Bronco

The petzl helmet "meteor" is similar to a bicycle helmet with a foam liner. Supposedly only good for one good hit then throw it away and buy a new one. Pretty inconvenient if you are on the 2nd pitch of a 20 pitch alpine climb, if you were to ask me.

If you are in jail, I will give $ to the Caveman legal defense fund.

Missed this thread while on vacation. I know an old gezer log home builder who drives a 87' Mercury Grand Marquie with mud tires on both axles. This would be a great mountain car. you can haul 8 climbers and sleep 4 in the trunk (no rangers would look for you in there). Terrible mileage but great ride and power. Clearance is comprable to the Subaru generally come with leather interior which is very durable and killer stock stereo systems. This car would turn some heads at the trail parking lots.

I read an "extreme sports" poll in the 9/23 Seattle PI of what "extreme sports" Amerikans participated in most over the last year. Thought I would post what I could rememeber as I can't find the poll anywhere. 1. 400,000,000 ROLLERBLADING!!!(i made up the number, but it was a lot) 6. 6,000,000 INDOOR WALL CLIMBING Way down at the bottom slightly less than 2,000,000 Mountain/Rock Climbers. Point is, well, I don't have one, I just found the poll interesting to know I was outnumbered 3 to 1 by indoor plasic pullers.

Eddie: It depends on if they are screaming at the top of thier lungs "ROOOOOOOCK" i will make myself small against the wall, if it is more of a casual "ehh - rock dude" I will scope it out to either dodge it or take it like a man in the teeth.

What other harnesses do you dirtbag hippies or yuppie gapers think is the best thing swami belts went out of style?

cool, now I know why.

Anyone have one of these newer type Petzl harneses Calidris or Corax? I am looking for an all around (craggin, alpine, trad, ice) harness. Have an older REI harness that has served me well, but want something a little more comfy to hang in.

We forgot to pack a lunch yesteday on a long hike. I found 2 old "carrot cake" cliff bars in my pack and we each gagged one down. Pretty gross. I had to wash my mouth out with many beers to get the taste out after we reached the truck.

http://www.rockandice.com/index.phtml?section=gear good article reviewing several different cams including robots.

Pro Mountain Sports was closing out their stock of HB cams for $35 per cam, regular price of $55. I don't know if they have any left. From what I understand the Robots don't have cam stops which means you can't use them for passive pro. I dont know why you would haul cams around only to use them as passive pro, but that is what I have read on the Robots.

Thought this would be the best place to spray about some crazy bastard dragging his crying little kid across the Cowlitz glacier yesterday afternoon. For those of you who havent slogged on Rainier's South side this is the jump off point for teams leaving Camp Muir and where you would rope up. Cries of "NOOO DADDY" echoed. I couldent stand it and started out onto the glacier, stopped, talked to a RMI guide reading a patagucci cataloge who had talked to the guy and his daughter. She said they had also checked in with a climbing ranger prior to starting across and hoped he didn't take a crevase fall becuase the little girl woulden't be able to stop him. I start and stop trying to anticipate what I would say or do when I caught them. Being the parent of a kid myself I decided the guy must have an idea of what he is doing and the climb was probably well planned and the kid was just scared because of the thundering rockfall. The weather is perfect for the next couple of days, all snow cover is gone from the glaciers so most crevasses are visible justify it all you want, if you don't do something you are just as bad as the other people at camp muir just pretending they dont hear anything. Finally it looked like the pair had turned around and I suddenly felt pretty embarassed to be out there to lecture this man on the virtues of parenthood and scurried back to camp muir, grabbed my wife and hurried down the mountain. I'm glad the confrontation didn't occur, parenting is not easy in the mountains or in the home. My thoughts for the day.

Hiked up to Camp Muir yesterday w/Mrs. Bronco, no crowds on the snowfield probably because the final 2,000' is ALL ICE!! Suggest bringing crampons even if you are only going to Camp Muir. Bring your ice tools for the sticky seracs on the Cowlitz Glacier.

I'd use free three year old ropes if you decide not to......

Fish and chips and Guiness.....MMMMMMMM I think I'll take a long lunch today.

No left turn from Westbound Hewitt onto Colby my climbing friends, (unless you are driving a City Transit Bus) But the Pig is located just south of Hewitt on Colby. I can't make it tonight (class), but, I will be there in spirit wishing I was doing that instead of learning how to appraise income properties for the 5th time...

I don't mind the audience, I accepted the fact a long time ago that I am a gomer and always will be. But, I will let you know next time I go. I made a rhyme!

(chest beating) first lead on trad gear this weekend at Bozeman Pass in MT. Went to the crag and found to my dimay it was all bolted!! No guide books available at the climbing shop so we asked around at the crag looking for a 5.8 crack that I could bail off of on the bolts if I suffered an epic whilst attempting to place gear. No luck. All of the easy climbs were occupied. While touring the crag we watched in horror as a hot mamma top roped off of a quick draw attached to a single hanger about 40' off the deck. As she neared the draw she looked at us and asked "isn't the rope supposed to go a certain way through this thing?" I said "yeah it should go up and out like the opposite of how it is now, but...." I hold my breath as she calmly reached up and unclips the rope completely from her only pro and clips it back in correctly. "Like that?" she says "Uhhh Uhhh Uhhhh" I stammer. Next to us is a rasfta wannabe belaying his bro (who out weighs him by a good 40 lbs.) up a juggy bolted 5.8 and the bro is suffering mightily to get up this little overhanging section while we are all distracted by the actions of the hot mamma. All of a sudden, zip!! big bro takes what should have been a 10' whipper. Because rasfta man is not attending the belay - about 10' of rope zip through his atc and he is yanked into the air about 5' so - big bro ends up taking a 30 footer which conveniently stops about 6" above a large ledge. WOO-HOOO! Good stuff to watch and not participate in. Anyway, we found a nice hand crack (no bolts)about 50' long that probably went at 5.7 placed some hexes and 1 cam, got to the top of the crack and realized NO PREINSTALLED RAP ANCHOR - DOH! But a nice big flake to tie a runner around and lower off (thank God!). Lesson learned - when climbing non established or un-documented routes, go prepared to improvise.

eh, I'll take a rain check on the hug thang.

Of course your people will care when you are gone Dru, buck up!! I think the distinction is kids are DEPENDANT on thier parents and it is somewhat irresponsible for parents to take unnecsary risks. Nobody is discounting the life of a single climbing geek with no kids. Just discriminating against parent climbing superstars.

Neat! But I thought wolverines looked like Patrick Swayzee and fought the Russians. (bad joke, sorry)

"Asphinctersayswhat?" Wayne

David - I bought the BD Ice Pack this year and have used it quite a bit, pretty happy with it, real straight forward with no foofy gimicky stuff. The only thing I would change is adding a wand pocket, it just has straps for sliding your ski's into so carying pickets and wands requires some thought. Bought mine for $127 on Snowleopord.com of course it is last years color (boo hoo) I wanted a nozone but couldent put up the $$$ at the time and wanted something I could use for a summit pack on an extended trip. Happy shopping!

http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis/web/vortex/display?slug=hikers09m&date=20010909&query=chair+peak Pretty detailed article about the very unfortunate accident.

I'm no expert, (and I know you didn't ask) but, it seems to me that devise (Kong GiGi) was not designed for belaying 2 leaders, but 2 2nds. If you check it out, and find I'm right or wrong, post it so I will know. I've considered doing the same thing, but didn't have faith in the setup because if one climber falls, you have a handfull of trouble.