22 Jan 12° Kandersteg ICE Climbing Festival

 
The 12th  Ice Climbing Festival in Kandersteg took place last weekend  in Kandersteg (pleasant town in the Bernese Oberland)  with 90 competitors, 21 of whom were women. The dry-tooling competition was won by Patrik Aufdenblatten of Zermatt, 2nd place for  Nikolai Primerov from Russia and  3rd Gatean Ruyman.  Ines Papert of Germany won the female competition, 2nd  Petra Müller and 3rd  Christina Schlesener  
 
Kandersteg, is one of the most important centers of ice-climbing in the Alps.  Some of its fantastic itineraries are visible on the rock band just behind the village and many are within a few minutes approach.
 
Other more remote routes are located  in the Crack Baby sector and those frozen flows have marked the evolution of modern piolet- traction and make us remember a pioneer of the vertical ice: Xavier Bongart