Sunday 26 February 2012

One last trip?

Here we go, off to Sounkyo for what might well be the last trip of the winter season... Stay tuned for lots of pictures when I get back!

Thursday 23 February 2012

Ines Papert in China

And now for something completely different (and utterly spectacular)!

A little reminder that climbing - especially ice climbing - isn't just about gnarly new routes on remote mountains.


Tuesday 21 February 2012

Sounkyo - here we go again!

Time for at least one more trip before this year's winter season ends, so this time I'm off all the way up to Hokkaido at the end of the month (from 27th).

Take one group of volcanoes...

The Daisetsuzan Volcanic Group

...add a lot of flowing water...

Sounkyo gorge in the summer

...and then add winter temperatures down between -15 and -20C during the day...

What do you get? You get a gorge several kilometres long, lined with spectacular climbable ice routes of every possible description.

Ice in Sounkyo gorge during the winter

It's super cold so camping isn't an option. Luckily there's an onsen (hot spring) resort town right next to the gorge, which is empty during the winter, so excellent accommodation can be had for absurd prices.

A full buffet breakfast, a day climbing pristine multipitch water ice, an evening in a natural hot spring to get rid of all the aches and pains, followed by a real, hot dinner. It's almost too easy...

Getting yourself out of trouble...

We all hope it never comes to this, but if the worst comes to the worst, this is how you'd hope it goes.

I know this video has been around for some time now but my blog hasn't and it's one I've re-watched a few times over. It never fails to amaze. Great job by both of these guys for getting out of there safely, calmly and independently.





Meanwhile planning is underway for my next trip - more of a single-day cragging style trip this time, but to Sounkyo gorge all the way up in Hokkaido. From what I understand it's like a Japanese version of Rjukan. Promises to be especially cold! More on that soon...

Saturday 18 February 2012

Are your ice tools right for you?

While sharpening things for my next trip (Sounkyo, hopefully) I was suddenly surprised at how far my ice tools had come from their 'out of the box' appearance.

So here's a simple question: are your ice tools exactly right for you?


If they're not, and I'd wager that's the case, then here's the answer: make them right!


A lot of people seem to baby their tools. Unless you're being paid to model for the latest Black Diamond catalogue, this is the wrong approach. The sooner you get the 'shiny new toy' phase over with, the quicker you can get on with viewing them for what they really are: TOOLS!

I climb with (2011-) Petzl Quarks. They're superb axes (and hey, Petzl didn't screw them up like the new Nomics!) but out of the box, for my tastes, they could be improved. I'd bet that's the same for anyone, whether you climb on hand-me-down DMM Flys or the latest Grivel carbon competiton tools. So don't be scared - make your tools yours and get the most out of them. They'll almost certainly still climb harder than you!

And hell, if all else fails, just think how gnarly they'll look...


Shiny new Quarks!

My Quarks!
(About two weeks' worth of  total climbing days on these so far)

How my Quarks evolved:

  1. Removed triggers from Trigrests. I found I didn't move only my index finger up much, but I did match on the tools quite a lot. Now I can fix the Trigrests overall lower, making for more stable matching, without the triggers in the way of the standard grip. I don't miss the ability to move them.
  2. Added 6mm cord loops (tied with double fisherman's) to provide more flexible umbilical attachment points.
  3. Added tennis racket grip tape to the shafts for grip and insulation when matching and daggering - gaffer tape low down is both to hold the end flat and to pad out the Trigrests a little.
  4. Removed adze from one tool, kept one hammer. One hammer is enough (why carry the weight of both?) and adzes are more of a liability when on pure ice routes. The balance is slightly different between tools, but not enough to fuss about.
  5. Added pick weights - for a better swing and more reliable first-time sticks on pure ice.
  6. Added thin foam to upper shaft for insulation when daggering up high for long periods.
I'd be lying if I said any of the above tweaks were my own original idea - I've borrowed ideas from all over - but the resulting tools are perfect for me, right now, doing what I am doing. Can't ask for more than that.

Friday 17 February 2012

Crampons and boots - open your mind!

"Monopoint crampons are only for hard mixed and drytooling"


"Double boots are overkill for Scottish winter"

Blah blah!

There's so much crap out there about what goes on your feet for winter climbing, both directly (boots) and what you strap to them (crampons). It's honestly getting quite annoying seeing yet another person spout off about monopoints only being for hardcore Dave MacLeod mixed types and double boots only being worth it in the depths of alpine winter or at high altitude. Rubbish, on both counts.

