MOUNTAIN LIFE - Blue Mountains | Winter 2021

42 lease. She immediately re-learned to ride a bike, which led to mountain biking in Utah. Her first day on a stand-up paddleboard encouraged her to try surfing in Nicaragua and Mexico. Able to hike again, she tackled volcanoes in the Azores. But the prospect of ice climbing? Her comfort zone is a universe away. Confidence shaky, she makes it over the first boulder, scrambling more than climbing. At the sheer vertical pitch, she’s unsure. Stuck. But with every ice-tool swing or nervous step, four of us encourage from below, laughing and cheering as she overcomes one challenge after another. When she reaches the top, our collective scream echoes off the rock. For the remainder of the afternoon, we hike from one route to the next, climbers taking turns, inching to the top and catching the free ride down. Everyone is drenched in sweat, mixed with the constant drip of warming waterfalls. With the sun low and muscles exhausted, we pack up and half- walk, half-slide back to the lake and across to our waiting cars. • • • Four days later, our world shut down. Oblivious to what lay ahead, none of us knew that adventure would be our last for a very long time. I reached out to see how our little group looked back on that day, when we were just strangers thrown together on the ice. “There’s something about a shared experience, a bonding that brings you all together—especially when there’s a potential for danger. It’s one of the reasons I do these things: to meet cool people. Everyone has something in them that they bring to the experience,” says Bre. “My legs were rubber and shaking the whole time, but it was so much fun, especially because of the group. The encouragement of strangers really goes a long way.” “It’s the feeling you get when you see the look on someone’s face: They’re tired, scared, going to give up. But when they’re getting support and inspiration, you can see that glow, the look in their eyes. And everyone else is connected to it; we all shared in that victory,” says Jim. “When someone walks up to the base and says there’s no way they can climb 60 feet—and an hour later they’re at the top? What a rush!” Peter is still guiding, primarily with private groups, but the rest of us are aching to get back out there, meet new people, share new adventures. And Jim is ever-encouraging to locals who might be on the fence. “For someone who hasn’t done it before, ice climbing may sound exotic and far-off, like you might need to fly halfway around the world. But you can do it right here in southern Ontario, in a relatively safe way. It’s attainable, affordable, takes very little commitment, and it can be an experience of a lifetime.” A peak-bagging mountaineer who’s pumped to watch and inspire others, a mother overcoming physical challenges and fears, a climber who made her first day on a waterfall look like her 100th and a guide who kept us all safe and entertained—yup, I’d do it all again in a heartbeat. This time with boots, please. Bre Robertson hacks in.