Guided Ice Climbing in the Ouray Ice Park
Climb In The Ouray Ice Park: Colorado's Best Ice Climbing Destination
The Ouray Ice Park is one of the world's premier destinations for ice climbing and one of the best places to learn, practice and progress on technical ice. Located in the Uncompahgre Gorge in southwest Colorado, the Ouray Ice Park offers an extraordinary concentration of ice and mixed climbing within walking distance of downtown Ouray. More than 150 named ice and mixed climbs are spread throughout nearly a 1 mile stretch of the gorge, creating terrain for first-time ice climbers as well as experienced climbers working on steep ice and advanced movement.
Skyward Mountaineering provides private guided ice climbing and personalized instruction in the Ouray Ice Park. Our AMGA certified guides can tailor the day to your experience and goals, whether you're trying ice climbing for the first time, transitioning from rock climbing, improving your technique on steeper ice, or preparing for longer multipitch routes in the San Juan Mountains.
No previous ice climbing experience is required for introductory guided days.
Trip Description: Ice climbing and mixed climbing in the Ouray Ice Park, with over 150 pure ice routes. Routes range in difficulty from WI3 to WI6 and M4 to M10, depending on the area and specific route. All routes can be toproped, with the exception of the Lead Only Area.
Prerequisites: Routes for all abilities, from beginner friendly to expert climbers. No previous ice climbing experience is required for toproping in the Ouray Ice Park.
Schedule: Full day (8 hours) of ice climbing. Due to the short approaches, it is easy to maximize the time climbing. The Ouray Ice Park is generally open from mid December - mid March, conditions and weather pending.
Group Size: Maximum of 4 climbers per guide.
Location: Ouray Ice Park is just 2 minutes south of Ouray, Colorado.
Elevation: 7,792ft / 2,375m
Pricing: From $275 per climber.
The Ouray Ice Park Is One Of The World’s Best Ice Climbing Destinations
Ouray's unique combination of natural terrain, engineered ice, accessibility and concentration of routes has made it one of the world's best known ice climbing destinations. The Ouray Ice Park is located in the Uncompahgre Gorge using a water spraying system that allows ice to be formed throughout the climbing season, creating an unusually dense collection of climbing terrain in a relatively small area.
For climbers, that concentration is the real advantage. You can climb several different types of ice in a single day without committing to a long approach, making Ouray an exceptional place to learn fundamental ice climbing movement, experiment with different tools and crampons, refine techniques or practice climbing steeper terrain.
For visitors new to ice climbing, the Ice Park removes much of the logistical complexity associated with finding and approaching backcountry ice. For experienced climbers, it provides an unusually efficient training environment before committing to longer multipitch routes in the San Juans or larger alpine objectives elsewhere.
Plan Your Ice Climbing Trip To Ouray
Learn How To Ice Climb & Improve Your Technique
You do not need previous ice climbing experience to hire a guide for an introductory day in the Ouray Ice Park. The park's concentrated, accessible terrain makes it an exceptional environment for learning the fundamentals of ice climbing. During an introductory guided day, your guide can teach you how to use crampons and ice tools, move efficiently on low-angle and moderate ice, belaying, rappelling, anchors, and understand the fundamentals of climbing technique.
For climbers who already have experience on ice, a guided day can focus on becoming more efficient rather than simply climbing harder. Your guide can help identify inefficient movement patterns, improve body positioning, refine tool placements, develop better resting strategies and help you understand how to climb steeper and more three-dimensional ice.
Why Hire an Ice Climbing Guide?
The Ouray Ice Park is open to independent climbers, so you don't need a guide simply to access the park. The value of a guide is expertise, instruction, route selection and efficiency. If you're visiting Ouray for only a few days, a guide can also help you make the most of limited climbing time. A Skyward Mountaineering guide can help you:
Choose terrain appropriate for your experience and adapt the itinerary to avoid crowds
Learn the most efficient ice climbing techniques
Manage climbing systems and provide instruction for you to be self-sustainable in the future
Progress to steeper terrain
Practice leading skills
Exper local knowledge
Training recommendations for continued progress
Plan a Multi-Day Ouray Ice Climbing Trip
Ouray is particularly well suited to a multi-day climbing trip because you can progress from accessible instruction in the Ice Park to increasingly challenging terrain in the backcountry without changing your basecamp. Your itinerary doesn't have to follow this exact progression, our guides can customize a program around your experience and objectives.
Day 1 Learn or refresh the fundamentals: Build efficient ice climbing movement on moderate terrain.
Day 2 Improve technique: Work on steeper ice, movement efficiency and three-dimensional ice climbing strategies.
Day 3 Multipitch systems: Apply your skills to longer climbing and practice transitions, anchors and rappels on shorter ice climbing routes in the Ouray backcountry.
Day 4 Backcountry objective: Climb a longer multipitch backcountry route based on conditions and your abilities.
From the Ouray Ice Park to Backcountry Multipitch Climbing
Ouray is more than just the Ice Park. The surrounding San Juan Mountains contain a huge variety of backcountry ice and mixed climbing routes. The Ouray Ice Park provides an ideal training ground for these longer backcountry objectives, such as in Ouray, Silverton, and Telluride. After developing efficient movement, belaying, and multipitch systems during instructional climbing days in the park, climbers can apply those skills to backcountry routes where longer approaches, dynamic conditions, and more complex climbing systems become part of the experience as well.
