slothrop

There are other guide services: http://www.nps.gov/mora/climb/climb.htm#guide but they'll probably charge about the same. Why don't you get those nice neighbors of yours to teach you the skillz? Or go get Freedom of the Hills and a willing friend and try out glacier travel, crevasse rescue, and self-arrest tactics at Paradise or the Coleman Icefall?

That saucy photo of Mt. "Fill me up" Baring has inflamed my loins. She's mine.

dudes, the Mountin' Hard Wear site is totally extreem! it has these extreem pictures of climbers on the front page. they sell 26 kinds of "domes" (that's "hats" to all you lamers out there).

I've got a Canon PowerShot S300 Digital Elph, which has worked well on the few outdoors trips I've used it. I haven't had any problems with it freezing up when I keep it in the chest pocket of my jacket, and it takes pretty good photos. I need to get a new memory card, though, since the 8 MB it ships with is way too small. According to Canon, it weighs 8.5 oz. + battery and memory card. The metal case has a solid feel, but it remains to be seen how much abuse it will put up with, especially with the LCD screen. It was a Christmas present... I think it costs around $400. These photos, from an overcast day, were taken with the camera.

Wow. That, like, rulz.

I've got the Alpinist bibs. They're the bomb. I like the full crotch zipper

http://www.geocities.com/~gibell/cirque/

The product warning shows up in a popup window: http://petzl.devcross.com/petzl/popup/reverso-en.htm

so what's up, jon? why is the thread closed? should i sic Fiery Stove Kitty upon you?

No, kitty, don't sit there!

Grrr, explain yourself.

Aw yeah.

Um, why is the REI thread closed?

Sheeit, nice work, jon. I think I'm going to start a thread on how much a new set of Friends and twin ropes and a rack of Express screws really really suck. I actually had question relevant to the REI thread: one poster said that you can special order anything and it's dividendable, while another said that you can special order, but it's not dividendable and you have to pay a $25 fee for the special order. What's the scoop, yo? Jules?

REI's climbing gear section would be greatly improved if they had competent people working there. Not some of the time, but all of the time. A simple example: I went looking for cord to sling a hex with and no one could help me. The fella who was there didn't know what Gemini was and didn't know what to recommend instead. I had just come from Feathered Friends, who were all out of the techie 5mm cord I needed, but could talk with me at length about what the right stuff to use was. If I'm buying gear from someone, I expect them to know as much or more about it than I do.

Yup, it looked like there was some thin ice over the lower left section of the slab, below the first trees. Above that and on the far right side of the slab, it was all snow. We backed off because we didn't want to trigger a slab on the snow slope or the gully. The route was probably over our heads, anyway. We had only gotten a short bit up the snow slope, didn't get too close a look at the ice. There are some photos here.

Woke up at 4am Sunday and headed out to Alpental to check out the NE Slab of the Tooth. Got to Great Scott Bowl after snowshoeing through heavy snow in Source Lake Basin and dug a pit in the steepening snow below the east face. There was a 3-inch slab that slid very easily on a thin sugary layer, and the next foot and a half of the rutschblock disintegrated with one stomp. "Better safe than dead", so we turned around, chatting with some guys setting up for the ski rally. The route looked very snowy, with what looked like lots of ice to the left of the head of the rightmost snow gully. Disappointed, but hungerin' for something to climb, we hiked back down to some short ice flows just south and above Source Lake. Not comfortable leading up a thick detached overhanging blue icicle, we tried to set up a top rope for another flow to the right. Descending a gully that turned into a cliff, I set up an anchor as a bird watched me from two feet away on the tree I was braced against. Like true bumblies, we rapped down the wrong gully. Bouldering on the cliff below, I fell and landed on my crampons Contemplating other ways to screw up, we looked over at the ice we intended to top rope and my partner suggested I lead it. Cool, no problem, my first lead on ice will be a 15-foot pair of steps ending in a walk-off along a rock ledge. I placed four screws in 15 feet and the third one unclipped itself I placed the fourth with one arm stuck up to the elbow in the space behind the ice, axe jammed against a thin rock flake. As Steve cleaned the "pitch", he tossed down the biner that had unclipped itself. It landed on the piled rope and clipped itself in The ice was rotten, about 3 inches away from the rock, and rotten. We were entertained by the sounds of the racers being cheered on, a huge group of ski patrollers tearing up the glop, and the briefest glimpses of sunshine. All in all, a fun day.

