mattp

I'm on the fence about attending but if someone wants to drive over on Friday night and return Sunday, that'd help tip me toward going because I'd win extra points with my wife if I left the car home. I'm looking for cragging and last weekend bought Bryan's new guidebook which looks like it offers some good lowland ideas. Has anybody been up to Fire Wall?

Julie brought the carrot cake. She is the one who invented Climber's Picnic though I quizzed her about this and she said "well it wasn't really me. I mean, I just lived in this house and we were social..." Anyway, it was Julie's picnic when I first attended one - at this same picnic shelter, roughly 25 years ago.

Rockclimbergirl won't even take the stage until after 10:00, so come on down when you get back from climbing.

I'll be doing some shopping this afternoon and plan to show up at 5:00 or may be a little after. If somebody wants to help set up, that'd be great. I still have not located a laptop computer that the owners says is "qualified" - whatever that means. I can bring a desktop machine from my office but surely one of you folks has something better. I'll be looking for a grillmaster. I'll have the charcoal and tools. Bring gear to swap. I've got a bunch of old rock gear and some vintage ice screws and a super dooper sleeping bag. I'll toss my old slide projector in the car in case somebody wants to show hardman shots of yore.

Pete: No, I have not climbed Girth Pillar. That is why I ask. It has always been one of those routes I thought I might like to do but wasn't going to head up there just because it was in a select guidebook. Where somebody suggests it may be in the top 5 NW climbs, that piques my interest.

Idea guy is right: the turn off Aurora is poorly marked. If you miss it, just take every possible right turn and you will eventually end up where you should. I have an old school projector and am picking up a rental diggy projector tomorrow but could use a laptop computer that is better than the TWO that I have lined up but which the owners say are sub-standard. Doesn't anybody have a kick ass laptop? And who is bringing the avocado side dish?

I mean no disrespect here, Eric, and maybe I am missing something ... but have you climbed Girth Pillar? I can well believe it is a cool little feature in a neat place but it has a pitch and a half or two pitches of hard climbing on an otherwise moderate alpine ramble. And it is a big ramble.

I may also be interested in doing some climbing over there this weekend.

Monty: your simple bottom line is exactly right. What I was saying about the wire gates, really, was that many of them have an aggressive "nose" which can direct the rope into the gate. Eldienite, I think your 9 out of 10 times it will fail is a slight exaggeration, but I do try to clip the right way around. Dru, if we ever climb together, I'll prefer to use my rack.

The dogbone draws lie flat against the rock facing right or left when clipped to a bolt but not necessarily if you clip to a piece of gear and if you use the "trad" draws, with a shoulder length runner tripled over, they orient kind of right or left but not absolutely so. They do sometimes flip around so the rope is ready to unclip itself or at lest so there is an odd twist when you change directions. Does anybody but me think that many wire gates are just as prone to unclipping themselves as the bent gates - or perhaps more so?

Fox: Nice! I brought one home from our last adventure. Tick list indeed. Back to Shaoleung: I'm not sure there was any real reason why such a proposal never got incorporated, thought I don't know what an "8nu style tick list" really is. But we here at cc.com like to pooh pooh any new proposal or anything that sounds "commercial" so if it includes a reference to a commercial website it is likely to get panned. Yours might be a fun proposal. See the "5 top climbs" thread currently on the Climbers' Board.

I think there's a lot of truth to your complaint that "nothing substantive has changed." I don't think our propping up the banks or our plans in Iraq have changed. And he's only made marginal improvements in environmental regulation. But at least Obama says that we SHOULD be talking to the leaders of other nations when we formulate foreign policy, he's saying that we SHOULD have scientists in charge of matters requiring scientific knowledge, and that we SHOULD actually try to make any overall domestic economic and spending programs benefit normal Americans in addition to the mega-rich. For that matter, even though he is promoting stimulus spending, he has been talking a lot more about fiscal responsibility than his predecessor. I bet that, in hindsite, he will be seen to have delivered on at least some of this. I hope so.

Like Monty and Gene, I like having at least a couple draws set up with lockers on the active end of them. I think monty piton may be referring to "unclipping" when he writes about "back clipping" above. With both bent gate and wire gate carabiners I have seen the new "easy clip" carabiners unclip themselves and in fact I've seen it more with the wire gates than with bent gate spirits, at least. For racking wired stoppers, the aggressive hook on most wire gate carabiners is a bit of a nuisance. For a general purpose 'biner, I like Petzl sprits and have about equal numbers of those and Wild Country Heliums, with a few petzl attache binners on my rack.

waterproof breathable shell. Used once. See it at the climber's picnic on Thursday.

I'm pleased to see Darrington show up in two posts so far. I have always thought it was one of the best local climbing areas! Dreamer and Roan Wall are fantastic, but there are a lot of other good climbs up there!

Hood has killed as many or more climbers than any other peak around but the south side is a good newbie climb. Choose a day when there is no big wind or wet weather predicted for the next three days, and maybe check for an avalanche warning, and take it half way seriously. It should be just fine but you better know at least a little bit about climbing steep snow.

Here's Seattle's Greenlake from the air. North is off to the right.

Hey all: I just want to let you know that it is looking like a good year at the Climber's Picnic. It is not supposed to be raining sideways on Thursday, and we've got some good slideshow presenters lined up: among others, RockclimberGirl, Steph Abegg, and Wayne Wallace. We'll have a mix of rock climbing and mountain climbing pictures to look at, and I hope we'll have a pretty good gear swap as well. If somebody is gearing up for Antartica, I have a -40 western mountaineering bag for sale.

Everybody has their own sense of what is fun around here and you're right, Tim, a good old fashion train wreck can be lots of fun -- but it was also apparent that lots of folks, while they may have had something to say on the topic, were largely just bored and looking for something to jump on. Maybe Brett can show up at the climber's picnic on Thursday and meet Micah in person. How about a couple of Aborigine slides and we can revisit the whole thing over a couple of hot dogs?

I have some Friends that I'm pretty sure I got from Jardine in Yosemite in '78 or '79, trading for ropes he was hanging on the Nose. They say "Wild Country", Friend 2, US Patent...something (hard to read) ... made in england. I have what appears to be an earlier one, size .5 maybe, with no mark. The stem appears to be a different type of metal - it has tarnished differently. Is that the elusive "Jardine model?"

For Washington: Davis Holland/Lovin Arms, Index Midway, Castle Rock N. Face, Nooksack Tower Burgner Stanley, Prussik Peak Liberty Ridge, Mt. Rainier With the exception of Nooksack Tower, these are all popular routes. They are popular for good reason. There's good reason Nooksack is not popular, too. It is not easy, it is not easy to get down from, and it is not featured in the "Select" guidebooks. It is a great climb on one of Washington's coolest peaks, and full value, though.

Don't forget: We're celebrating WASHINGTON CLIMBING next week!

Awesome!!! Lloyd's place is really cool and it is warm and dry down there, while up on the pass it is still ski season. This is truly the best of all worlds; one of the supreme campouts of the year! Great news!!!!

Awesome! Skin-in 2006