle(d) trilogy. Undertow was the first route climbed on the wall, and is without a doubt one of the finest ice climbs in the Rockies. All but one or two pitches are moderate, but they go on and on, all the way to the summit. Below are some photos from our day. Dawn over the Sunwapta valley. It had been snowing off and on over the previous few days, and fresh snow blanketed the mountains. Eamonn making the long traverse from the top of Shades of Beauty to the base of the routes. We traversed above treeline to avoid the post-holing in the trees. This is what we drove three hours and walked four hours for. From the left: "Undertow", "Can't Touch This" and "Boobquake". As the sun hit the wall, sloughs started coming down all over the place. Some were big enough to make us stop and think what we might be getting ourselves into. "Let's go, they're just sloughs. What's the w...

Given that I live on the doorstep on the Canadian Rockies, it’s probably just as well I’m not a devoted rock climber. Don’t get me wrong, I love rock climbing, and I've been going up to Yam and Bataan since the middle of March. But when the weather turns cold and snowy, I’m just as happy going ice climbing – especially when it’s ice like the stuff on the north side of Tangle Ridge. I’d heard rumours of big ice back there, but it wasn’t until I saw photos of the route “Undertow” that I realized just how cool it was. The northeast face of Tangle Ridge. From the left, the routes are "Undertow", "Can't Touch This" and "Boobquake" Last weekend Dana Ruddy, Eamonn Walsh, Ian Welsted and I got up early and hiked up Beauty Creek. The approach is long (almost four hours) but straightforward, and the tedium is nicely broken by having to climb “Shades of Beauty” an hour into it. We considered making a foursome on “Undertow” but thought this might involve t...