I was climbing this day with Des Rubens, an outdoor-education teacher from Edinburgh who had climbed for decades in Scotland, as well as on expeditions around the world. When we reached the Scottish Mountaineering Club hut at the main face, Des pondered the crowds of climbers streaming up the gullies and said, “Och, we may have to wait, but I think we'll have the best luck in Observatory Gully.” And so we cramponed up firm Styrofoam snow toward the icy Indicator Wall, where queues of climbers stood below every climb. We perched atop a tiny bergschrund below Psychedelic Wall (VI, 5) to wait our turn.

Psychedelic was climbed in 1978, and the classic thin-ice face route was quite feared back in the day, hence the respectably high overall grade of VI. Modern gear and good conditions had dimmed the aura of the climbs on this wall, but not the excellence. In the condition we found it, the Psychedelic Wall equated roughly to easy WI 4. But the route, especially the second pitch, was still quite serious. The ice was never more than about six inches thick, and much of the climbing depended upon sheets of sticky névé — wind-plastered wet snow that sucked up picks and crampons points. On the second pitch, the ice and névé thinned to about an inch for a delicate 25-foot rising traverse with no protection. But the angle was such that you could balance on your feet, and Des led it comfortably.