The answer is this: look at what your needs are and use the right kit to deal with them best.

Double boots are awesome at high altitude or in seriously cold temperatures, sure. They have a ton of insulation. But what says they're overkill for less extreme conditions, like say winter in the Japan Alps or the Cairngorms? Nothing.

Are you out and back in a day or staying in a heated lodge? Are you young and fit and with good circulation? Is it above maybe -15 C? Then use singles - you can get away with it.

Are you bivvying out, where frozen boots are an issue? Do you have circulatory problems, perhaps from past cold damage? Is it just really f***ing cold? Then use doubles and screw anyone who tells you it's overkill.

Traditional wisdom says that dual points are best for ice and monos are best for mixed (less leverage, etc). Well again, what do YOU want to climb in? What do the conditions dictate that you climb in?

Are you climbing neve or poor-quality ice? Do you want more support? Then climb with dual front points.

Are you climbing delicate ice? Are you climbing mixed? Is the ice bullet hard due to low temperatures? Then you go ahead and throw monos on your boots and enjoy nimble footwork and less ice shattering.


Left: Scarpa Phantom Guide (lightweight single boot) with Petzl Dartwins (dual front points)
Right: La Sportiva Spantik (lightweight high-tech double boot) with Black Diamond Stinger (monopoint)

During the Kaikoma trip I lived in Spantiks. They're 'big, clunky' double boots. I climbed in Stingers. They're 'nimble, mixed-specific' mono crampons. What on earth was I thinking? Well, I was thinking I wanted the easy bivvy logistics of a double boot and the better climbing performance of a mono crampon. I'm sure to some people such a combination is ridiculous, but you know what? I felt more capable of hard climbing in them than Phantom Guides and Dartwins - the combo I used at Yatsu in December.

This isn't meant to be a run-down of the pros and cons of each, more of a plea to not blindly follow so-called 'advice'. So go ahead and ignore all the know-it-alls who will tell you that something is overkill for your needs, or that you're not extreme enough for a certain piece of kit. Use whatever you need to get the job done and be happy.

Oh, incidentally the new BD Stingers are really, really awesome crampons and I'll probably write a bit more on them specifically sometime. If you can find them, I highly recommend them!

Wednesday 15 February 2012

Kaikomagatake - February 2012

From February 9th to 13th I, along once again with Ed from IceClimbingJapan (but not in a guiding capacity this time) took a trip out to Kaikomagatake in the Minami Alps (southern Japan Alps).


View Larger Map

No lodge this time! Kaikoma is pretty remote - something of a frontier of winter climbing in Japan, with only a handful of climbing teams really going there each year. You really have to be totally self-supported. A lot of the area is totally unexplored from a climbing point of view, so that was our objective here - go in, see what's there, and climb some of it.

Conditions were promising. In the days leading up to the trip temperatures experienced a bizarre spike, reaching well above freezing and coupled with some quite heavy rainfall (rain, not snow!). The temperatures then plummeted back to their usual sub-zero values in the following days. This meant that there should be lots of fresh, well-formed ice and the rain would also have removed lots of the surface snow - often a big obstacle for access.

Everything laid out and ready to pack

Somehow all packed and ready!


On Day 1 we took a really early start and walked in from the nearest roadhead (we went as far as the taxi driver would take us). The first part of the walk-in was hilariously easy - along an abandoned road built into the hills. Bit of a mystery what it was doing there, actually. My guess is that it was an access road for some construction project (hydroelectric power, maybe) but it's still quite bizarre.

After reaching the end of the road (it literally just ends) we headed down a steep slope (with the aid of some fixed ropes) and into the approach valley proper to Kaikoma. Here the going got really tough. Numerous times we had to cross rivers in various states of freezing. The river was bounded by cliffs and broken by waterfalls (unfrozen!) which meant we often had to climb up onto the banks to get any further - not an easy task with heavy packs and thick foliage (which seems intent on snagging absolutely everything it could).

At some point in the mid afternoon we both agreed that it was getting tough and that we were wasting time. We'd already passed lots of potential climbs so we decided to head back to one in particular and give it a shot, then bivvy there for the night.


The route we attempted to climb on Day 1
(Photo courtesy of Ed Hannam)

Pitch 1 of the climb turned out to be... interesting. After being in the sun all day the ice was in pretty poor condition and that made things a little hairy.  The climb wasn't easily protectable - one poor screw in some slushy ice and a piton tapped in halfway and then tied off with a sling (a real "Andy Kirkpatrick special").

