mattp

I've mostly worked on cliffs that are less than vertical. On slabs and faces up to 75 degrees I generally just rap down on two ropes and then wrap the rope around my leg a couple of times to hold position.

KK you made your point very clear: taxes suck and the reasons for arguing against this or that tax don't have to either make sense or be correct. Jay: I would agree that a simpler tax code would have its advantages and that folks might understand and accept a capital gains tax over an estate tax - if that is what you are saying. But are you not making the same mistake that you so derisively ascribed to the "self annointed progressives" in your proposing we eliminate a huge body of tax incentives, credits, deductions etc. that have presumably been adopted at least in some cases for good reason?

Jay, you’re speaking nonsense again. Do you really think that all any “self-annointed progressive” cares about is punishing the rich, and they have no concern for or consideration of how various investment incentives have been fashioned for good reasons some times? And do you really still believe in Trickle On economics? I agree with the sentiment in your first sentence: "I am left wondering whether a tax code that is not conceived in a manner thats in accordance with peoples abstract conceptions of what constitutes a "progressive" policy matter more than the outcomes that the said code produces." However, I'd say that same tendency for folks to view tax policy through the lens of their own political agenda and limited view of the consequences of this or that tweak to the tax code applies equally to conservatives, libertarians, and liberals.

I always enjoy those last two pitches and I think they are in fact "great." The second to last has some amazing features on it, with a steep wall featured kind of like the top of Orbit giving way to a few slab moves and then a crack. The last is more or less a "gets you there" pitch, but there is nothing at all unpleasant about it and I always enjoy the relaxation that comes with easy climbing on top of the world. Besides, it is not until the last pitches that you start seeing Glacier Peak, and not until the very summit that you can look over at Three Fingers and Squire Creek Wall.

The bolted finish for Dreamer was in place at least five years before Nelson's book came out. Smoot left it out of his 1989 guide and I think it may also have been omitted from the first edition of the Travellers Guide. Smoot also left the bolted top pitches out of his 1999 edition, and he showed Safe Sex without the bolts so many parties still end up by mistake on Safe Sex after seeing a bolted anchor above Dreamer's fourth pitch. I think the recommendation to bail after the second five nine pitch may have originated with Dave Gunstone, and I can only assume he had not been on the route after the finish was added. Before that, it was indeed wildly run out up there if you did not follow bushy flakes and corners as Greyell and Constantino did when they put the route up. The first time I climbed Dreamer that second to last pitch had unprotected 5.8 with a guaranteed 75 foot fall to a ledge. To rap onto Safe Sex, you divert from Dreamer on the second rap, the one from a pair of oversize metolious hangers next to a tree that is maybe 120 feet below the crest. Instead of dropping to the next set of Dreamer anchors on the slab above the crux pitch, head skiers left to a station on a small knob next to the Botany 101 dihedral. From there, a short rap leads to a Safe Sex station in that dihedral, and you are on your way.

KK, you are ignoring the step up in basis. When someone dies, current law provides that the capital gains tax is eliminated on their previously untaxed capital gains. You are also mixing apples and oranges here: real estate tax is not a tax on income or on capital gain. Next you're going to be telling us that the estate taxes force the sale of family farms (hint: when the Republicans tried that in Congress they were called out on it and could not cite a single example of where this had ever happened).

I'm repeating several posts previous, but let me repeat that you are just plain WRONG on the double or triple taxation issue. If you are against such "double or triple taxation, let's talk about simply eliminating the "step up" in basis. The vast majority if not nearly all of what is taxed under estate taxation laws has never been taxed. We are not talking about some poor working schmoe whose estate is now being taxed on his paycheck savings. In order to pay any estate tax at all, you must have an estate valued at over $2 million or $4 million for a married couple. Unless they are paid a lot more than you and me, this is not a tax on someone's wage income that has been put in the piggy bank, but it is a tax on their earnings from stock investment or real estate or other assets that have never been taxed. Seriously: the "double taxation" argument just doesn't hold up unless you assume that these people who earn 100's of thousands a year are idiots and don't invest well. Let's have a real discussion here and see how many succesful investors are interested in avoiding "double or triple taxation." (Note: by "successful investor" I mean anybody who has had substantial sums to invest - wealth - and competent counsel or inate skills in asset management.) It is largely capital gains or in cases where they have not managed the estate very well it is simply taxes on the perpetuation of wealth that that folks don't want to pay.

