The Feline Wall, about ¼ mile into Panther Gorge on Mt. Marcy, sometimes hosts a thin ice smear down its center line. It seems reliable in that it forms every year. The caveat is that it is thickest at the top where the water feeding it seeps from the krummholz. Sun heats the dark underlying stone and often delaminates the bottom portion. Whether it is bonded to the anorthosite when one visits, is a persistent wildcard. Temperatures were forecast to be in the 40’s F in the Keene Valley; a little elevation should have kept it in the 30’s on February 18th when I and friends Matt Dobbs and Jace Mullen went searching for ice. Only when I returned home did I find out that the thermometer in the shade had reached about 60. This explained the conditions we encountered, but I’m ahead of myself. I picked Matt up at 3:40 a.m. We met Jace at the trailhead and began hiking the hard-packed trail by 4:40. Some mornings we are chatty, but only short conversations broke the silence as we each struggled to wake up. The sun breaking over the ridge to the east a couple hours later aided the effort. Blue skies and occasional winds accompanied the trip from Slant Rock to the Haystack intersection. I scanned the cloudless sky and wondered how this would bode for climbing. READ MORE HERE: http://www.adkhighpeaks.com/forums/forum/adirondack-slides/slide-climbi…