We continued up onto pitch 2, which was mainly rock and turf - not brilliant either - but realised that we couldn't easily get across onto the ice. Eventually, with darkness closing in, we abseiled off and vowed to come back and try it again via a different route.

After coming down we set up a surprisingly comfortable open-air bivvy tucked at the base of a cliff near the falls. Temperatures probably got down below -10 C but we were quite comfortable in just our sleeping bags (and Thermarests) on a tarp.


Our open-air bivvy site on the morning of Day 2

Glorious!
(Photo courtesy of Ed Hannam)

Day 2 was a climbing non-event but yielded a lot of new ice that has quite possibly not been seen or climbed before. We pushed on a little further up the river but again, with the surface being largely unfrozen, the going was incredibly slow.

Plenty to come back for next time, though!

We pushed on as far as we could, then decided to just make the most of what we'd already seen. We went back and bivvied where we did the previous night and planned to climb our previous route again first thing in the morning, before the sun melted it away too much, to completion.

A section of the river we attempted to follow

One of the huge icefalls along the river in 'Middle Kaikoma'
(Photo courtesy of Ed Hannam)

More ice in 'Middle Kaikoma'
(Photo courtesy of Ed Hannam)


Day 3 was dominated by the new route. By the time we were finished we were both wiped, physically and mentally - enough climbing for one day!

For pitch 1 we took the same route as last time - the left-hand fall, which began with some nice fat ice and ended with thin, flaky ice over wet rock with a little bit of unfrozen turf thrown in. Belay 1 is a spectre in turf - hardly ideal!

Pitch 1 of Tanuki Suicide

Tanuki Suicide belay 1...

Pitch 2 was a total horror show. Belaying Ed up was bad enough - both his upwards progress and the rapid thawing of the route as the sun hit it (both melting ice and thawing turf/rock) caused frequent falls of huge chunks of ice and rock. I was belaying from a sort of corner and couldn't wedge myself far enough into it! I counted three good hard impacts on my helmet from that alone.

When Ed finally got a belay in and started bringing me up, it only got worse. After coming up a little turf and rock I found myself in a little channel in a corner, with blank low-angle granite on the left and vertical, flaky granite on the other. This channel was FULL of fast-flowing water - further evidence that the route was melting away from under us. As I progressed upwards, mainly with drytooling on quite blank rock, something utterly terrifying happened...

The lovely ice I kept looking up at, hoping I could get onto soon, gave way. Twice. The first collapse came rushing down towards me, funneled by the channel I was standing in. All I could do was brace myself. It hit, a little wall of ice, painfully slamming big blocks of ice right into my shins and knees. Somehow both my feet and tools held. Stepping through the debris I started upwards again, when the second chunk gave way. An even bigger collapse, this one just blew my feet right out from under me. Luckily I had good tool placements in a smear of ice on the right and they both held, but I was left desperately scrabbling for footholds on slabby granite for a few seconds - unable to see because everything was covered in blocky ice and snow and with my shins screaming at me.

After getting established again I resolved to get the hell out of the path of any more collapses, so I traversed right onto the utterly blank granite slabs and made very slow progress upwards (pure drytooling with more crampon smearing than anything else) to some more turf. From here I traversed back right onto the top of the icefall that had collapsed onto me (that was a pant-shitting moment, rest assured...). Every tool and crampon placement yielded a hollow sound and you could hear rushing water under the ice - it was clear that it wasn't going to be there long! I don't think I've ever climbed so quickly from there to the belay... I was utterly desperate to get off that ice before it all went!

Belay 2 was a pair of passable V-threads in nice fat ice. Much better!


Tanuki Suicide pitch 2

Belay 2 (set up for an abseil with extra screw)

Pitch 3 made it all worth it! A nice rewarding 50m section of steep ice, lovely and plastic giving good placements and even reasonable screw placements. Lovely climbing.

Belay 3 is a set of decent trees, which also make alright abseil anchors.

Pitch 3 of Tanuki Suicide

Topo of Tanuki Suicide
(Courtesy of Ed Hannam)

Descent is by abseiling more or less back down the route in 2 or 3 pitches.

All in all an exciting route! Fun? In a "Type 2 Fun" sort of way, sure, but at the time maybe not so much!

