Climbing Chapel Pond Pass

The Adirondack Park offers an incredible variety of rock climbing opportunities, all in the spectacular setting of perhaps the east’s greatest wilderness.

View from Bob's Knob

Last weekend I traveled to the High Peaks region to climb for the first time this summer. Climbing Chapel Pond Pass was our goal, a region known for its incredible beauty, easy approaches and lack of blackflies.

With a major rainstorm overnight, our first destination was the Pitchoff Chimney Cliff, a roadside crag that dries quickly, given its south-facing orientation and exposed position above Cascade Lakes.

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Spring Slides: Wright On!

The Adirondack High Peaks are a mystery to me. Seen from afar, they are both vast and tiny, occupying a fraction of the otherwise enormous park. Even with the stunning density of 4000 footers accessible from the Adirondack Loj, they’re both in your face and utterly inaccessible.

Adirondack slide skiing

I know this well as many of my backcountry trips to the park end with epic workouts and fantastic stories, that often don’t have much to do with the skiing. This day on the Wright Peak Slides was no different.

Last Sunday I had a bag packed with technical gear for my first ski descent down the Trap Dyke, but my body hardly felt up for the task and a familiar sense of a mission unaccomplished set in its place. Rather than continuing up from the Marcy Dam to pursue Colden, our group allowed me to present a case to try the Angel Slides on Wright Peak instead.

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High Peaks, NY: Adirondack Asphalt

Cascade concrete. Sierra cement. West Coast skiers have endearing nicknames for the moisture-laden snow that doesn’t ski like champagne powder but can come down in fountains.

Wright Ski Trail

While the northeast sees every imaginable kind of winter precipitation, our mountains tend to get icy before they get heavy. Not this past week. Now we’ve earned our own coinage: Adirondack Asphalt.

Winter Storm Damon was touch-and-go for much of the region as sleet, ice, freezing rain, and plain old rain foiled the hopes for a 100% snow event. Luckily, on our side of Lake Champlain, the Adirondack High Peaks stayed almost entirely snow to the tune of two feet.

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