Rob Smith and I deciced to go looking for some end of season ice. We drove up the Icefields Parkway but wasn't sure about the amounts of recent snowfall around Mt. Murchison. It's a good thing Murchison is on the east side of the parkway and lies in a rain shadow as west of us winter was still very much alive there.
We decide to have a look at a newly climbed route called "Sails for Seniors" (M6, WI6), located in a gully just up and left of the popular Balfour Wall. The approach is simple as it follows the Balfour Wall approach for 40min before contouring up to tree line then traversing up and left to the dry looking break in the cliffband above. 1.5 hours later we were standing below a short pitch of black ice dirtied from runoff rocks and dirt. This short pitch of WI3 led to a low angled snow slope, which led to the base of S for S. The climbed looked thin and fun from the base. 2 gorgeous pitches of thin ice climing with some excellent rock protection in a awesome setting made this one of the funnest climbs I have done this year! There is some interesting chimneying with blobs of good ice and some rotten WI6 ice on the second pitch to make it exciting. Both belays and most of the good gear was in rock. More info on www.gravsports-ice.com. FA J Mills and M Adolph
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