Jason and I tried to link-up Hydrophobia and Sorcerer, it's been done a few times before (solo and not) and we had done both climbs together before by themselves (and multiple times), so figured why not try it. Except there were some things working against us: 1) it was the shortest day of the year (well, technically the day before), 2) it was -20 C, 3) the road into the Waiparous was in rough shape, making the Ghost the smarter choice for approaching, but much longer.

For 1), we decided to head out of Calgary at 4am and hope to start hiking in from the Ghost by 6am so we have time. For 2), couldn't do anything, not in our control... and 3) - well, it's just some more hiking, how hard can it be? "Harden the f*#@! up!" comes to mind.

The approach to the Sorcerer took about 2 hours as the trail was not set the best way this year, and there was some postholing (last time we did it, it took us 1 hour 20 mins, pretty big difference). Still, we were climbing by 8:30-9am and Jason took the first pitch to a bolt anchor. I was pretty well frozen belaying even though he was quick, and I barely warmed up following the pitch. Then I headed off onto the "approach" ice and up the first pitch to the cave, with 70-meter ropes and Jason walking up the snow slope at the end. He followed efficiently and led the next pitch, up I went next, we were both at the top of the climb at 11:30am - not bad, we were slightly ahead of schedule. I sent the cornice, which was the sketchiest part of the day, it was much bigger than expected (see pics)! Traversing around the cornice didn't seem too appealing as there are sketchy rock slabs with questionable bonding of the snow, straight up was sporty but fun. At the true top at 11:45am, coil the ropes and start hiking towards Hydro.

Getting up to the ridge up a scree slope was a bit of a hump, but not more than 15-20 minutes, and then we realized it's not quite as close as we imagined it from there. Traversing around and up one more small hump, tricky hard snow on the traverse, I elected to put my crampons on... long story short, an hour and a half to the top of Hydro, longer than we thought. I forgot to drink or eat for the last 3 hours, quick bite and drink half a liter while Jason is setting up the first rap. Three 70-meter raps off fresh abalakovs and we were at the base of the steep ice, the watch reads: 2:00pm.

This was good time, we still had about 3 hours of daylight, plenty in order to finish the climb. However, since we hiked in from the Ghost, we had planned on traversing the ridge back, and rappelling down the Sorcerer. There was no moon and the clouds rolled in with slight snow at times, so we knew it would be pitch dark. Navigating the ridge when you are tired in the pitch black did not seem too appealing, and there were several gullies that you could get sucked into instead of the Sorcerer, which would be bad news. We discussed climbing Hydro, rappelling down and hiking out the long way through the forest, but the biggest problem with that was that our packs were at the base of the Sorcerer... and we didn't want to have a long epic thrash through the night. So with that said, we decided to call it a day, and hike back... not majorly disappointed as we knew we were sort of pushing it with the timing - we'll just have to come back.

Hiking back, there was a lot of snow (a lot more than the previous time we had been here), no trail, etc... we thought we'd go a little further and try to catch the Johnston Lakes quad trail, and indeed there was a quad track there. We followed it for a bit, but it went the wrong way, ARGH! Back to the forest we go, through terrible deadfall, and knee deep snow in places. Just as it got dark, we found our tracks leading up to the Sorcerer and dropped our harnesses, ropes and all of our gear... what a relief. We hiked up to the Sorcerer now for the second time, collected our packs, and hiked out in the dark, now following our old tracks . Total time from the base of Hydro to the car = 4 hours and 30 minutes. By this time we were no longer second guessing ourselves whether we had made the right call to bail - it was clearly the right choice. Ouch, clearly all this hiking was not in the plan, but it was a great exercise. We reflected that we underestimated the amount of hiking on this link-up, particularly the connection between the two climbs on top of the ridge... I always imagined they were right next to each other, but it's not the case, it's not something easily done in the dark either. We'll be back! I shot some movie footage with my new helmet cam, but haven't had the time to put it together.

		The upper pitches of The Sorcerer	Me on the first steep pitch

			Jason scopes out the 2nd pitch of The Sorcerer

		Frozen eye lashes and all, -20 C... my GoPro camera gives the dorky look :)

		Jason and the big cornice I climbed through (crux of the day for me!)

	Looking up from the top of Sorcerer		Want to hike up there? Not really, but we have to :)

	Jason at the top of the Sorcerer/Hydrophobia ridge	It's cold	Cryophobia mixed climb in the middle, with the top of Hydro seen... still a long ways to go

	Hiking on top of the ridge

	Top of Cryo is pretty fat	Rapping Hydrophobia	Cryophobia

	Hydro and me hiking down, for scale	Hydrophobia	Hydrophobia and Cryophobia on the right

	Ready to slog for 4.5 hours?