mrefranklin

As a matter of fact it was, Glen. You were there too. I think we had beers downtown afterwards and talked about what a rotten idea the BAT was. Good to hear from you. I hope things are going well.

Thanks for the help. I did try a google search before I posted here and found a Colorada phone number that had been disconnected. My guess is that the freaks are gone...

So the million dallar question is: Did you let your subscription run out or did the issues just stop arriving? Nekkid mountain chicks are fun. I went to a Warren Harding slide show where he kept inserting picture of nekkid hippie girls in between his slides of climbs in the valley. One of the best slide shows I ever attended.

A couple of years ago, back when I was doing a little work in the outdoor industry, I went to the Outdoor Retailer show and picked up one of the many free magazines that they always give away there. There was a magazine called Mountainfreak that I thought was pretty fun. I can't find any info on it now so I'm assuming that it must be defunct. Can anyone confirm or deny?

Hey Jim, I would heartily recommend taking your gear with you to Shasta. I've had some of the best backcountry days of my life there. Of course, part of that is probably because I grew up in that area and have spent more days there than anywhere else. It's pretty easy to get up the old ski highway to bunny flat. Just drive almost any road from the town of shasta towards the mountain and you're bound to stumble on it. Cruise all the way up until the road stops. You can either head up Green Butte, Avalanche Gulch, or skin up the snowed in road to reach the old ski bowl. All can be great skis... Personally, I like to head up Green Butte because it's the most direct way to gain elevation. I take it up until I can drop down into the old bowl and then I ride the road back down to the cars at Bunny. You can probably lap it a couple or three times no problem. Eric

Howdy climbers, A couple of friends and I took a look up at the North Face of Mt. Shuksan. I figure it might be of use to some you hearty ice climbers. We drove a beautiful Westfalia in to fire access road 5307 (below he lower lodge at Baker off of the Hwy about 1 mile before the gate). The road is "shrubby" as you get down lower We managed to put some nice little scrapes in the brown exterior of the car. "Merely flesh wounds" I tell you... From the lower end of that road, you bushwack straight down the valley, cross the creek (which is very passable right now), and head up the opposing ridge, veering right towards Mt. Shuksan as you ascend. Stick to the heavily forested areas as much as possible to avoid underbrush vegetation and the ever-popular devil's club. Be careful not to overturn too many completely hidden hornets (bees) nests as I took about 8 stings on the way in. Access the top crest of the hill and hike it to some nice bivy spots near the base of the North Face. Plenty of water opportunities in the form of snow patches still exist if you hike the ridge far enough. When you are ready to begin the ascent of the North Face, don't rush to put on your crampons (as we did). We traversed an ever-steeping snowfield until we reached the base of the climb. The snow was a step below water ice, but not by much. Much quicker travel can be had by skirting the lower rocky edge of the snow field until you get up to the hanging glacier on the actual North Face. It looks like it's about a 12-15 foot iceblock climb to get onto the route. We turned back here due to our unfamiliarity with the route higher up and the fact that retreat looked like it would be a royal pain if we got in over our heads. All of us have climbed on ice that steep, but never for that prolonged of a period of time. None of us felt comfortable leading all of the tough pitches. I think we'd planned on a little bit more neve conditions without quite as much broken near-vertical climbing. Oh well, we'll be back. For a good proficient ice crew, I think the route looks like a blast right now. A nice fellow who planned on soloing the route had bivvied below. On our way out we stopped to talk to him and found out that he was an alpine guide who turned around because the conditions looked a bit fierce for a solo effort. He had climbed the North Face two years ago in August and found a "fun" 30 ft bergschrund up the route. He was guessing that it might even be larger now. He hiked the ridge down with us for a ways but split off to reach his car at the Baker ski area since we were on the fire access road. You can check out some pics I took here: http://homepage.mac.com/cascadeboy/PhotoAlbum6.html I hope that this helps some of you ice folks out there. We didn't make it far enough to see what happens higher up the route but it looked like fun.

Heinrich, We were out taking a peek at the North Face this weekend. There is currently about a 12 ft ice block entry just to get onto the route. The "snow" was about as close to ice as you can get without being water ice and the schrund up higher looks pretty big (30+ feet). We felt we were in a bit over our heads considering our group's lack of ice lead experience. We'd all climbed ice that steep before, but never for that long. We met a fellow up ther looking to solo it. Nice guy who climbed it 2 years ago and worked as a guide. He backed off too. He probably would have gunned it if he had a partner, though. For a good ice crew it looks like heaven. Hope that that helps. Eric P.S. Watch for the hornets on the way up. We dislodged hornet nests about 4 or 5 times and I took about 8 stings. Yowzah!

Sorry for my misinfo on the Rainier climber report. Apparently the Mowich face info has not been updated in months. Thanks much to several private messages sent to me for my last post. Mea culpa.

Rainier report here states that some folks were doing Mowich Face a couple of weeks ago: http://www.nps.gov/mora/climb/climb_cd.htm Also, Gator's guide puts the standard in-shape times for the route as May, June, July, and October. With the weather we've been having, shouldn't it be closer to October conditions than September - or is it just too friggin' warm? I might just be having a spout of denial and really hoping to squeeze it on before the end of the year. How about this one: Has anyone in Cascade Climber land been up Mowich recently or during another melted out time in previous years? What does the route climb like in similar conditions (I assume much more scree to cross, rockfall, and circuitous glacier navigation).

Weekend of April 20th. Must have been very tired. Just thought I'd try...

Weather forecast looks pretty decent for the weekend. I think we'll be making a go of Gib tomorrow. I believe there are still no limit restrictions at Muir until June 1st. Can anyone else confirm that? I think we just self-register at Paradise and truck on up. Good lord am I gettin' excited... Climbing season here we come. http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/getproduct.pl?SEASEARECSEA

"I'd rather be with you people than the finest people in the world!" - the mayor in "Roxanne" Sort of wraps up how you feel about any climbing partner...

While I don't have any specifics on permanent positions, I did see a post up on the board at the Mountaineers (in the hall outside of the bookshop) that a group is looking for somebody to take a couple of duffel bags full of stuff to Nepal to drop off for some charity efforts. I forget the specifics but the group was offering gear to anyone that would agree to make the delivery. It looked like a legitimate request and it may make you feel really good to do something for them while exploring your new home. Best of luck to you!

Just a word of warning, if you plan on hitting Cooper's on a Tuesday, you're in for a bar full of folks playing trivia. You don't have to play but it can be pretty distracting and noisy... Thought y'all might want to know.

Har dee frickin' har, danlo, For those of you who didn't hear, I left my parked car at 1 AM to head in. I bumped into a bear on the trail, in the dark, at about 2:15. The bear retreated up the trail. Since I didn't feel like chasing him up the trail while I was all by my lonesome, I hiked out to the trailhead, drove out to the rest area on Hwy 2, and slept in my car for a while. What a spooky dark experience that was... Obviously, I have no further beta to report on this outing... E