| Summary | |
| Owner | MITOC Gallery Administrator |
| Creation Date | 2007-02-26 16:03:21 UTC-0500 |
| Description | Shoestring Gulley and Elephant Head Gulley February 25, 2007 Christiaan & Maria Shoestring Gulley is one of New England's classic gulley climbs. Rated NEI2, it has about six pitches worth of low to medium angle ice. Anticipating a long day of climbing, we got up early on Sunday morning, headed from Intervale into Crawford Notch, and found the gulley on the side of Mt Webster. Parking along the road a couple miles short of the notch, we geared up and hiked through the woods and across the river. Having left the car around 7:30 or 8am, we made our way up the (thankfully) pre-broken climbers trail, which wound it's way through the woods just to the left of the gulley. Once the angle of the gulley got steep enough to be interesting, we stepped over into it and began to ascend the snow field (~9:30am). We quickly made our way up to the first (~3m high) ice buldge. Roping up turned out to be pointless, and we continued up the next snow field to a nice ice flow in what was becoming a pretty tight gulley, surrounded on both sides by steep rock. Here we roped up, despite the fact that several folks passed us free climging. One long (55m+) pitch later brought us over three ice buldges with snow fields inbetween, and turned out to be the top of the ice in the main gulley (~noon). Surprised at the speed of the climb, and hoping for more ice, we continued up the narrowing snow filled gulley. Once the angle started to diminish, and the trees to close in, we realized that we were already off the climb (around noon?). We went back down to the top of the ice, where a variation finish headed up to the right. This variation is a NEI3 chimney climb, about 30m high. With thin ice, it turned out to be a nice mixed climb, with enough good cracks to place several solid pieces of rock pro. We topped out onto a nice little ledge overlooking Crawford Notch, and had lunch in the sunshine (~1:30pm) before hiking the 3 miles of the Webster cliff trail back to the road. Since we still had over an hour of daylight left, we drove up to the top of the notch and climbed Elephant Head. Yep, that's the cool little ice gulley you can see right along the road from your car when you drive through the top of Crawford notch. The belay stance is practically on the road. A pair of climbers was just finishing up, so we geared up while they rapped down, reporting thin, steep ice at the top. It didn't look bad from down below, so I decided to give it a shot. The first few buldges were no problem, but then it quickly became MUCH steeper than it looked from below. And thinner too. The last third of the climb was nearly vertical, with only a few inches of ice on the rocks. Still, I managed to find enough good stances in the picked out ice, and placed plenty of screws to keep me climbing. The last move to the top involved pulling up over a boulderwith very little ice for the feet, and nothing but snow for the tools. Yikes. With plenty of trees for anchors, I belayed Maria up, and we rappeled down in the dark, just barely making it to the bottom with my 60m rope. Turns out Elephant Head is rated NEI3+... definitely another notch in my climbing record, and highly recommended if you've got an hour or two to burn. In the end, a wonderful, sunny day with some great climbing. -Christiaan |