Return from this weekend at The Ice Pit

After a highly enjoyable weekend at the Ice Pit, I have returned with a computer full of new photos and a head full of ideas. As expected the 2nd annual Midwest Ice Climbers Festival at The Pit was bigger and better than last year and I was told there were 200+ climbers in attendance. The weather was ideal and after a light snow Friday evening the Pit was starting to look a lot less like a... well, pit I guess. The blue sky and wispy clouds made for an aesthetic and relatively well lit two days of climbing, and the temps even managed to stay in the double digits. So now I will be working diligently to edit and upload all of my photos from the weekend , and beyond posting my favorites to my blog and website, I will be creating a Flickr account where I will post most all of the 2011 festival photos for people to look though and enjoy. I am hoping this will be an easy way for people to find photos I may have taken of them, as well as just enjoy a larger amount of the photos I spent two days shooting. When this is complete I will post the link to this blog as well as the Ice Pit's facebook page. For now here are three photos from the weekend to help pass the work week and to keep the festival fun fresh in your head.

Peter Beck gives ice climbing a try during his first day at The Pit.

A great turnout means many belayers... but don't forget, they want to climb too.

Patrick Bodien doesn't mind flying ice chunks, in fact I think he likes it.

Thanks to all of the Ice Pit members, climbers, belayers, sponsors, vendors, speakers, and hotel housekeepers for making this event possible and helping keep ice climbing in the midwest a radical endeavor. Cheers!