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Ice time draws veteran, novice climbers to Ouray |
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Friday, January 13, 2012 10:40 |
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Photo by Jim Sojourner, Durango Herald
By JIM SOJOURNER, DURANGO HERALD
OURAY--Like a swarm of locusts, once a year a great host descends on Ouray’s sleeping mountain community, hungry and abuzz with excitement.
Instead of humming wings, though, these wanderers bring with them the clamor of chipping ice and crunching boots. And instead of hungering for crops, this swarm is on the prowl for good ice and good beer.
As has been the ritual since 1996, thousands of climbing enthusiasts crowded into the streets of Ouray last weekend to participate in the 2012 Ouray Ice Festival, some by climbing, some by watching and others by simply reveling in the weekend festivities.
For the uninitiated, it might be difficult to understand why 3,000-plus people would want to cram themselves into an otherwise tiny town in the corner of Colorado for a few days of standing on a frozen river in a subfreezing canyon, dodging deadly hunks of falling ice while waiting for their turn to scramble up tenuous ice tendrils.
But for the Ice Fest initiate, it is difficult to understand why – with the snow-dusted San Juan range presiding overhead, frosty blue spires of ice begging to be picked out and toasty bars with warm companions and cold beer waiting below – anyone wouldn’t.
“It would be hard not to have a good time. It’s just a beautiful thing to do, climbing ice. It’s wild,” said Jeremy Scheuer, a first-time fest-goer from Mammoth, Calif.
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