Jay, around here you are Mr.-sneer-and-contempt so I guess I take that part of your jab as a compliment. But just what are you saying? That the press has done its job? That I am naive or idealistic to think that Democracy is founded upon the premise of there being an informed electorate and real discussion of real issues? That we are not, as a nation, on a disastrous course toward economic ruin with our unbridled spending while borrowing so much from so many nations that are not likely to be extending a helping hand when we have trouble paying that debt? Or do you think our overall tough guy stance in global politics has been a good idea? We can and will debate the politics of these and other issues but how is it that anybody could say that the "liberal press" has helped foster any true discussion of the real issues? I'm taking "liberal" in the classic sense - not some "liberal = Democrat" baloney.

I have not followed Fairweather's link, but I wonder if it is "partisan" to run stories about the weakness of a Republican agenda that has clearly led this country astray. Isn't that a significant issue in this election? I share KK's cynicism that he expressed in another thread that we're fooling ourselves if we think a shift in balance in favor of the Democrats is going to change the disastrous course we're on as a nation, but c'mon: the Republiklan playbook has been utter disaster. This constant drum beat of "we gotta take the war to the terrorists before they bring it over here" and "gays threaten the institution of marriage" has been an obvious pack of lies from the beginning and a clear attempt to divert attention away from real discussion of whether this or that foreign policy or fiscal policy is a good idea. Over the last week we've seen the White House deny that "stay the course" was their policy, or even that President Bush ever used the phrase more than eight times. We've seen reports that the N. Koreans "unconditionally" agreed to return to the six party talks when it looks as if a "condition" of that return was that the talks would in part address last year's economic sanctions in response to their counterfit US currency scheme. Or take this Kerry story: the President wants to make hay bashing Kerry over what may have been a clumsy statement, but can anybody really deny that a large segment of our military volunteers DO sign up because they lack better alternatives? Didn't they relax educational requirements specifically because of the difficulty signing up new volunteers - or at least talk about doing so? Don't the recruiters target economically stressed communities? Tvash in another thread pointed out that it is not all poor or uneducated people who sign up for the military, but certainly this is a large pool of applicants. What is "liberal" about an institution that actively supports - without rarely any question - such obvious distortion of the issues, whether by Democrats or Republicans?

I agree with the cynicism, Scott, but consider the fact that by undertaking organized efforts we have IN FACT been able at times to have an impact. In Darrington, for example, we got the Forest Service to repair the road after they had decided to let it go. In Leavenworth, we raised money toward the purchase of a parcel for donation to a land trust. At Index, the State Parks is taking direct action in response to our complaints about people throwing large objects from the top of the cliff. Perhaps there is generally a bureaucratic inertia against change favoring our form of recreation, but sometimes our efforts will succeed.

I say thumbs up to Bryan for coming here to directly answer Jizzy’s original questions about the route - as this kind of direct response from someone being targeted for criticism over bolting practices on cc.com is relatively rare. You have a "right" to make your points, Mark, and you have. So too does Paul have a "right" to suggest that he didn't like Jizzy's original tone. But lets not turn this into a discussion of who is the jerk around here. We've beaten THAT dead horse plenty of times. Some climbers will like Prime Rib, others will not. If the existence of this climb or others like it has great implications for climbing in Washington, those issues are probably better discussed in a separate thread because they are probably not specific to this route.

This tree in front of my house is spectacular every Holloween. I don't know what kind it is (some kind of decorative maple) but it is truly extraordinary at this time of the year. This is the actual color without any photoshop manipulation.

I have noticed no problem with crotch overheat. Your mileage may vary.

Archy, it is fairly simple. Allow the rope to drop down between your legs after you hook up your rappel device. Then reach around behind your butt and take hold of the rope with your thumb extended away from your body. Bring the rope back around to run next to the outside of your hip. For less friction, drop this "breaking" hand back around behind you. The rope runs more or less straight through your legs. For more friction, bring the rope tails forward and accross your lap so you in effect wrap the rappel ropes around your leg and take them toward the other hip. It is a bit tricky to get the fine control so that you get just the amount of friction you want using smaller diameter ropes, but this works pretty well and it is both simple and intuitive. For overhanging rappels on skinny cords, I sometimes add a carabiner to my belay loop or one of the leg loops to maintain the leg wrap. I put the carabiner on the front of my harness, and then after hooking up the rappel device I let the rope drop between my legs and then reach around outside my hip and bring it back around to the front to pass through that biner. The result is that I have to feed the rope through the belay device to lower myself.

You mean they've updated the guidebook since the 1968 one?

Nice post, Tvash, but I think you'd have to agree there certainly IS a lot of brainwashing involved in the operation of our military so that, for example, I remember reading as recently as about two years ago (or maybe more recently) that an astoundingly high percentage of American military personnel in Iraq believed that Saddam had attacked us on 911. Of course, I have also read that 43% of American citizens believe the same thing as recently as September of this year and our illustrious President, as recently as his 2006 State of the Union Speech, deliberately hinted the same thing without actually saying it.

