The story
Ouray Ice Festival in Ouray
Each January, the town of Ouray, Colorado turns into an ice-climbing gathering point built around the Ouray Ice Park, home to more than 200 ice and mixed climbing routes carved into a narrow gorge beside town. Now more than 30 years running, the festival draws climbers of all levels for free walk-up climbing, clinics, competitions, and gear demos over three days and four nights in the San Juan Mountains.
Ouray sits in a narrow box canyon in Colorado's San Juan Mountains, a setting that produced heavy mining-era infrastructure in the late 1800s, including pipes and flumes that once carried water for mining and municipal use through the gorge just south of downtown.