During both the climb and descent we saw absolutely no evidence that anyone had ever climbed it before - no tape on trees, pitons or piton marks, scratches, abseil tat or anything else. Therefore I think there's a reasonable chance that this was a first ascent of a new route - I guess it will never be proven, but for now it's a reasonable assumption. Therefore, we get to name and grade the route.

Tanuki Suicide, WI5- M4+, ~120m


Why 'Tanuki Suicide'? Because of what we found at the first belay ledge - a tanuki (Japanese raccoon-like animal) that appeared to have simply fallen from the sky. Very strange. It made naming the route easy, anyway!

The namesake suicidal tanuki

After climbing and descending the route we had lunch, packed up our bivvy site and pressed on back up to the road we walked in on. No more climbing today, but it put us in a good position to get lots more done the following day. We slept in a hut near a gorgeous fall - relative luxury!

Night 3 and 4 bivvy site

On Day 4 we first headed down from the road to check out some of the mostly unseen ice down there. Ed climbed one route but ended up backing off due to sugary, frazzled ice (the sun was already doing its evil work) and frequent small ice collapses.

Some of the ice below the road that was sadly not really in climbable condition
(Photo courtesy of Ed Hannam)

After scrambling back up to the road and having a snack we hit up a popular climb (well, it's in the guidebook!) - Gun-Ma Taki F1, WI4. Only one pitch, but really nice climbing, even if it was a little stepped-out by this point (we'd seen other teams on it both days). There are apparently more pitches above but nothing looked in condition so we abbed off.

Gun-Ma Taki F1, WI4

Finally we headed back to an area of promising-looking mixed climbing. Sadly it was dripping, so we decided to see if it would freeze back up and instead concentrated on two lovely steep ice pillars to the right side. The ice was hollow and actually detached from the rock at many points, and too thin to be easily protectable, so we top-roped it anchored from a tree at the top (good effort by Ed for soloing up a neighbouring fall to set up the top rope!).

The left pillar probably goes at WI4 and the right at WI4+ (it's a little steeper).

The promising 'mixed area' with ice pillars on the right
Getting on some steep ice

By the time we'd finished messing on these the mixed routes were still dripping and we were both feeling pretty worked so we called it a day. Back to the bivvy shelter!

On Day 5 we checked the weather forecast (luckily we were in an area with signal, somehow!) and found that temperatures were set to continue to increase. Additionally this was heralding the arrival of a snow front. With this news we decided to bail a few hours early, rather than trying to get another half day's climbing in. Even the fat icefall behind the bivvy was looking pretty frazzled out anyway and that had happened overnight. Not promising...

Snow coming in over Kaikomagatake

We walked out and we were back at the trailhead by about 11am. Nice and easy. As we came out we could see the snow rolling in over the mountain, so I think we made a good decision - the snow could have turned to rain lower down, too, which would have made the walk out utterly miserable.

The early start meant I could skip the return stay in Chino, so I moved the train ticket and I was back in (a very wet) Kyoto by mid afternoon.

Kaikoma is totally different from Yatsugatake. It's remote, it's unforgiving, access is harder (or at least it was this time) and there is a LOT more to climb. A lot of it's still unknown. The trip didn't go quite as planned but we found lots of 'new' ice, got lots of ideas for the future and got plenty of climbing done including what is quite possibly a new route. That's not too bad, if you ask me!

Monday 13 February 2012

Kaikoma - back!

Back from Kaikoma already - a day or so early - due to changing weather conditions.

I'm pretty tired so I'll put up a proper post in the next couple of days, but for now let me give you one small taste of what turned out to be a quite unusual, quite productive and at times rather surreal trip...

That's a dead tanuki (a large Japanese raccoon, basically) at a belay halfway up an ice/mixed route. Strange indeed.


Check back soon!

Wednesday 8 February 2012

Kaikoma - here we go!

All set to leave for Kaikoma. Still can't believe I got everything (more or less) into a 45 litre pack without even using the snow collar.

Should be an awesome trip. More when I get back!


Sunday 5 February 2012

Kaikoma prep (2) - Nutrition

Following on from my previous post about homemade energy bars, I thought I'd just show you how they fit in my plans of what to eat on the trip...



Really simple, minimal faff. Everything will survive cold temperatures and being repeatedly crammed into a rucksack. Stuff is divided into ziplock bags to help with organisation.

Breakfast is quick and easy - the bars can be eaten on their own or broken into hot water to make a sort of strange porridge. In this case a squeeze of tube butter is added for extra calories. Tea gives a mild caffeine kick without a huge crash later on and is hydrating - I tend to go for a variety of fruit teas which, while undeniably girly, does help to break up the monotony.