I agree, ScottP, that one thing which hinders organizational efforts on behalf of climbing is a lack of cohesion that results from the way in which we have delt with or not delt with our disagreements over what we call "ethics," but I'd say at least an equal facor contributing to our lack of cohesion is that many climbers just don't want to feel as if they are part of a "group." We spend a lot more time proclaiming our independance and bluster than we do trying to organize as a user group. I bet there are fractions within other use groups as well, but many of them have a much longer history and substantially larger numbers so that, for example, those with different ideas of "fair means" in deer hunting may vehemently disagree, but they still end up with more people working on local or national issues. Also, in the case of hunters, fisherman, and ORV interest groups, they have licensing fees that contribute funds which are by law or tradition directed toward the coffers of groups focussed on their issues so organizational efforts are in a sense "forced upon" them. For a variety of reasons, these groups have a lot more money than we do; if groups like the Access Fund or the Washington Climbers Coalition had more money we'd have full time staff people working specifically on issues like this. That would go a long way toward having Peshastin opened for a longer season, better parking and bathrooms at Vantage, or better enforcement against yahoos throwing large objects from the top of Index Town Wall, or whatever else we might identify as an item of general concern.

People bail on Dreamer in significant part because the guidebook authors have suggested that the top pitches are not worthwhile. I disagree with this. The climbing is enjoyable on the last few pitches and the views are spectacular. If you reach the upper pitches of Dreamer, I agree with Mr. Cash that Safe Sex offers a cleaner rappel route - even though you have to monkey around a bit from Dreamer's 8th pitch to get to the Safe Sex rappel route and there is a bush in the way when rapelling pitch 4 of Safe Sex.

I don't think "we" retained any specific rights to have it open any particular season or hours. It is a State Park and, as you know, State Parks all over the state are seeing cuts in funding and corresponding closures and reductions in facilities. Maybe the State Parks management was not a good idea -- I don't know. Two years ago, when "we" bought some land in the Icicle Creek Canyon, we gave it to a land trust instead of State Parks. Ten or twenty years from now we may find out this was better or worse. I think that, as a user group, we could probably make more noise about this and maybe there'd be a cost-effective solution of some sort. My guess is they get an irate phone call from one or two climbers a years, but little more. Weighed against the expense and work that might be involved in changing the closure, and with little clear indication that there are many potential users affected by the closure, a longer season is probably understandably not high on their list of priorities.

I too have been evicted when climbing there during the closed season. I had assumed that it was as Zonk says - they really probably didn't care whether you climbed there or not but probably just lacked the money to open the gate. However, the Ranger was pretty upset about it and I regretted having made this assumption. Two weeks ago, I went to climb there on a gray day and was quite surprised to find it closed on October 15 (I thought it usually closed November 15 or so). My hand was already inflamed and we were only looking to do a little bit of climbing anyway, so we didn't feel like driving to Vantage. Although I know there are other areas to climb in the nearby canyons off highway 2, it was by then already raining in Leavenworth and we elected to head back to Seattle. It is too bad we climbers are not organized like fisherman, hunters, or ORV groups - we'd have it run in a fasion more to our liking.

Yup, 3501 Stone Way N. mmmm ok then. We can beg if you want. Everybody's a cool kid at pub club. mmmm

By the way, while were at it, let's create that great beta that Selkirk thinks might solve all of this. I've added Orbit to my MaryJane topo, using a photo I found on Eric and Lucie's bus trip and my memory of this climb from having done it years ago. It gets a little complicated around where I show that second belay, and I can't quite remember exactly where the bolts in question are. I think they are up where I show face climbing, after stepping right under a roof - are they not? (If you want to maintain the adventure associated with this classic climb, look away.)

I don’t think we’ll likely all agree here because the standard reasons for/against bolting get particularly complicated in this case. A devotion to maintaining the style of the first ascent might dictate that we keep the bolts in the same location as they were originally installed, but most of us here agree that location is not optimal. A desire to keep bolting to a minimum on a "trad" climb might suggest we simply pull them because they are not necessary, but many here feel that even if they personally don’t need them somebody else might and for safety’s sake we should have those bolts. A standard for safe and sane bolt belays might appeal to some but will drive others to call for chopping. I’d say that we should go up there as a group, string fixed lines from bottom to top, and talk about it. No doubt, clear heads will prevail.

My guess is the State doesn't "know" or "not know" anything. I bet they simply run it as they would other State parks of similar usage - in terms of numbers - with the same season and hours. It is a shame, but I bet it'd be hard to change this. I'd like to hear otherwise. My impression is that some other state agencies run more lands with specific user groups in mind - DNR manages lands for hunters and for motorcyclists and Fish and Wildlife manages places for fishing... but do State Parks?