Climbing policies

[freemountain]

How would I go about finding whether a particular site is located on crown land and climable?

I have been eyeballing an 800ft cliff in the interior of BC for several years now, that had been climbed 15-20 years ago, but is located adjacent to a camping resort. There is an irrigation channel between the resort and the cliff along with a *very* seldomly used gravel road for maintenace of the waterway. There are several "no tresspassing, falling rock" signs at what I believe to be the edge of the resort, but before the waterway.

Any ideas on how to determine whether I can climb this without getting into legal trouble?

[staven]

You could try using the Provincial mapping database called iMap: http://webmaps.gov.bc.ca/imfx/imf.jsp?site=imapbc. It can be complicated to use, but should be able to show everything you need (district lots, private land parcels, commercial leases and tenures, rec sites, water licenses, forest harvesting activity and planning, etc.) If it is on private land, you may be able to use the PID number of the property to find out the owners name using BC Online. Good luck, hope it's good to go!

[Peter]

You could try www.access-society.ca. But since I'm here, your best bet would be to find out what Regional District it might be in; http://www.bcstats.gov.bc.ca/data/pop/maps/rdmap.asp and then make contact with that particular office. For example, the Squamish/Whistler area all falls under the SLRD-Squamish/Lillooet Regional District, their head office is in Pemberton and can usually tell you what land is what.....

Peter
Climbers Access Society of BC

[freemountain]

Thanks guys, I pulled it up on imap bc, and google earth, looks like the resort backs right to the edge of a cliff, then it's a provincial park.

[staven]

Great news, any hints as to where the mystery crag is located?

[rolfr]

Sounds like McIntyre Bluff.
I will be living in the interior from April till October in the future, if you need a hand and a drill send me a PM.
Always wondered about the quality of the rock? Seems that there is some potential but it would have to compete with Skaha for quality.

[Dru]

Or maybe the wall on the other side of the valley from McIntyre, behind the KOA campground?

In which case the phrase "provincial park" should give cause for concern since it's Vaseaux Lake park and that has some major cliff bird nesting areas. IIRC Robin B and Guy E did a bunch of route development at Vaseaux Lake in the 90s and those routes have gone the way of the Lambing Grounds.

[freemountain]

Wow, didn't expect anyone to recognize the place from that vague description, I've been eyeballing both of the cliffs named for years, the cliff that backs on to Inakeep prov park, and the Indian head cliff (never touched that one though). I have a friend who's dad is a councillor on the reserve, I'll talk to his dad and see how the outlook is. I have seen tons of pigeons nesting in a chimney on the cliff (looked in there, wouldn't touch the wall there, they've been there forever and it shows), but I'm only there for a month in the summer, so it could very well be a protected habitat.

Here's a close-up ish pic
http://imgur.com/mlHUw

Bolts would *not* be necessary, there are cracks throughout the cliff that would be excessively easy to protect. cracks everywhere, but it seemed quite solid.

http://imgur.com/PzodW
(a series of bad decisions led to us scrambling to find a way down before the sun set, but you can get an idea of the structure of the rock)

I imagine that the resort will say to stay off for liability reasons, and because of the proximity to the resort a large part of the cliff is likely not doable, depending on where their property ends, maybe an agreement with management could be reached to climb away from the resort, it would bring in traffic and benefit the resort. I won't be making any progress on this for several months still, but if someone else would like to make headway go for it. Otherwise I'll message back once I get somewhere.

[staven]

A quick search of the Conservation Data Centre's website showed several Blue-listed species (threatened) living near McIntyre Bluff: Spotted Bats living on the cliff itself, and the Nuttall's Cottontail (rabbit) and the Great Basin Spadefoot (frog) living near the base. The area east of Gallagher Lake is also inhabited by another blue-listed species, the canyon wren. Probably a good idea to tread somewhat lightly and do a little research to assess the impact the climbs may or may not have.

[Brendan]

Wow, didn't expect anyone to recognize the place from that vague description

Yea well once I posted a pic from below a totally obscure not-yet-rated climb looking straight up at basically the blue sky (and I even did a PRO job a photoshopping the power lines out), and DRU nailed it exactly where it was. LOL. So don’t be surprised.

[freemountain]

Someone set bolts, any idea who it was? I've got a couple questions for them.