chucK

I saw on the news that two trees fell on some guy's car and he died at Mt. Rainier. chuck

Cavedude! You did Easter Tower? I've long wanted to try that. Sounds like you didn't like it? Care to elaborate? Chuck

Uhhh...I met Conrad Anker's parents once. My best time on the Tooth is 2:26 (official time between leaving the honey bucket to that point which you find out whether there's a notice of non-compliance on the windshield). I liked all that stoopid grunge shit BEFORE I moved to Seattle('90). Can drive from Seattle to the end of the Middle Fork road in under 2 hours. No moving violations in 18 years. Been on top of Big Snow Mountain 3 times, twice in the middle of the night. How's that? Chuck

Stoop, CascadeClimbers, stoop, and let us bathe our hands in Bonzo's blood up to the elbows, and besmear our swords. Then walk we forth, even to the marketplace, and waving our red weapons o'er our heads, let's all cry 'Peace, freedom, and liberty!'

You first dude. What's your dubious distinction(s)? Was it going to that ""DeWeeWee"" slide show? What's the record time on the Tooth? Chuck [ 11-19-2001: Message edited by: chucK ]

= [ 11-13-2001: Message edited by: chucK ]

quote: Originally posted by jon: GU is on sale at Performance Bicycle for $20/box until Nov. 4. How many packets in a "box"?

quote: Originally posted by Government Watch Dog: Berkeley (and much of the bay area)is excellent, plus there is a good outdoor scene going on.And hey,Yosemite is right there. Yeah, "right there", just a four hour drive. Sorta like driving to Squamish from Seattle.

He walked all three in a year. There is no asterisk needed next to that statement.

The SI article says he took a 1.5 day break to do his taxes!

Check out the SI article linked in his website. It's a good article with some good info. For "crampons" he used 1/2" hex-head screws pounded into his shoes, tips up(?). Sounds like he started doing the AT from the South, then when he got too bogged down by the winter up North, he flew and did 600 miles in New Mexico, then he thru hiked the PCT. Then finished the Continental Divide trail, then finished the AT. The article was written after an interview in July when he was at Crater Lake. The isolation sounds brutal. I get chatty with strangers on a 1/2 day solo climb. This guy was out there 7 months! You ever run into one of those solo hikers out in the woods? They're dying to talk about anything. I remember heading up to Thompson one morning and some guy just about begging me to join him for a cup of coffee up there next to Ridge Lake. Chuck

The new features that allow you to go straight to the most recent page of the multi-page threads is a great improvement. The feature that shows the most recent posting on each board is great. Is it possible to copy that so it would be available for each thread within each board? I liked the ratings. It was fun to automatically one-star anyone who bitched about the ratings or the new board. But like someone else wrote, it would probably get old quickly. Great job guys. Chuck

Dude, I'm intrigued by your reluctance to lead. If it is because you don't feel ready and perceive it as dangerous, consider this. Many of the "leaders" that you are following up a mountaineers climb have exactly the same amount of experience as you do now. You are putting your life in their hands. Wouldn't you rather control your own destiny? If you just want to climb with Mounties on the basic level you can still sign up for the basic climbs as long as you stay a member. I did that for a while. It was a bit harder to get on climbs, but no problem if you just sign up for the harder ones. Chuck

Went and climbed the Tooth in the warm sunshine. Nobody was around. I do think I spotted ScottP up dancing naked on Chair though. Glad I didn't have my binocs. Chuck

Nevermind, too late. I went up and climbed the Tooth. There was NOONE up there? I thought the Tooth was supposed to be crowded. Chuck [This message has been edited by chucK (edited 10-20-2001).]

DPS brought up being sick in two separate threads. That makes it look like he WANTS to discuss it, doesn't it? I hope he's gonna be OK. Get well soon Dan. Chuck

