The Polar Vortex has descended on the Upper Peninsula and we could not be happier!  Took a drive over to Pictured Rocks today to scout out conditions and found the East Channel climbs over on Grand Island forming up quiet nicely!  Also of note the big lake is showing signs of getting cold with a bit of ice floating around the bay.  Lets cross our fingers for an early lake ice season to access those climbs!

 

The following photos are of the front country climbs.  As you can see they are coming in but not climbable as of yet. The good news is we are about two weeks ahead of schedule and the long term forecast is excellent for making ice.  There is also a tremendous amount of water flowing in the true waterfalls, another good sign for fat conditions!

 

The Back Country climbs are accessed via the Lakeshore Trail which is now boot packed in to the Mini Me and Sunny Day climbs.  There has been some significant tree blow downs which must have come down during the recent storms! High winds today may drift over the packed trail but at least we have somewhat of a base.  Here is a look at the progress of the Back Country climbs. Sweet Mother Moses was not touching down and had lots of water flow- no photo as it is difficult to see from the trail.

 

 

 

&

Video of Giddy Up 12-14-16

All in all things are looking really good, but really only a few climbs that are actually climbable right now.  If temperatures stay stable, and cold, we should be all set between Christmas and the New Year.  As always we will be posting the most up to date conditions so please keep checking back. Please be mind full that these formations are extremely delicate and knocking any pillars down at this point may take a month to reform.