Hanging Gardens
Its like the North End of Cathedral, but tilted up side down. They are both on the far right, in shady little, protected nooks that you have to walk right past on your way down from most routes at the crag. As a guide who spends a lot of his winter days cragging on the world class ice at Frankenstein, you tend to know know the conditions at the Hanging Gardens intimately; seeing the wild daggers and pillars that form here after every trip up Standard or Dracula.
I’ve been busy guiding over the past two weeks, and have been watching this one pillar grow, and grow and… It just looks really cool, coming out of a Jared Ogden route called Something About You Makes Me Wild, begging for an ascent that ended on a massive free hanger on the top of Joe Josephson’s hard classic, Within Reason.
My wife Anne is making a short film with local ice climber, alpinist and all around great guy, Kevin Mahoney. Kevin keeps pulling the right size straw when it comes time to leading the goods this season, the next time I loose rock paper scissors I’m gonna have to throw some elbows and grab the rack first and go!
Anyway, courtesy of Anne Skidmore Photography, here are some stills pulled from yesterday’s footage. Enjoy! See more of Anne’s outdoor photography at AnneSkidmore.com and anneskidmore.blogspot.com.