Matt's Alaska Trip

Thanks for the pics. Would love to go to Valdez to climb WI 4 or 5 multi pitch stuff.
Great stuff!!

The climbing there is unreal. Awesome pitches just off the road for after work shenanigans and crazy ice in crazy places (I turned down a ski tour over a frozen river to get to some amazing stuff - my flight left at 5, and I didn't think I'd be able to get back in time).  But, here's some pictures from one of the guy's facebook pages:





Makes me want to get into ice climbing up around Keene Valley.

mattchuck2 wrote

Makes me want to get into ice climbing up around Keene Valley.

You definitely should give that a try.  There are many, many excellent ice routes at all ability levels.  Chouinard's Gully is one that should be on your list for next winter.  

Having dabbled just a tiny bit in ice climbing, I can say it's an awesome way to experience the mountains in winter.  The problem, of course, is that ice time takes away from ski time.  

I don't know if you've done any rock climbing, but I'll bet a dollar you'd really take to it.  Many great opportunities in the Keene Valley area.

By the way, enjoyed the video.  Nice choice of Elton's "Madman" for the soundtrack.

WOW. What a sweet trip. After reading your posts and now watching this I really want to go. Great job  letting us in on your adventure.  As a fellow cam owner can I ask what you used to edit your trip?

Just Windows Live Movie Maker.  I hate the program with a passion (annoying interface, non intuitive functioning, inability to put more than one caption on the screen at a time, etc., etc.), but I'm too cheap to buy anything else.

Having climbed all of the major routes in the Keene Valley, I can't agree with Jeff more. The ice climbing is world class.
Power Play and Roaring Brook Falls

Nice job Matt, wicked cool

Climbing pix are sic!!! There are only a couple things I miss about living in Smuggs, climbing in the Notch is one of them. Thanks for bring back memories!!

Matt any guesses on what it might cost to go and stay at tompson pass for like a week? Seems like it would be a once in a lifetime trip. Should I start saving now.

Raymo40 wrote

Matt any guesses on what it might cost to go and stay at tompson pass for like a week? Seems like it would be a once in a lifetime trip. Should I start saving now.

Really depends on how you do it.  You can dirtbag it real cheap (winter camping, touring) for just the cost of food (if you have all the camping stuff).  You could stay in Valdez for cheap (I stayed at Anna's B&B. $25 a night and I was the only one there).  You could spend more and rent an RV and Snowmobile for the week (which would probably be what I would do next time) and just park it at the pass (apparently there's no restrictions on overnight parking in Alaska).  Or, you could spend $6,900 for a week of Heli Skiing.

The biggest expenses for me were the Airplane Ticket ($600 Round trip - Albany->Newark->Seattle->Anchorage) and Gas:



If snowmobiling and RVing, the Gas prices would probably kill you. I made the 6 hour drive from Anchorage in a Rented Toyota Yaris, so the mileage was pretty good, and I still spent a lot in gas (I mean, I wanted to see everything so I drove a lot).

Don't want to start a thread drift about the price of gas BUT here's an FYI: the price of gas in Alaska is less than what we Hinterlandians pay every day, living within spitting distance of New York State. That Alaska price works out to $1.24 per litre, I paid $1.31 per litre yesterday. Don't complain.

2 weeks ago in Hawaii I was paying between 4.60-4.80...
I would move there in heart beat..