Raphael Slawinski

The Bozeman ice fest in early December has become a bit of a tradition for me. Drive down, see some old friends, teach a couple of clinics ("Kick like you poo, swing like you screw."), and get in a day or two of climbing in Hyalite Canyon. This valley just south of Bozeman holds an outsized place in the history of North American ice and mixed climbing. Pat Callis, Jack Tackle, Alex Lowe and many others have set new standards of skill and boldness on its icy - and notoriously loose - walls. Last year I was joined by Juan Henriquez and we had an excellent day on the Big Sleep , a classic Doug Chabot-Alex Lowe route. With Juan away in South America, I messaged Jess Roskelley  to see if he wanted to get out after the fest. He was keen. We'd met before and hung out in locales ranging from Chamonix to Islamabad, but we'd never climbed together. I'd first heard of Jess in connection with a bold first ascent in Washington , a mess of chandeliers badly adhered to th...

Winter seemed to come early to the Rockies this year. Late September and early October, instead of yellow aspen leaves and flawless blue skies, brought deep snow all the way down to the valley bottoms and the plains further east. After some grumbling over the premature ends of both the rock and alpine-climbing seasons, I reluctantly embraced the wet cold. I went drytooling long before I would normally consider it socially acceptable; I ventured up the guts of a chimney I wouldn't have given a second thought to in better weather; I even swung tools into freshly formed ice , the earliest I'd done so in a quarter century of climbing ice in the Rockies. I felt almost disappointed when warm sunshine returned, melting the snow and ice and drying the rock. While in cold, shady corners choss remained solidly frozen, it seemed perverse to make winter longer than it is already. Hanging up freshly sharpened and already dulled ice tools for at least another week or two, I hiked up to ...

This past summer, Alik Berg and I went to Pakistan to have a mountain adventure. Below is a brief report from our expedition. For a more impressionistic account, check out this  Bird Blog . For a photo essay, check out this Flickr album . *** In the summer of 2018 Alik Berg and I traveled to Pakistan to climb in the Karakoram. As often happens, neither the final team nor the final objective ended up being what they had been originally. To begin with, there were four of us intent on exploring the largely untouched peaks of the Kondus valley. Over the winter, however, Chris Brazeau and Ian Welsted pulled out. Then, just a couple of months before our departure, military authorities refused the permit application for our primary objective, the unclimbed K13 (6666 m). We scrambled to find another goal, and settled on the unclimbed Pumari Chhish East (ca. 6900 m). I was familiar with the peak, having attempted it unsuccessfully in 2009 , and knew to be a difficult and inspiring...

Ducking my head, I stepped from the plane onto the jetway, and from the cool air inside the cabin into the oppressive heat of an Islamabad evening. After more than thirty hours of contorting ourselves into cramped airplane seats, and lounging at airports from Vancouver to Beijing, Alik and I had finally arrived in Pakistan. Down at the baggage carrousel, one big duffel appeared, then another and another... I held my breath as the conveyor belt grew empty with one of our bags still missing, but then a bulging blue duffel emerged. I exhaled in relief.  Outside, dazed from jetlag and sleep deprivation, we stood by as a cabbie secured a small mountain of expedition duffels to the roof rack of a Corolla. The thin string he used didn’t seem adequate for the purpose; I hoped gravity would help to keep the heavy bags in place. As we drove into the city, lightning flashed and sheets of rain came down, forcing commuters on their small motorbikes to seek shelter under overpasses. “You...

The first time I tried a really big mountain was in 2006. In the summer of that year Ben Firth, Eamonn Walsh, Ian Welsted and I traveled to Pakistan to attempt the then-unclimbed Kunyang Chhish East (ca. 7400 m). We felt strong and fit. In the weeks before our departure I went on an alpine climbing binge on Mt. Andromeda. It culminated with the first ascent, together with Scott Semple, of DTCB, an unlikely line left of the Andromeda Strain. Onsighting virgin Rockies’ choss, I felt on top of my game. As we made our way to Kunyang by plane, jeep and foot, I was optimistic about our chances. The 2500-metre tall southwest face of Kunyanf Chhish East, Pakistan. It was not to be: our highest attempt ground to a halt nearly a vertical kilometre below the virgin summit. It happens; after all, success on an expedition to Pakistan is never a given. But it wasn’t overhanging rock or thin ice that stopped us. In fact, our climbing skills were never put to a real test. No, what made us t...

Spring has come to the Rockies with a vengeance. Just now we're changing rock climbing plans for tomorrow and thinking of shady Acephale or Planet X, fearing the sunny Coliseum might be too hot. Yet not so long ago it seemed winter would never end, and we'd never trade ice tools for chalk bags. I love the transitions between the seasons. They don't last very long: one day there's a white ribbon of ice snaking down a cliffside, the next afternoon there's nothing but a dark wet streak. Or, six months hence, that same wet streak can turn overnight into a dangerously enticing veneer. It's during those times of transition that some of the wildest, most unlikely ice lines can form. I have a list of them in my head and come October, I start eying certain cliffs, knowing that if I blink, I'll miss my chance. But there at least one of these ephemeral of lines you need to keep your eyes peeled for in April. The East End of Rundle, affectionately known as EEOR...

The steep gully, hemmed in by walls of featureless limestone, opened up into a small snowfield, but higher up it necked down again. As the beam of my headlamp swept up the nearly vertical chimney, instead of the hoped-for snow bowl, it revealed nothing but blank, bulging rock walls. I'd led us into a dead end. Traversing to a snow arete bordering the gully on the right, crampons scratching on rock under a thin covering of snow, I looked down into another couloir. It seemed more open than the one I'd been following. Maybe it was the right one? I traversed back into the dead-end gully and pounded in a knifeblade. Adding a stubby screw, I shouted down, "Secure!" A few minutes later a headlamp appeared below, and soon thereafter Alik himself. After a brief discussion of our options, he tensioned over and down into the other gully. Removing the screw and leaving a 'biner on the piton, I followed, the jury-rigged toprope cutting into the faceted snow of the are...