[pct-l] A REAL Iceaxe

[Matthew Edwards]

Hi MendoRider! I met you briefly at FireFly's house. Your horse was "cleaning up" the yard. 
Anyways I too had used a Heavy Black Diamond Iceaxe for years before last years PCT. In fact Last year while I switched to an 11 ounce Camp Corsa my buddy Socks carried a heavy Black Diamond with a polished chrome Pick and Adze. While we got lucky with the timing and conditions I can see where Sock's would have had a much easier time chopping steps the I would. My ultralight axe might have even sheared off had I tried to chop ice due to it only being attatched with two pins and not welded. It's shorter length would have meant leaning over quite a bit to effectively chop steps.. Not the most balance position to take upon and icy snow slope.
As I said we got lucky. The snow melted in the afternoons but not much before the hail storms would provide shade. Then in the mornings there would be just a few hours of sun to soften the snow on the way up the passes. The clouds would roll in around 11am and hail comenced providing Sock's and I an easy descent from the passes with minimal postholing.. Until Donahue where the snow was just plain rotten but thankfully short.
Conditions will no doubt be different from year to year. There may be a need to use a heavy axe to chop steps. I just think for most folks the weight issue will mean carrying the lightest axe possible if at all and making do. A lot of the choices, right or wrong, that thru hikers make are compromises between safety and weight. Ideally we would have the finest equiptment for every circumstance. But inevitably we make compromises to save weight. Under the conditions we saw last year our Iceaxes were not neccesary. This year who knows?
One place I certainly did NOT need to have the axe strapped to my pack was at the San Diego Airport.. Security frowns upon that sort of thing these days!
-Iceaxe  ;) 

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