Chouinard slides

This year's Mountainfest is, as always, on Martin Luther King weekend (1/19/2019). It is put on by the Mountaineer and Adirondack Rock and River and is a festival celebrating winter activities such as ice climbing, snowshoeing etc. - Clinics are taught, slide shows given and while the weather can at times be challenging, it almost always delivers as a highlight of the winter season. This year there will be a very short (15 minutes) presentation given before the feature slide show on Saturday night at the Keene Central School. This warm up presentation will commemorate a very historic event that occurred at Chapel Pond 50 years ago (almost to the day) which, being a lover of all Adirondack history, I would like to make mention of here. In 1969, Yvon Chouinard (famous climber and founder of the company, Patagonia) organized a clinic to be held somewhere in the Northeast that was to introduce his new, revolutionary climbing tools/crampons to the climbing world. Chouinard and his 2 friends - Doug Tompkins (founder of the clothing company, North Face) and Jim McCarthy (famous Gunks climber) asked the American Alpine Club to send 2 members from each AAC state chapter in the Northeast to this clinic which they decided (due to its' great ice and central location), would be held in the Adirondacks. These representatives would then go back to their home states and spread the word about these new techniques and climbing tools to their fellow climbers. The clinic was held at Chapel Pond and Chouinard's new, much shorter ice tools with curved picks (instead of straight picks that didn't work in steep ice) and his new rigid, 12 point crampons, were introduced...This clinic is well known by all serious ice climbers and climbing historians agree that this event gave birth to the modern version of the sport of ice climbing. To honor this event, Jeff Lea, a long-time New Hampshire guide and attendee of the clinic representing new Jersey at the time, will give a short presentation remembering this historic event and showing a few slides/tools etc. Also!!! The highly elusive Yvon Chouinard himself will send a short video clip of himself reminiscing about that era/event. This is a huge deal since we've been trying to get him to come East for over 20 years! His video clip may be nothing much but at least he responded and will make an attempt...So just a heads up - Saturday night, 1/19 at KCS - see the Mountaineer's website for more info...