Some of our guides’ favorite routes include Stairway to Heaven, Bridal Veil Falls and The Ribbon, depending on conditions and the experience of the climbing team.
FAQs About Climbing In The Ouray Ice Park
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Ice climbing conditions change throughout the season with temperature, weather, route traffic and ice farming operations. A route that is excellent one week can change as the season progresses. Your guide will monitor current conditions and route availability before your climb and can adjust the objective accordingly. Typically, the Ouray Ice Park opens by late December and closes around mid-March, although conditions can shift the opening and closing dates. For climbers planning a trip, weekday visits can help reduce crowding.
The surrounding San Juan Mountains offer additional backcountry ice climbing that forms earlier in the season and remains viable outside the Ice Park's operating window, primarily due to the higher elevation and shaded aspects.
Skyward maintains a comprehensive ice climbing conditions page for Ouray and the surrounding ice in the San Juans. This community resource is based on observations from our guides in the field and local reports, updated weekly. Your guide will review conditions before the trip and choose objectives accordingly.
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No, you do not need to have previous climbing (rock or ice) experience to enjoy climbing with a guide at the Ouray Ice Park! Skyward Mountaineering offers ice climbing courses and guided trips for all skill levels, from beginners to experts. Honestly, there are routes for every level climber with multiple styles of climbing. Our professional guides will help you through the entire process, with getting equipped with the right gear, how to build anchors, how to belay and other fundamental ice climbing techniques, and efficient ice climbing movement.
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Yes, Skyward Mountaineering puts a lot of value in working with you to personalize every guided climbing trip. Some popular customizations include:
Personalized instruction based on your goals and climbing ability
Combining ice climbing in the Ouray Ice Park with a backcountry multipitch route
Professional photography options
We guide toproping in the Ouray Ice Park at a maximum ratio of 4 climbers per guide. If you would like to climb as a larger group we will add another guide to the team. Contact us if you would like to climb in the Ouray Ice Park with a group of more than 4 people.
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We have a detailed equipment list to help you prepare and pack for your trip. If you have questions about any of the gear please let us know, we’re happy to help make recommendations or clarify.
We provide all of the technical group climbing equipment, this includes ropes, anchor material, protection, etc. Many of our clients are experienced ice climbers and prefer to use their own equipment, though we do maintain a small fleet of personal gear for climbers on trips with us to borrow. We are also happy to have you use a new pair of ice tools or crampons if you’re interested in trying out different, modern tools. Please let the admin staff or your guide know ASAP if you expect to borrow personal climbing equipment such as backpacks, harness, helmet, belay device, carabiners, personal tether, etc.
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Before your trip, your guide will talk with you about your climbing experience, goals, and equipment. That information helps us choose an appropriate objective and determine what skills to emphasize.
On the morning of the climb, you'll meet your guide in Ouray, organize your equipment and head into the Ice Park. Your guide will review the day's plan and introduce or refresh the technical systems you'll use.
From there, the day is built around climbing and instruction. Depending on your goals, you may spend the day repeating moderate terrain to improve technique, progressing to steeper ice, learning new skills or climbing a longer objective.
Because conditions and route availability change throughout the season, the itinerary is intentionally flexible. The best route for your group isn't necessarily the same route that was ideal the previous day.
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Sun or snow, we’re able to climb in the Ouray Ice Park during almost all weather events. Due to the nature of the terrain in the Ouray Ice Park, there is little to no avalanche hazard in the Ice Park, making it a reliable option in comparison to many of the backcountry areas around Ouray and Silverton during large snowstorms. Also, as local guides in Ouray we are able to precisely monitor conditions and weather to provide you the most up-to-date information.
In the rare event that the weather or conditions prohibit the team from ice climbing and your guide deems conditions to be unsafe/unreasonable we will work with you to reschedule your climbing trip.
For more information on our cancellation policy, please see our terms and conditions and contact us with any other questions.
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Established in 1994, the Ouray Ice Park originally began illegally with climbers poking holes in the penstock diverting water from a hydroelectric power plant upstream, so the water would freeze on the steep cliffs of the Uncompahgre Gorge. Legendary alpinist, Jeff Lowe was critical in the development of the Ouray Ice Park and the annual Ouray Ice Fest, along with local legends, Bill Whitt and Gary Wild.
The Nuche (meaning The People, commonly referred to as Ute), lived in Ouray and throughout the surrounding areas of the Colorado Plateau. The town of Ouray is named after Chief Ouray (meaning Arrow), leader of the Tabeguache who agreed to a controversial treaty with the US government on behalf of all the Nuche tribes.
The Ouray Ice Park is located in the Uncomphagre Gorge, which is a Nuche word meaning water that turns the rocks red, due to the high mineral content from iron oxide deposits.
Today, the Ouray Ice Park is the beating heart of the Ouray winter economy. Climbers from around the world come to the Ouray Ice Park, for the annual Ouray Ice Fest, private ice climbing with a guide, or personal climbing with friends.