mattp

The forecast I see indicates there will be a "chance of showers." Depending on what they say that chance turns out to be, I'll be ready to head up there anyway. I could probably climb Silent Running to replace old bolts there even on a slightly damp day. But I'll wait and make that call a little later in the week.

I think I'm looking for a partner for Sunday, as right now my Saturday partner says he's out for Sunday though I plan to twist his arm. Anybody wanna do some cragg maintenance or possibly explore? Send a PM. There are a few things I'd like to do in Darrington before the year is out.

Yup. That is the unfortunate downside of regulation. As they said in communist Russia: "if you want to make an omlette you have to break some eggs." But concerns for individual property rights should argue in favoer of paying attention to elections and holding public officials accountable and maybe tweaking the system so that it is not so much tilted in favor of developers - not for abandoning the concept of land use regulation.

Here's an excerpt from the 1989 Washington Rock Climbs guide by Jeff Smoot: Might one or the other of these be near where you climbed?

Way to go, guys! There may be a few bushes over there, and a tad bit of lichen, too, but it is a cool walll, no? That dome is way special.

The driving road/approach description in selected climbs is fine. I've got a more detailed and up to date topo here: web page

Troggy's right. If you go to Outer Space on a saturday, you gotta be ready to share it with folks who climb faster than you, or who may be trying to pass you, or who don't do things your way at a belay, or whatever.

Dru- Have you actually tried this? I'd be interested to hear from someone who has actually tried this method - either in practice or in a real rescue situation. It is easy to picture a slight advantage over having the "victim" fumble with prussiks down in the hole, but my own experience with jumars or prussiks usually involves one of them attaching to my waist rather than two feet, and I bet that is more often then not necessary even if the guys "up top" are hangling the rope management. As a side note, perhaps only slightly off-topic, I'd say that with a party of four or more it is probably easier to just haul the poor guy out of the crevasse.

Get the bike chain lube or the Metolious product if you can, but I've had decent results with the WD-40 too. Over the years I have used various products - including silicon, graphite, wd-40, and bike chain lube - and I think the silicon seemed no good but everything else has worked generally OK. I'd be careful to try not to get any of it on the sewn slings.

A good, succinct discussion. Germane to the "bolt clipping" thread.

muja says that the stiff side of the dogbone is for the bolt, and I don't think this is quite correct. Yes, it is true that it works well as muja describes - as a reach extender - to use the stiff end to clip a bolt. However, I believe the reason for the rubber thingy's development was that it kept the active 'biner - the one the rope flutters through - oriented properly. Securely attached to the draw, it cannot flip over so as to become cross loaded when the actual catch is made. The only time I've ever broken a 'biner during a fall was when it ended up cross-loaded. Regardless of which end is which, however, all of this discussion points to the fact that there are all kinds of variables at play, and in each individual case there may be factors that weigh in favor of gates facing the same way vs opposite, stiff vs. floppy draws, etc. There have been lots of times when I've clipped a draw, stood there eyeing the next move, and wondered if it was worth it to reverse the gate or swap for one with a locker on it, or ...

I don't know the answer to that question. It was a draw from "the other guy's rack" and I don't care enough which way they face to have noticed that particular fact. It was fine when I led on it, but when I started to yard a bunch of rope up through it for a belay, the draw rotated upward and the 'biner unclipped from the rope.

I had one do this just this past Sunday as I pulled the extra rope through it to belay the second.

I like the Helium's.

Off topic slightly, but Mr. Legs I can tell you I'd be very unhappy with your rack if it consisted entirely of the "typical" wiregates with a very aggressive hook and sharp "nose" on the gate opening. They catch on stuff and are a damn nuisance to get wired stoppers out of and can even be a pain when unclipping a tripled runner yet they unclip themselves when racked on your harness and I wonder if the lead rope may too unclip itself some time. Further don't work for a 'biner break. I'd be a lot more uncomfortable with a rack entirely of these than I would with a rack where the guy had the draws clipped backwards - though I could deal with it if my partner said they were uncomfortable with what I have.

Ivan, I have had that happen almost exclusively with wire gate carabiners, with an aggressive "nose" next to the wire gate opening, and mostly with ice screws or with a stiff-stemmed gizmo device like a TCU. It mostly happens at a belay where the piece of gear gets pushed onto something and therefore pushes back against the gate, and if you play with one you can easily see the mechanism for this. I bet turning them around WOULD reduce this unfortunate occurence. Meanwhile, I fear that these same 'biners may be more likely to unclip the lead rope if you clip in the dreaded gate-toward-travel orientation than might some other type of 'biner.