Daytime food is quick and easy as well and can be eaten on the go. Power bars and Kendal Mint Cake for quick energy, homemade 'active' bars for a more balanced input. Peanut butter is just generally awesome and I found it in a tube, so that's a winner. The tortilla wrap will be loaded with cheese and meat (and possibly, wait for it, peanut butter!) and is actually something substantial so you feel like you've eaten something! Boiled sweets keep the spirits up on long belays, etc. An isotonic sports drink in my Nalgene provides the day's hydration plus a steady input of carbs and ions to keep going and fend off muscle cramps.

Dinner is a 'proper' meal. Instant ramen noodles form the base (I'll take a variety of not-too-adventurous flavours) and individual cheese squares provide extra fat, as does a squeeze of butter. Both can be added to the noodles if you want. Very hot chili sauce decanted into a tiny dropper is also good as it provides a lot of flavour for very little weight and bulk. Homemade 'recovery' bars give the body what it needs to refuel and repair itself ready for tomorrow. Cocoa is a hot, warming comfort drink - just what you need at the end of a long day.

It's impossible to carry enough water during the day, really. Therefore you make sure to hydrate properly in the morning and evening. Copious drinks and water-rich foods help here (as long as you can either find running water - lucky! - or melt enough snow).

I'll also carry a bag of nuts/rice snacks to eat at night if I wake up cold - always seems to work.



EDIT: And here it is, all bagged in individual ziplocks to massively simplify organisation.

Top to bottom: 4x breakfast; 5x lunch; 4x dinner; sundries (butters, nuts, trash bag)

Homemade energy bars

Insulation is important in climbing. You're there, puffing away (you purebred athlete, you), generating all that heat... so the last thing you want is for it all to blow away when you stop, leaving you to start all over again. However, all the insulation in the world won't do you any good at all if you can't generate that heat in the first place. You have to keep stoking that fire.

So, nutrition is vital. In the winter especially, where you burn energy just to stay warm let alone climb anything, staying on top of your energy needs is critical. In fact, that's one of the many reasons why winter climbing is fun (honest) - it's almost a license to eat stuff other people would consider 'bad' and then justify it with "Well, I'll die otherwise!".

Fat rules, because you generate lots of heat trying to break it down. You also need carbs to keep you going (short and long-term release, ideally), protein to help your muscles stay in good condition, vitamins and minerals to stay generally healthy, fibre to keep things moving inside and also to regulate carb release...

Power bars are popular but are hideously expensive and often don't really contain what you need, especially for winter climbing. Inspired by a recent post by Ed (of iceclimbingjapan) I decided to have a shot at making my own power bars. I basically copied his recipe, eyeballing the amounts (but noting them as I went along) and missing out one or two ingredients I just plain couldn't find here.

To make them I just mixed all the liquidy ingredients together over a low heat to soften them up, then threw in the dry stuff and mixed it all up for a few minutes. Spread it on some wrap, topped with more wrap, flattened it and made it roughly square and then threw it in the freezer to cool. After an hour or so it was cool enough to cut into 'bars', each of about 200 kcal (so you can count what you're eating).

I'm keeping them in the freezer for now but honestly I think they'll be fine in the fridge too. I'll test one or two and see, maybe.

The ingredients (including approximate weights and calorie contents) for both 'rest/recovery' bars and 'active' bars are below.

-----------------------------------------

'Rest' bar - breakfast, evening meal, etc


Ed says: "for breakfast and after climbing your system needs to recover from the last effort and store energy for the next. you want fat and protein, slow release carbohydrates, micronutrients and vitamins, and fibre to keep your system moving. these are for fast breakfasts (can be broken into hotwater if you want), straight after climbing for the day and as a midnight snack if you wake from the cold. think where you will be eating these – at a bivvy, in a sleeping bag etc – so larger blocks may be more convenient to consume."

