hakioawa

So I find myself with a bunch of vaction to bun in the next month or so and minor shoulder injury that is keepinging me from doing anything fun (i.e. climbing). So I figure now is as good a time to think about a WFR course as any. So the question is. Can anyone recommend any good ones? Are they worth taking? Any that focus on climbing (i.e. technical rescue etc.) Is there any "standards" or certifications to look for in a school? Thanks.

The number one thing in my mind is to start small. I'd say start with route 3-4 gardes below what you sport lead. Its really easy to get scketched out especially a few pitches up. When I was just starting to lead I had situations where I felt totally exposed. I would have been more comfortable free soloing. But it gets better. Try placing gear on top rope with a loose belay. It a good way to practice placing gear and climbing with a rack. To learn to trust gear find a good/steep/clean piece of rock, get 2 belayers one with the top rope and one on the leader rope (or one person if they know how to belay on two ropes) and fall on a few nut placements see if they hold?

Willstrickland suggested a good way to practice placing gear is to find a good route to practice clean aid climbing. So the question is . . . . Where are good EASY clean aid routes? I can lead 5.8 trad free climbs but would love to be able to clean aid a little to get that up to 5.9 or so. Any thought?

Good description. I'd add a couple of things. The first pitch of the cave route is ugly. The begining is fine, but soon you will encounter a single ugle 5.8/5.9 move. It's much gutsier than hard. You can't protect it. So make sure you protect the easier bottom section (it's kind of a diagonal traverse) with good pro. As I recall its a nasty pendulum if you fall with the posibility of hitting the deck. The second pitch is easier. Go up diagonally to the left. About 2/3 of the way you eill come to an area where the route splits. Going low looks easier than the high route. Stay high. If you go low (to climbers left) the route gets much thinner. Staying high is a little more difficult to begin with but finished much easier.

One more thing. There is beautiful new rap station anbout 1 double rap from the top. Sombody put in 2 new bolts w/ 4 slings and 2 rings. It is exactly a 50m from the next station. It loosed less than 2 month old! Anybody know who put it up there? At least they did a nice job!

6) Thicker cable can be sold for more $$$

Somebody asked for it so here it goes. Got up at 5:00am from the cutthroat trail head and made a quick jaunt up to the Silver Star trailhead. High winds, rain and the summit was not in sight. We kept driving. 15 minutes later we were on the trail to WA pass. Rain there too. We bailed and spent the day clipping bolts in Mazama. In the hour we were at WA pass, about a dozen dishwasher sized boulders had come down on to the highway just above the Silver Stat turn off! Got up at 5:00 am Sunday (a few pitchers worse for the ware) and we’re on the trail at 6:15. It was cold, but there was no wind. One of my partners had this habit of running up hill so by 9:00 we were at Burgundy Col we we’re putting on every last stitch of clothing we had. The route descriptions in the Becky and Nelson books are both right on the money and way off. Becky has topos but only of the top. I now understand why. The route goes up the “Obvious Gully” which starts about 30’ below the col. There are two pitches on “Mostly 4th class”. Mostly being the operative word here as there are a couple of 5th class moves to maybe 5.4. We simul-climbed them but I stitched of one move pretty well. At the sandy ledge the real climb begins, just as the route description says. When at the sandy ledge stay right until it turns to 5th class, the work your way left on a small flake/ledge system to a belay at a rap station. Look for an old rusty bolt w/o a hanger. This is maybe a half pitch of 5.5 when you get up there you’ll find it was harder than it looks from below. From here there are about two pitches of 5.7 and 5.8 with some serious 5.8 moves. The route is easy to follow, but for me the lead was very committing. But the holds are all there. Stick you fist in the crack and go! There is a very good rap station at the top of the 5.8 crack to belay from. Welcome to the second sandy ledge. We had been making very good time and the summit looked on pitch above us! I told my partner “you have 15 minutes to get to the top, to make it a 6 hour climb. Boy was I ever wrong! The guidebooks say you have a choice of routes. Had I read the description well we would have gone another way. The best way is probably to traverse way right. IT is a long traverse and you scramble through a little tunnel. This is the way our second rope team went. We went left. This led to a little friction slab that is very hard to protect. Just as the going gets tough a miraculous bolt appeared! We we’re on route! Clip the bolt and keep going! About 5 feet higher is a little step to get over. There is a little exposure! Try about 2000’ of exposure looking down at Silver Star Glacier. My partner protected it real well and I had to pull out the chock pick to remove a hex. I had the next pitch. We went down and to the left, which went up a little chimney over a step, a fun grunting little move. Now the topos in the Becky book started to make sense. They only show the top because the bottom of the route really IS obvious. I down climbed and traversed right under a roof and over a ridge to a belay. The summit was right there, and I had enough rope but there was too much rope drag and I couldn’t make it. This turned out to be my good fortune! We found ourselves at the base of a 50’ diagonal chimney. It looked easy, and we’re it not for the rope drag I would have gone for it (The book has it at 5.8 but I’d say its harder). My partner, a little cocky kept his pack, took to rack and went for it. Thing were fine for the first 30’. Then the holds ran out. With all that extra gear my partner was hopelessly wedged in! No hands, no feet, just pack and rack we’re holding him in. Furiously we struggled for gear. First a #11 nut came out and was placed into a #12 placement. I wouldn’t wave wanted to fall there. Meanwhile I’m furiously taking keeping every last inch of slack out of the rope in the event of a fall. Hopelessly grabbing for any gear that would come, a #2 Camelot and double runner were dislodged from the rack. With a dyno the cam was plugged in and my partner aided his way up. With my partner still stuck in the chimney I hear a call from below. “Hey Erik, how far above us are you? Can you throw us the rope?” I couldn’t see them but the other rope team had taken a wrong turn and found their way halfway up a 5.10 chimney. I belayed my partner up the final few moves to the top. He anchored the rope and I pulled out my here loop (I knew I had brought two for a reason!) and attached it to the rope. Prussiking my way back under the roof I found a rappel sling directly above the second rope team. I anchored the middle of the rope and threw the rest to the second team. They aided them selves up to me and we were all safe again! The three of us followed to the top! It was about 4:00 pm. Two double and five single rope rappels later we were back at Burgundy col. by 8:00 we we’re drinking beer at cars. 14 hours car to car. The climb itself is a great one, and a bit humbling. Don’t be over confident. Just when you think you have it bagged the hard part begins. Both routes as described in the Nelson book are pretty accurate. If you go right, go way right. Remember the easy way (we never found it) is supposed to have an easy 30’ slab to the summit. If you find yourself looking up a crack system/chimney to directly to the summit keep going right!

