Ski mountaineers, fast-and-light alpinists, and freeriders face a constant battle against pack weight. Traditional ice axes provide the secure self-arrest protection required for steep snow, but carrying a 500-gram piece of steel on your pack…
Carrying a 500 gram ice axe for eight hours of glacier approach just to use it for ninety seconds of self-arrest practice is the kind of tax that makes weight-conscious mountaineers grind their teeth. The…
Most ice tools that swing well cost a lot, and most that cost less feel like a compromise by the third pitch. The Trango Raptor is one of the few that gets close to the…
The Cassin X-Light is a general mountaineering axe that shaves weight off CAMP's Alpax design without switching to a full aluminum head. It's aimed at climbers who want one axe that plunges comfortably on glacier…
Picking between the Petzl Quark and the Petzl Sum'Tec is harder than it should be. Both axes look similar. Both come from the same brand. Both use the same kind of swap-out pick system. So…
If you've spent any time on ice climbing forums, you already know the Viper has a reputation. It's the tool that guides recommend to people who ask "what's the one axe that'll get me up…
The CAMP Corsa Alpine sits in an odd spot in CAMP's lineup: heavier than the all-aluminum Corsa, lighter than a true technical mountaineering axe, and built around a full steel head that the base Corsa…
The CAMP Neve has been a staple recommendation for climbers building their first mountaineering kit for over a decade, and it still holds up. In this CAMP Neve review, we break down what the axe…
If you have spent any time browsing Petzl's ice axe lineup, you already know the brand does not make bad gear. It makes gear that is easy to overthink. And nowhere does that overthinking happen…
Note before the article: Amazon currently lists the Quark in a 50cm shaft length only, sold in Adze or Hammer configuration at the same price. Older Petzl catalogs offered additional lengths for some Quark variants,…
