The Organic Climber – Blogging about climbing, RAW foods, vegetarianism, running and cycling.

Whenever people think of ice climbing Arkansas is probably one of the last that would come to mind, but that is exactly where we went this past weekend. Gary, who headed up the trip had been watching the temperatures over the past couple weeks and noticed there had been several day with temperatures below freezing and would continue to stay that way through the weekend we would be there. Despite knowing this I was still skeptical, after doing numerous Google searches for Arkansas ice climbing and turning up nothing I really began to wonder if our weekend adventure would allow us to dig an ice axe into a frozen waterfall.

Our adventure started at 6 a.m. on Saturday with a temperature of 6 degrees. After gearing up and eating breakfast we headed out to High Bank Falls near Cass Arkansas. This was the prime location we hoped to find ice to climb, but as we neared the falls it was very evident we where not going to be climbing ice here. There was plenty of ice at the base and the top of the falls, but it hadn’t been cold long enough for them ice formations to connect. So we did some more exploring in the area but didn’t find much of anything other than small ice flows across the Mulberry River.

But not wanting to give up we started back down the road we headed in on to check out some of the ice flows we saw on our way to Twin Banks. We ended up finding what looked like a good line heading up a dihedral. The ice was solid and connected all the way to the top of the cliff line, but would likely require just a little bit of dry tooling. Somehow I was suckered into being the one to go set up a top rope along with two other guys from the group. The task was not easy, the top of the cliff line was very steep, requiring three of us to rope up and simulclimb along the ridge to reach the top of the climb.

The process of setting up the rope took way longer than it should have. Two hours after we began making our way up the cliff line we reached the base of the climb by rappelling down a fixed line just right of our climb. By this time, the climb had already been baking in the sun for some time.

Despite the climb spending so much time baking we all had a chance to climb on the ice, but after each person climbed the more dry tooling was required. Each climber pulled off sections of ice. Had the climb not been in direct sun the ice would have been pretty awesome all the way to the top.

After finishing up on that climb we decided to inspect another area near by that Gary knew about close to the Ozark Highlands Trail. To our surprise we found quite a few ice flows, ranging from 20-60ft tall. So, we decided to head back the next day and climb the routes we found.

This time we decided to wake up earlier since we where going to be heading home that afternoon. After eating breakfast at the Waffle House the employees began warning us of sasquatch, aliens, white panthers and bears. Apparently all of them shared a home in the Ozark National Forest. But the folklore didn’t scare us away, we trotted off into the forest to climb the ice we found the previous day. The start of the morning was gorgeous, we were at a higher elevation, so there was snow covering a lot of the ground, I have found I really love the sound of snow crunching under my hiking boots as I walk over it.

This time setting up ropes was a bit easier, we were able to walk right up to the cliff line and set up anchors off trees. One of them was hard to set up, but still didn’t take as long as the day before, and we put up three climbs. After all of us rapped in we began climbing a line with a really hard and thick sheet of ice straight up a dihedral. The climb was dead vertical, likely a WI4+, but that is coming from the guy who had never climbed ice before that weekend.

After watching Gary climb and taking photos I decided to throw on the crampons and climb the route I had set up around the corner. At this point it had been baking in the sun for a while. At first glance the climb looked good, so I roped up grabbed the axes and threw in the pick only to see a large sheet of ice move, so I pulled my axe out and the sheet of ice moved away from the wall. An ascent on this route wasn’t going to happen, too bad too the upper section of ice was super thick and very solid. It’s a shame, because the day before after it had been in the shade half a day the ice was very solid. An afternoon trip that day might have been better.

So, after the other climb was free again I got on rope and began my ascent. I had a lot harder time than the previous day. My crampons wouldn’t stick quite right and my axes kept pulling out of the ice. The ice in this particular section was mostly clear, and from what I read later on clear ice isn’t exactly good ice. But after numerous tries I made my way past that section and up onto a ledge that began the dead vertical ice pillar inside a dihedral.

At first I really felt like I was getting the hang of it and began moving up the pillar, but then stared having the same problem of my axes not sticking. This time my crampons seemed solid though, but every time I would stand up and the slightest bit of pressure was taken off the axe I would go flying away from the pillar. Eventually I gained some more height by using the side of the dihedral, turning it into a mixed climb.

After gaining some more height I moved back into the pillar and gained some more height without the help of the rock face off to the side, but eventually I got to a place where I couldn’t find a good place for my axes up high and kept falling off the ice when I stood up. So after numerous tries I finally gave up and lowered off the route. I did get to experiment with placing an ice screw before lowering off though. It was actually easier than I thought it would be, but of course I wasn’t doing the placement on lead.

After everybody else finished climbing this route Naren, the only person in the group who had any real experience ice climbing decided to attempt to climb the largest ice flow we found, the only bad part was the bottom was very thin. After moving up a few feet and inspecting the thin curtain of ice more closely Naren decided to back down. Even though the ice past the curtain was extremely solid the risk of having a curtain of icicles fall on his head was far to great.

My first ice climbing experience was actually quite enjoyable, despite not doing very well at it aside from the first day. The climb we did wasn’t exactly a good beginner ice climbing route, but I enjoyed it enough to plan a trip to Ouray in late February, so if you will be around let me know and we can meet up.

We discovered that Arkansas DOES have ice, not just rock climbing. You just have to know where to find it. Other large ice flows were spotted from the road; we just didn’t have time to go check them out. I also discovered from online forums that the Buffalo National River offers some ice climbing. There is even a book called Sothern Fried Ice that features Arkansas ice climbs. But conditions have to be perfect for it. Some of the flows we found would have easily been climbable given more time to form in freezing temperatures. Now weather I will venture back to Arkansas for ice climbing is yet to be determined. I guess it will all depend on how addicted I get after visiting Ouray.