ICE CLIMBING!! "What on earth do you want to do that for ?" is usually the next question.       The short answer is that we don't, unless there is no other way. But when one is confronted by that last terrifying pitch of that unclimbed mountain that you've spent the last few years dreaming of and promising to climb, you'd better find a few ice climbing tricks up your sleeve. Especially if you have burned your bridges and there is no other way down.       In our lives, we don't look at ice climbing as a sport, but as something that it's sometimes necessary to do in pursuit of the exploration of some of the last wild places left on earth. This is far from the scenario in which someone ponies up fifty bucks to duck out of work in Toronto one afternoon for a quick adrenaline fix at the local theme park. It has often been said that there is no exploration left to be done in the world, but this is sheer defeatism. True, the amount of territory left to explore has been much depleted, and its nature has largely been confined to the vertical planes rather than horizontal, but there are pockets of territory left in which there is lifetimes of work to be done. These are mostly concentrated in Chilean Patagonia, Antarctica and Greenland. If one can reliably expect to get in and out of a place in an aircraft, it doesn't qualify. These days, unclimbed mountains are not those that necessarily require great gymnastic ability, but ones which are surrounded by moats of wild country which are punishingly difficult and therefore expensive to traverse. Most of the game involves getting to the chosen area, under ones own steam, taking the full responsibility for ones own security from start to finish. The "sport" of ice climbing only comes into play at the crux point of a long and arduous approach, sometimes taking years.       These days, ice climbing is the pursuit of youthful specialists who can see nothing else in front of their noses than the next "hardest pitch in the world", often artificially described. The physical training necessary to accomplish this is Olympian in scope, but I am usually happy if I can thrash my way unstylishly up some godforsaken gully somewhere to get to the next easy bit on a route that above all possesses geographical elegance. The line must capture the mind before the flesh is committed. All the time that I would otherwise possess to train my body to climb efficiently and well is always spent feeding the insatiable maw of the monster that ownership of a boat creates. Boatyard work. Nothing could be further from the free spirited athleticism that is demanded by ice climbing than this ground-bound drudgery and sailing itself is hardly an aerobic exercise. When we arrive at the bottom of a far flung peak in Antarctica, its hard enough just to be able to walk again, let alone bend the mind around the sophisticated subtleties of climbing ice. As we get older it gets harder still, but it is still the lure of the feeling you get, having conquered something within yourself to complete that last spastic lurch against gravity up an improbable ribbon of ice to the top of a new world that launches the boat. Something has to draw you out there, otherwise the pull of the easy life is too great and the dream is just that, just a dream. Dreams don't count. ...return to BACKGROUND index page