The American Alpine Club hosted their 5th Hill to Crag, and the FIRST ice climbing event this past weekend! We were incredibly fortunate to partner with the Bozeman Ice Festival and spotlight not only the event itself but the beauty and grandeur of Hyalite Canyon.

Hill to Crag is a unique opportunity to bring together legislators, staffers, outdoor recreation influencers, and veterans to discuss and share information in an exciting way - Climbing! Participants had the opportunity to get on the ice with some of America’s foremost Alpinists, as well as Service members who have a passion for the outdoors.

Among other things, we discussed Veteran issues, the impact of outdoor recreation on the economy, and access to public lands to support a healthy economy and Veteran therapy. We were joined by Rachel Vandervoort, Director of the Montana Office of Outdoor Recreation and spoke at length about the amazing climbing resources in Southwest Montana, and elsewhere in the state.

We were also joined by Zoe Bommarito and Darla Cotton from the National Forest Foundation, who experienced their first time climbing ever! Nearly 34% of climbing in the United States lies on Forest Service lands - that’s more than any other agency public lands. It was great to connect some of the stewards of these lands with climbing for the first time and talk about the importance of National Forests everywhere to the climbing community.

A big thanks to Joe Josephson, Conrad Anker and Graham Zimmerman for showing our crew around the canyon, putting up ropes, and teaching climbing movement. These folks have contributed in so many ways to the climbing community and we were grateful to have them in attendance. Also, thank you to all of the service members who attended. We hope to continue sharing climbing and public lands with active and veteran military communities across the country. A final and important thanks to our sponsors for the event, Black Diamond, Scarpa, Cilogear, and Patagonia!

Photo Credit: Joshua Murdock and Taylor Luneau