Here's my two cents... Though I enjoy the freedom inherent in anarchy in hills, I do think that the most popular areas could or do benefit from some group taking the initiative to maintain the area and/or delineate some measure of decorum. At popular crags I have concerns with waste disposal (litter and human waste) and unnecessary impact on the surrounding environment (e.g. multiple redundant trails and erosion). These problems could potentially be solved by educating the users to the problems, but probably the best method is for a concerned group to take steps to make it easy for the less-concerned (and everyone) to not trash the place. For example, build some good and obvious trails, block the redundant ones, and provide easy access to waste disposal (honey buckets, trash cans, and the big one, maintenance of said items). In this scenario, there are no potentially thorny issues of who polices whom and how much. By making it more convenient for people to take care of the place, you'll get pretty good compliance. Most people will not be dickheads if it means going out of their way. The crux here is whether or not anyone takes the initiative to do the dirty work. At most popular places some motivated party will get the ball rolling on positive improvements and I wholeheartedly thank those like DCramer and MattP with the drive to initiate this stuff. Once the process does get started I think it's the duty of frequent users of the area to pitch in and help. The topic of "rules" for crags is more problematic. Without a clear governing body it would be difficult to delineate and effectively enforce any rules on route development, obnoxious behavior and such. Establishment of a governing body, especially one that enlisted the feds, would be worrisome to me. I get all touchy about that "slippery slope" stuff. At present I don't see a big problem at the crags I visit in terms of "rules" and people following them. Sure there's some worrisome stuff, but most people act pretty civil, and when someone gets way out of the line the local community appears to police itself reasonably well. I'm not going to go jumping on a bandwagon to create a system that at some point is surely gonna "cramp my style" on the chance that we might need it someday. I'd rather put off a painful cure until I'm sure it's needed. One more problem I see in the climbing community is that damn ice-cream truck that visits the UW Rock and blares its annoying ditty to distortion. Perhaps winter will take care of that, like the fruit flies in our kitchen. Chuck

The report doesn't look too bad for the East side of Cascades for Wednesday. Chuck

Well this one doesn't even compare to NW face of Forbidden, but if you're short on time, check out the N Ridge of Foggy Peak. With a bike it's a short day (I was home for dinner in Seattle at 6pm) but you won't find near as many people as the Tooth. There's a bit of bushwhack then you climb up and pop through Ida Pass. The scenery gets cool here. Glissade down about 600 feet then traverse around and back up to N Ridge of Foggy. Awesome granite up on the crest. Easy climbing for about 400 feet. Lonely summit. Take the shorter way back down the SW face route. Chuck ps I posted a report earlier this year, http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/ubb/Forum2/HTML/000195.html about another obscure day trip in the Monte Cristo area I stumbled on this year.

That Dave guy is is pretty cool. Just make sure you don't let him drive! Chuck

I did Thompson about a month ago, via the Direct W Ridge. It is easy, but the pro is pretty sparse for a beginner leader. If you are getting worried and needing to place a piece every 10 feet or less then you might take a REAL long time to do the climb. That might be a concern if you are doing it from the car as it's a pretty long trudge. There was a party or two that got there just after we did (Thank God!) and they were VERY slow. I'd bet it was because of the beginners*no pro factor. The Tooth would be an awesome climb to let your beginner partner lead if it weren't so goldeen crowded. You might try that. You probably wouldn't have to worry about being held up by anyone. A good possibility if you have mountain bikes (or the key to the Monte Cristo gate) would be the N Ridge of Foggy Peak (Green Beckey guide). Two-three pitches of nice granite on the ridge. It might require crampons to get to it this time of year. The SW-face route is OK too. It is shorter and would not require crampons now. It has only one short but good rock pitch up on the ridge, but throws in a couple of nice, though exposed, 4th class pitches. I'm not sure if there's good pro on the 4th class stuff. Chuck

My birthday's the 16th. Can I come too? Chuck

I do recall that West of the summit was a precipitous dropoff and that I got to the final summit point from the North. That would imply that I traversed under it on the right (East). I don't recall any scary parts there but perhaps it's being blocked from my memory by post-traumatic stress? Like I wrote above, I did find a summit register. I don't remember thinking that I hadn't summited. I do remember thinking it would be cool to climb that crazy balanced rock (with a partner). Here's a cool picture from Alex Krawarik's page. You decide which is higher. Chuck

I climbed it last year via the SE route. I remember two harder sections. One was a short chimney. The chimney turned out harder than I wanted on the way up and I had no rope with me so I chained two or three bootied rap slings together to make a little prison-break rope to aid my descent. After the chimney I came to a decision of an exposed traverse on the right of a tower or a 25' high or so corner with a crack (and slings at the top) that led to ledges left of the tower. I took the corner. From there I went left of the tower then right of the balanced rock then easy to the summit. I don't remember(?) any other difficulties. I probably was on the summit as I do remember reading summit register entries. I also remember that the insecure summit combined with the foreboding about my upcoming descent precluded me from enjoying myself very much on the summit. Does this sound familiar? Did you find my flag of rap slings? Chuck [This message has been edited by chucK (edited 09-24-2001).]

That bolt above the pedestal replaces an old rusty one. I can understand how people would miss that old one since I missed it myself the first n times I climbed OS. Didn't find it until someone else led and clipped it. Yes, it does work very well to reduce rope drag. If you're just worried about rope drag though, it seems like the old one would have sufficed. Maybe it's to protect RPM? Chuck Chuck