1/2 jar (170g) smooth peanut butter - 1000 kcal
120g honey - 400 kcal
110g nutella - 580 kcal
100g dried berries - 350 kcal
20g butter - 150 kcal
25g dried shaved coconut - 120 kcal
30g chopped roasted almonds - 180 kcal
25g flax seeds - 130 kcal
30g sunflower seeds - 180 kcal
150g oats (10% oatbran) - 630 kcal

TOTAL = 780g = 3720 kcal

18 x 200 kcal bars (plus a little extra)

'Recovery' bar prior to cooling and cutting

-----------------------------------------

'Active' bar - on-the-go energy


Ed says: "your system is zapping calories during this phase and doesnt want to be redirecting blood and hormones to digestion when youre climbing. you want a mix of slow and fast releasing carbohydrates, sugars to perk your brain up and flavours to make you want to eat, fibre to regulate absorbtion, plus just a hint of protein and fat to keep the system from crashing. these are designed to chow down at belays, on the move or when taking breaks. these will be eaten fast and in less-than-ideal places, so consider chopping them into bite sized chunks you can drop into a pocket or stuff sack and get to with gloves on."

1/2 jar (170g) smooth peanut butter - 1000 kcal
120g honey - 400 kcal
120g choc chips - 580 kcal
200g dried berries - 700 kcal
250g oats (10% oatbran) - 1050 kcal

TOTAL:  860g = 3730 kcal

18 x 200 kcal (plus a little extra)

'Active' bar, as above

-----------------------------------------

I'm sure there's some refining to do (I overdid the chocolate in both cases, I think - I just threw it in but a little seems to go a long way!) but they seem promising and man, they taste great (shouldn't be a problem wanting to eat them... by the time I left Yatsugatake I couldn't stand the thought of eating GORP or muesli ever again...).

I'd also like to add maltodextrin to the active bars, for more slow-release carbs, but I couldn't find it here. People have recommended replacing it with oats, so given the high oat content anyway it may not be a big deal. I'd still like to track some down though.

Both bars set quite solidly and should stay that way in cold conditions. I can't vouch for them in warmer climes but you'd probably want to make a much less fatty mix then anyway.

I'll be taking a lot of these to Kaikoma along with some 'proper' meals for evenings (read: cheese and instant ramen noodles) and good ol' Kendal Mint Cake for those times when you just can't get enough sugar to keep you going...


Friday 3 February 2012

Kaikoma prep (1) - Layers

As I'm currently prepping for my next trip - a 5-day excursion to the rather remote Kaikomagatake in the southern Japan Alps (Minami Alps) - I thought it might be interested to post a few snippets of what I'm doing and how I'm thinking.

I'll start off with clothing - one of the most important aspects to get right and also one of the hardest!

Climbing clothing, especially in the winter, has to do a lot. It has to keep you warm... or rather, comfortable, but I'll get to that in a minute. It has to keep you dry (or at least comfortable when wet, which is perhaps more likely). It has to be light and packable so that you can carry it all, but also robust enough to stand up to the rigours of climbing - if conditions get really gnarly you may end up climbing in EVERYTHING you brought along. That said, you don't want to be TOO warm. If you sweat too much (especially on the walk in) and wet out your baselayer, you're then going to be very cold as it dries off. So really you want to be just on the edge of feeling chilly, which is incredibly hard to accomplish and maintain...

Additionally, on multi-day trips, your gear has to do all that day-in, day-out for days on end. Stuff will get damp, stuff will freeze. You have to take great care to minimize this, but it's a battle and one you can't always be 100% perfect at, especially as you get more fatigued. So your gear has to cope.

Conditions at Kaikoma will hopefully be somewhere just below freezing during the day, dropping potentially to -20 Celcius or more (less?) at night. Conditions should be good (no precipitation, low winds), but you can't rely on the forecast, so it pays to be prepared for anything (realistically).

On my upper body I subscribe mainly to Mark Twight's idea of an 'action suit'. Essentially that is a baselayer and a softshell type jacket, which you do everything in. You regulate your temperature with zips and hoods to make it work for you. Then, when you stop (i.e. at belays or bivvies), you throw a big fat layer of insulation over the top to retain all that warmth before it seeps away and you get cold.

Kaikoma gear - left to right: R1 Hoody, R1 Vest, Ultimate Hoody, Nano Puff, Barrier Hood 

Yatsugatake gear - left to right: As above, but with Microlight Alpine in place of Barrier Hood

I start off with a Patagonia R1 Hoody, sized a little small for a snug fit. I love this thing - it's nigh-on perfect. Really breathable, wicks great and has a huge zip for venting. Good hood for under (or over, at a push) a helmet and the thumbloops stop the sleeves from going anywhere when climbing or adding more layers. 

