January Thaw

Randy approaching the falls.

A week and a half ago ushered great snow into our area, but also brought some warm weather screeching along like a banshee.  Those who extremely dislike cold weather would disagree since we saw temperatures in town bordering on balmy.  However, it's not very good for the snow.  Skiing during the weekend was fantastic, albeit wet riding the chairlift.  With heavy wet snow falling high in the mountains, rain coming down with a vengeance in the valley, my friend Randy and I went on an adventure to find some ice, or at least semi-solid flowing water...

Messing around behind the falls.

Randy pulling hard!  Look at those picks flying!

Getting some directions from another friend, we set off to find a hidden waterfall in a random canyon west of Kalispell.  Just as even blind squirrels find a nut sometimes and so Randy and I finally stumbled across a two-tiered waterfall.  The upper portion was frozen well enough to set up a top-rope on a tree and belay from below.  Armed with metal talons on our feet and wicked curved tools in our hands we fell upon the vertical playground in a frenzy (not really, but we did have a great time).  We had escaped the rain that day but managed to get wet anyway.  The waterfall was gushing pretty good, especially by the early afternoon.

Armed and Dangerous...and wet.