Naw, they can just use a girth hitch to tie in.

quote: Originally posted by IceIceBaby: Eric,That was hypothetical situation But the question remainsBD makes the claims that the gear will work under these kinds of conditions I have been proven wrong under much milder conditions Where is the quality that has been advertised and if there were stricter controls, this would not happen Nope, wrong on that one, too. BD advertises their Dry Tool gloves (http://www.bdel.com/compare/gloves.html) to be rated for use down to 28 degrees F, 68 degrees higher than the 40-below conditions you speculate on in your "hypothetical situation". If you're only wearing Dry Tool gloves at -40, you're asking for frostbite, whether the glove rips or not. I find it quite helpful for BD to advertise the performance range of their gloves. However, I am a thinking person like most of us here, so I know that a temperature written on a chart can't possibly mean that there is no way anyone who wears the gloves can get frostbite unless the temp drops below the rating. I also know that gear (and all things) can break, regardless of quality controls. Anyone whose job involves making things and testing them knows that. If "your mileage may vary" is not part of your belief system when dealing with gear, you are going to have a very hard time dealing with reality. As evidenced by your incoherent rant.

Wow! Look at Dru have a spray contest with his own avatars!

quote: Originally posted by Beck: Prison labor is a bad trend in America- the largest office furniture manufacturer in America was forced into bankruptcy by Michigan prison labor producing same type of furniture. There the prison system itself is the manufacuturer of all sorts of products and the prisioners get the 75 cents or buck fifty an hour. I understand market trends drive industry and understand how cutting costs increases the bottom line and can help keep costs down-but, essentially, any manufacturer who's using prison labor makes the decision to employ convicted felons instead of hardworking law abiding citizens to save some bucks, taking jobs away from average joes and having rapists and child molesters work for them. That pisses me off! Same with the Bush administration plan to make it easier for illegal immigrants to work here. WTF? Why? Oh, I'm NOT pro union, I own things made in China and I have OP gear. The world's not a perfect place. It's not that bad in places where the prisoners are required (by state law) to be paid wages equal to the industry standard. In Washington, they get paid industry standard or minimum wage, whichever is higher. I'm guessing that the real sick thugs are not the ones in prison work programs, either. Joe Law-abiding Citizen is not necessarily a harder worker, either... would you work harder if the prize for doing so was getting out of prison early, or if the prize was yet another piece of stereo equipment (or even a nice new set of ice tools)? Eh, I'm just speculating, whatever. [ 03-21-2002: Message edited by: slothrop ]

quote: Originally posted by bobinc: Yes.... maybe, finally, cc.com is THE PLACE where all grammar and spelling errors will be magically repaired. That's one of the worst parts of internet culture: learning about the generally piss-poor mechanics of all of us who seem to ahve the time to post on these boards. Bwahahahaha! [ 03-21-2002: Message edited by: slothrop ]

They seem to be available directly from OP... I can add one to my shopping cart on the site.

I thought I'd move the more technical part of the OP discussion here... may the other thread spray on It looks like the fancy new Doval biners are not CE certified (there's no mention of it here: http://www.omegapac.com/product.asp?id=573). Are they so new that there just hasn't been time to send them in for official testing? What exactly is entailed in CE certification that the manufacturer wouldn't do itself? I don't think I'd buy 'em just yet. [ 03-21-2002: Message edited by: slothrop ]

Yeah, what's up with that warning about Tenaya Canyon? Why do the rangers want you to stay out?