The Nerdy Sheep's Crazy Adventures: Ice Climbing Adventures in Ouray

Ouray is a small town in Colorado nestled among the mountains, often referred to as "Little Switzerland" as it resembles parts of the Alps. They have some of the best ice in the lower 48 at the Ouray Ice Park, which is a major fixture in the ice climbing community.

Ouray at 6am

Back in February, I was invited by some of my CMC friends to go on an ice climbing trip to the Ouray Ice Park over a long weekend. I rented a set of Black Diamond-Cobra Ice Tools from Wilderness Exchange in Denver, packed up my gear, and waited for Walt who was coming at 4pm.

The drive was 6 hours, and we arrived in Ouray around midnight and completely crashed! I haven't been in the car that long since I was driving from Massachusetts to Colorado a year and a half ago.

We met the other four people at a coffee shop on the Main St. of Ouray and made our way across town to the Ouray Ice Park in Box Canyon.

In order to enter the park, you must first don a pair of crampons, then walk along the top of the canyon, until descending into an area called the Schoolroom.

Inside the Schoolroom

We climbed down the steep hill to the canyon floor, and crossed a ladder over the river and set up our base for the day. The sun barely made it down into the canyon as we began to climb; there were two routes set up, one up a series of ice falls/caverns and a lovely sloping one.

Looking down into the canyon.

Route 1

Route 2

Ice cavern!

Schoolroom with the only sun for the day.

Water Fall(ice fall?)

The sound of ice tools and crampons thudding into the ice sending out a spray of , filled the air, with the sunlight streaming far overhead. The Ice park was unlike anywhere I'd ever been before, there were hundreds maybe thousands of people from all over the place climbing in this one canyon area in Ouray, CO. We drove 6 hours, and the folk climbing next to us on day 1 were from Denver. On day 2, we were climbing a different set of routes, and we climbed with 3 other CMC groups from all different area's of Colorado. It was so neat to be in a place where everyone else loved what they were doing!