I agree with those who say it is not all that important, but in my opinion it is just plain obnoxious to carry on about how stupid the question is, and to turn this thread into an argument about whether or not it is a good question. Personally, I prefer having them both face the same way. I like this mostly because I have just grown used to it after being told, thirty years ago, that you want to avoid having carabiner gates face the rock and it is more often the case that both ends of the draw are going to be in the same vertical corner then it is that they might be in corners facing opposite directions. But for me this is as much a left-over practice from older ideas in trad climbing than based on any real consideration of sport climbing realities. The post about how it is easier to clip with the gate facing toward the climber has some merit. Assuming that most of the time you are not thereafter going to traverse past that bolt to climb on the far side of it, it might -more often than not - be better to have the 'biners facing opposite directions. I'm sure there are fifty arguments either way, and I would not be surprised if Dru is correct that there is not really a "correct" way. Call me dumb, but I think it is rude to pile on the original post or attempts to actually answer the question.

And here, at "Marmot Manor," above "Excalibur Rock," near the shores of "Lake Viviane" in the Enchantments:

Here's a picture of Peg and Bill (center of photo) and their dog Aaron at High Camp:

Last Friday, the Wenatchee World ran such a piece. web page Some here may enjoy hearing that Bill retired early from Boeing so that they could spend more time in the mountains. He and Peg moved to Leavenworth, and had a house where they invited lots of similarly minded people to come and stay. Most of their visitors were young and some had long hair. I'm not sure they saw it this way, but it was at times derided as a "commune" by their neighbors. Bill was very active in local Leavenworth politics and Peg, too, could be quite vocal on environmental matters. In one interview, Bill proclaimed he had left Boeing because he no longer wanted to be a "wage slave," and the pair of them served "Russian Tea" at their rustic backcountry resort. This was enough to get them branded as "communists." They had a very intense spiritual thing going for the mountains around Leavenworth and they devoted the second half of their lives to this passion. They were (are) good people.

Bill Stark and his wife Peg may be best known to Cascade climbers through their names of various features in the Enchantments: Lake Viviane, Aasgard Pass, Merlin's Tower, Rune, Talisman and Valkyrie.... These two began exploring the Enchantments in 1959 and fought quite a battle with the Forest Service to have their names adopted when the local District Ranger had named the lakes after girlfriends or given them more "institutional" names like "Inspiration Lake." Fred Beckey's use of their names in his guidebook tipped the scales in their favor. Peg and Bill also founded a back country ski business on McCue Ridge, above Highway 2 near the rest area east of Stevens Pass. Many who post on this site have visited that "resort." Some have gone up there to enjoy the magnificiant touring in high, but gently rolling terrain, while others have gone ice climbing at Lake Julius or hiked in the high meadows. I and several others who lurk at this site learned to telelmark ski from "the old goat." Bill touched many lives. He will be missed. Peg survives and lives in Port Townsend.

With regard a climb like the South Face of Jello Tower, I think that my own view of the difficulty has been greatly impacted by changes in my style of climbing. When I was a pup, I didn't mind throwing in a piece and gunning it to the next rest stance which might be as much as fifteen feet up (or more in some cases), and I didn't mind taking what by today's standard are considered big falls. I never got badly hurt doing this, but I no longer like taking such risks. That willingness to throw myself at something got me up lots of climbs, though, and I was able to lead the South Face of Jello Tower and think nothing of it at a time when 5.9 was really my limit. Hell, the pro was right there and somehow I always seemed to make it to the jug. Today, I think there are much fewer climbers young or old who are willing to plug and go if it means even the possiblity of a moderate fall, and by this I mean something more than a sport fall where the bolt is at your knees or above, Consequently, we don't learn to simply sprint through something where "the sequence" is not clear before nearly every move. This is part of why a very technical 5.10 face sequence requiring back stepping and very specific weight transfers is often seen as much "easier" than a 5.9 chimney whereas they would have been viewed quite differently "back in the day." It doesn't explain all the trend toward uprating many of the old classics, but it explains some of it. I'm not saying the South Face is in any way run out or that the pro is not right there in front of you - it is - but I do think that climbers who might not have the technical skills needed to climb it carefully, move by move, can probably gun it and grab the jug if they can simply free their mind enough to do so. (I wonder, too, if a hold may have broken off some time in the last 30 years.)

Marcus- You've linked the html pages that display the images, rather than the image files themselves. When viewing an image in the gallery, right click it to get the .jpg address for the image. Then, if you paste that between the image tags in yhour post, you'll get the photo. One problem, though: your originals are 2500 pixels wide, and will blow out the page so this thread is unreadable and we can only see a quarter of the image at a time. P1 variation: The meaning of offwidth: Bandana brotherhood: These are the "medium" sized versions of the image files, automatically created when you upload to the gallery.

How is the monster log about a half mile beyond the Three O'Clock trailhead?