Over that on this trip (as I did at Yatsugatake in December) I'll wear a Paragonia R1 Vest. I find the doubling-up of R1 retains a lot of breathability while upping core warmth substantially and cutting wind just a little. This combination works well for the walk-in, which can often get sweaty, and goes well under anything else for climbing. You can sleep in both, too. I will likely not remove either of these layers for the whole trip.

Topping off the 'action suit' on this trip is the Mammut Ultimate Hoody. I used to consider GORE Windstopper the fabric of the devil - not breathable enough due to the membrane, mainly. It's still not that great compared to Powershield and the like (let alone the newest generation of 'breathable' fabrics like Polartec NeoShell) but Mammut have a trump card to play with this particular jacket. It has HUGE side vents, running from the bottom hem to about the elbow on each side. They even zip both ways. The system is very similar to my beloved Montane Resolute Smock (a beefed-up Extreme - a well-tried design) and it allows incredible temperature regulation. If you seal yourself into it, you can be very warm, but if you really start to overheat you can throw those zips open and you get an enormous throughput of fresh air, blowing out any moisture and excess heat. Brilliant system.

The Ultimate Hoody isn't a perfect design - the hood peak is floppy and the handwarmer pockets are too low to work with a pack or harness - but the ventilation system makes it a great piece of kit (just in need of some refinement in the next generation!).

I prefer to divide my insulation layer into two thinner layers. I feel this allows for more mixing and matching to cover a wider spectrum of conditions for not much extra weight or bulk. My first layer is a Patagonia Nano Puff Pullover - this basically never leaves my pack no matter what the trip. It's seriously light and packable but provides incredible warmth. It's pretty robust, too, and of course being synthetic it'll not lose so much performance if it gets wet. I've heard this usage of the Nano Puff described as a 'belay sweater' and I think that's pretty apt - you can belay just in this if you want, or add an extra layer over it if it's really cold or nasty.

The final layer depends on the trip. Up at Yatsugatake I picked the Rab Microlight Alpine - a lightweight down jacket. It's really, really light and packs down tiny. Being down it offers much better warmth to weight than any synthetic piece. Again it's not perfect (what is?) - the hood is too small, for one - but I really like it nonetheless. However, down doesn't play well with moisture, and a 5-day trip makes it hard to keep things dry. It was ok at Yatsugatake because you could duck into the lodge and use their heaters to dry gear, but Kaikoma will be unsupported. Therefore I'm swaying towards the Haglofs Barrier Hood (a purebred 'belay jacket') this time - synthetic, a bit bulkier and heavier than the Rab downie but a lot less hassle. You really don't want your insulation to shit the bed mid-trip so I think this is a worthwhile trade-off.

On my lower half I'll be using what I used last time...

Left to right: Wicking boxer shorts, lightweight merino leggings, Aenergy Pants

Underwear will be a pair of Haglofs wicking boxers should keep things comfortable, with a pair of lightweight Cintamani (an Icelandic brand) merino wool longjohns to keep my legs warm even when standing around. I really, really wish both of these layers had a fly of some sort - lord knows it's hard enough when you're wearing a harness and gloves and doesn't need any more complications!. Maybe I'll modify them in the near future (or just buy some with...).

The top layer is a pair of Mammut's oddly-named Aenergy Pants, which are softshell pants really designed for ski-touring but are awesome to climb in. Really stretchy, protective enough and with breathable panels where you need them most (crotch region, back of calves). They have big zippered side vents too - essential for sweaty walks in. The integrated snow gaiter is something I'm never really sold on, especially with boots with integrated gaiters like my Scarpa Phantom Guides, but they don't do any harm on their loosest setting. I do wish they had grommets for a loop of cord under my boot - I'll probably stitch some loops on sometime although I've done some real snow slogs with no problems so far, so maybe they're not that essential.

Last time around I packed in a pair of synthetic insulated overpants for nighttime, but I never needed them. I think I might skip them this time - one less thing to carry!

Footwear is a whole other deal and I'll maybe make another post about that sometime soon. Likewise gloves, etc.

Obviously layering is a really subjective thing and what works for me may not work for you and vice versa. That's before you even consider where you're climbing, what the conditions will be, how long you'll be climbing for, etc. But hopefully this gives you an idea of one system - one that works for me in these conditions - and it might give you some ideas.

Thursday 2 February 2012

Yatsugatake - December 2011

This is being written more than a month after I got back, but never mind! Just thought it'd be nice to put up a little bit about my last trip before the next one rolls around...


