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There are no two-pitch free-solos. They are all one pitch.

Are you bringing a rope? If so, walk over to the rib beneath the East peak. If you see no snow, you're golden. That means no snow. If you do see snow, just scramble down the rib a hundred feet or so and pop back over below the snowfield. Of course, at that point you will be cliffed out above a big slab. But since you have a rope, you can rap it (or downclimb it, it's pretty cool). There's a couple stations there already. You probably might wanna also bring some bail webbing. And bring two extra water bottles.

guess where

What an interesting and cordial discussion of bolting. You guys are the best. Let me please step in here and take a couple jabs. I think it is interesting that North Bend and Vantage are being used as examples of places that bolts didn't ruin . Seems like using that argument is kinda shooting yourself in the foot if you ask me. The mention of bolts on the Canary ledge intrigued me too. Though I don't advocate chopping them like Thinker did ( ), they do seem pretty unnecessary and stupid. You don't need 'em to rapell. They are big fat 1/2" pieces of convenience. They probably help speed up the trains of people climbing up Canary and Saber, so that's probably a good thing. But a lot closer to 'convenience' than 'necessary' or even 'useful'. Hell for convenience, I think it'd be pretty convenient if someone went and bolted just one more pitch on Total Soul so you wouldn't have to carry all those heavy cams up that brutal Three O'Clock Rock trail. Oh, and I'm totally for bolted belays with chains wherever that belay is going to be often rappeled from.

details!!? Spill Alex. Route? Length of fall? Dogbone draws involved?

Hey Dru, About that contingent of Canadians that are coming down to the Icicle, and that kegger that you have invitied disenfranchised ropeuppers to. I think it sounds lame and you should change it.

"...ask for Bubblebutt." "Hi, can I speak to Bubblebutt?" "Who?" "The one with the big piton?"

Mattp, You are WRONG!!! The piece for that spot is a #8 Black Diamond Hexcentric. There is a slot into which one fits perfectly, like the slot (or hexes?) were made for it. It fits so perfectly that the hex will fit in only one orientation. It fits so perfectly that I would not recommend taking some other brand hex up there. I believe you should include this vital information on your topo. And Mr. Whitelaw, are you reading this?

Start of school for Seattle SD is Sept 3.

Did you have an orgazmik beer experience afterward, or does that require doing the whole route?

Oct 15

Why not have grass-roots, non-corporate, bring-our-own, "party" in September sometime? This would allow those who seem put off by the Octoberfest to do their thing. This would also allow all those who want to attend the big extravaganza to do that thing. AND it would not require the groups to be divided. If you got enough free time, this way you could do both! September is a good time for just about ANYWHERE in WA. Darrington or Washington Pass come to mind if Leavenworth is all booked up already. C'mon AlpineK, I'm sure you got enough firewood for two events.

I think a 50 would get you all up the Gendarme. First person leads on doubled rope. The other two follow separately on single strands. The problem I see with your plan is that having three people climbing is going to either cause you to go real slow (pitching it out [with 25m pitches ] the whole way up the ridge), or increase the danger (simuling with three people).

But you did say Roosevelt to Kaleetan was a traverse. I call it climbing two distinct peaks. Glad I could make you laugh. Better than a "rap on the beezer" I guess. Good to see you posting again.

Just Stuart-Sherpa or Dragontail-Colchuck might be good objectives for mortals? Hmmm...maybe not the latter due to the road closure.

Hey Fairweather, It looks to me like Mattp articulated a bunch of his beliefs. You on the other hand just acted the evasive crybaby . I don't think Matt's point was that NPR is not biased to the left. I think his point was that NPR reports closer to the truth than does FoxNews. What do you think about this statement?

Sounds good to me!

Nice pic too!

Matt, I think if the demos did have leadership it might be bad. Then they would have all their heads on the same chopping block. I kinda like them "diversified" .

If you camp at upper Ingalls Basin I would think you might as well pop up to the Lake and take Ingalls Pass out, but I could be wrong about that (it is not very far up to Ingalls Lake from there) My advice about the W. Ridge routefinding is try to scope it out well from a good vantage like Ingalls Lake and Pass and make some mental notes about big things that you'll be able to discern when right below them. Follow cairns from the summit to get to Cascadian Couloir. It's just on the other side of the East Peak. If you stay right on the crest initially there's a scramble path you can take that avoids traversing the snowfield directly below the summit. When we were up there 2 weeks ago the snow in the CC was pretty hard (i.e. easier to walk down talus unless you had crampons, unfortunately talus was not an option), though the day before at the same time of day the Stuart Glacier was casual. Probably something to do with the elevation difference.

I tried Pixie Corner and Jolly Roger and backed off of them both. Jolly Roger was more stemming without positive holds and my resolve just slowly melted until about 10m when I decided to downclimb (Later I saw somewhere that it is more difficult higher up?). I think the Pixie Corner decision was basically made on the ground. Rounded insecure finger locks soloing? You really should check out the Clean Starts/Neat and Clean area. At Clean Starts there's I think 3 distinct cracks. Left to right it's a finger crack, hand crack, hand crack recessed in dihedral. I thought the right stuff looked easier but it wasn't. I tried the far right, got halfway up, switched to the middle, then really cringed on an insecure topout (grabbing grass hummock). Then before I left I thought I could climb the finger crack as high as I wanted then downclimb, and it turned out to be much easier! Bomber locks pretty much the whole way. Of course YMMV depending on your finger size and technique. And I agree totally about Sugarloaf. Have you guys done that hand crack boulder problem through a roof that's just inside the jungle on the right (N) side of the Murrin Park parking lot?

Dude it's like a 1/4 of a mile. Don't sweat it. Just drive there and check it out. If it's too heinous for your rig, just walk.

OK. I guess you're right. It could be a reasonably long day, depending on how much was belayed. I still don't think it's easy (to avoid the chop), and I still don't think it's a traverse. To go from Roosevelt to Kaleetan, you climb up Roosevelt, then back down to the base. Then you walk over to the start of the N Ridge of Kaleetan and you climb up that. I think of a traverse as climbing over a contiguous feature between two peaks. Roosevelt Kaleetan is no more a traverse than Snoqualmie Peak -> Chair Peak would be, or perhaps closer would be Liberty Bell by the Beckey Route, rap down Overexposure to the notch then climb Lexington or Concord or whatever that tower is by Lib Bell by the N Face Route.

You probably wanna take Ingalls Pass to access the West Ridge, then Longs Pass on the way out. Are you planning on camping in upper Ingalls basin or at Ingalls Creek near where the Longs Pass trail is? West Ridge times can vary quite a bit. Depends on how much roped climbing you do and your routefinding decisions. It's easy to get lost up there. The West Ridge sees its share of unplanned bivys, so your time could be 2 days. A somewhat fast time from car to summit is 6 hours. I was just up there a couple of weeks ago and my time from summit to camp at Stuart Pass was 4 hours, partner took 6.