Between December 26th and 30th I took a trip up to famous Japanese winter climbing destination Yatsugatake, in the south/central Japan Alps (map below). I went with Ed from IceClimbingJapan (who I would highly recommend to anyone looking for guiding in Japan).


View Larger Map


 We spent 4 nights camped outside the Akadake Kosen lodge. The idea was to hit a natural ice route in the morning and then return to the lodge and refine technique on their 'Ice Candy' wall in the afternoons. For the most part this worked out just right.


Packed up and ready to go - somehow everything went in (or on) a supposed 30 litre pack!


Day 1 started off on a bad foot due to train delays. I can only assume this was due to the heavy snow falling across much of the country (even in Kyoto as I left!). Being an hour or so late, we elected to catch a taxi to the trailhead to make up time. The walk in took 2-3 hours and we were at the hut sometime after noon.


After pitching our tent and getting something to eat (the first of many, many instant rice packets, naturally) we had a play on Ice Candy and then called it early when they closed the wall for maintenance.


Akadake Kosen lodge and the Ice Candy artificial ice wall


Relatively cosy inside the tent despite it being perhaps -15 Celcius outside


Day 2 began early. After breakfast we soon headed on up to the base of Ura Do Shin, perhaps WI4-, which goes up into the mountains behind the hut. The weather was pretty glorious and we were climbing in baselayers - something that presided for most of trip!


The climbing was really nice and was only marred slightly by some very deep snow at the top-out, which made it sweaty going traversing across to the descent ridge. Nonetheless, after a rather knee-jarring descent we were soon back at the lodge in good time to have some hot food and have a mess with ice screw placements on the wall before it got dark.


Ed starting off on the first section of Ura Do Shin, WI4-


Looking up the route towards Daidoushin (the big rocky mass) 




Day 3 was another early-ish start, of course. This time we headed down slightly, to the Mine No Matsume falls we spied on the way up to the hut. They looked in good condition with little snow barring access (a major problem later in the season, leading to them being relatively unpopular).

Today we hit Mine No Matsume Migizawa, probably WI4- again. Great conditions prevailed again and we got some really awesome climbing done. One of the later sections had a particularly memorable section of bridging with a tricky exit - certainly the route crux - which provided good sport.

We climbed the route in a few hours, allowing for time taken to play around with gear and technique, and abbed back down it. Hot lunch in the tent and another go on the ice wall, then a chat in the 'warmth' of the lodge and off to bed.


Ed on belay 


Coming up one of the early steeper sections


Before topping out on a steep step


One particularly confidence-inspiring abseil anchor


Bridging the section on the far left gave good sport - the crux of the route


Day 4 saw us return to climb the neighbouring route to yesterday's - Mine No Matsume Hidari Taki, yet again probably WI4- although it felt easier going than the previous route.

Again, superb climbing was had. Conditions were mainly good but the wind began to pick up a little later on. We finished just in time - looking up at the higher peaks as we abbed down and walked back to the hut, it was clear that some bad weather was coming in and today would have been a bad day to be on the higher routes!

We got a lot of snow that night and it was quite windy, so we were right.

Gorgeous, plastic ice
Topping out on Mine No Matsume Hidari Taki, WI4-


A final glance across towards Akadake before the weather rolled in


Another lovely abseil anchor...

And here comes the weather - glad we were out of there!

Day 5 involved a slightly later start and a good play on Ice Candy before leaving, trying some much harder lines. The ice was fresh and really fragile - lots of chandeliers and icicles needing to be smashed away, making climbing quite tiring. Ed guessed that the line we were on probably went at around WI5+.

While lowering him off after getting pumped, my belay position gave way and I was rather spectacularly lifted into the air, swinging a good 30ft sideways and slamming into the ice wall, then swinging back the other way, smashing through every possible icicle with my shoulder and thigh as I went. All this in perfect semi-sitting, fall-catching position - Ed claims he didn't move an inch! Belaying 101: never let go of the rope!

Anyway, I was hurtin' after that little incident so we decided to call it a day - your luck only goes so far! We packed up the tent and headed out, just in time to pass by the crazy New Year rush coming the other way. The place is absolutely packed over the holiday - no time to be there, in my opinion!

It's not yours until you've bled on it

All in all the trip was a pretty fantastic experience. A great first taste of Japanese ice and a good leader into what's to come...

Thanks again to Ed for a superb 5 days guiding. I can't wait to get back there sometime and take on some of the lines I didn't get to try this time (Daidoushin Ootaki, I'm looking at you!).

Next stop, Kaikomagatake...