Wow. First time I've been flamed here! I'm not claiming anyone is lying. And I've got no problems with surprises. I guess my post was really more an observation that everyone should take the beta here with a grain of salt. I have not been climbing too long and so I shouldn't be giving anyone advice. If I did I'm sure I'd claim everything is much harder then it is! I guess I'd just like to know that when someone gives route beta they call out if they have actually done the route. Better yet if they have been climbing for 2 months or 20 years.

This site has very high quality TIFF files of every quad in the Northwest. There are no keys and you better have a FAT internet pipe because they are about 6mb each. But they are the best quads you can get, and they are free! http://www.reo.gov/reo/data/DRG_Files/northwest.htm

So I've been trolling around the archives of CC looking for route beta on Burgundy Spire. I'm a bit of a newbie so I can use all the help I can get. And an interesting thing occured to me. Why the hell should I believe anything anyone here says! Now its obvious there are some good climbers here. I've met a few on summit of various peaks (How did you like the cake on Shuksan Matt?). But it seems like there is some really confilcting route beta. One message says somthing like "3 easy pitches up to 5.8" and another says "6 pitches of honest 5.8". One says soemthing like "start early, the approach is a ball buster". Another "a short approach". It seems like most people offering opinions have never climbed the route in question. So the question is. Who is to be believed? I think anyone who writes a long detailed TR has good info, but you still don't know what kind of climber they are. Thoughts?

Anyone been up the northeast (I think) buttress of Goode? We're thinking about doing it this weekend. Two questions. Whats the best approach, and how the heck do you get down?

Did Shuksan Sulphide glacier and South East Ridge. A really fun climb and the route was is great shape. It took forever to get down as the gully had approximatly 20 people going all directions at one point.

I've never tried it but a friend of mine uses one of those reflective windshield covers as a second sleeping pad. They are light cheap, and a large on is just the size. Combine it w/ a 3/4 length therma rest and you are good to go in all but the colsed condtitions.

WAIT A MINUTE!! You mean, there is more to this climbing thing then buying hundred of dollars of shiny new BD cams? You mean my inexperience cannot by overcome with a credit card. I had no idea? Wow being a newbie I sure have a lot to learn! And I though that buying good gear was ALL I needed to do! After all who should have thought that having a rack of 3 tied runners and two biners would be safer then buying a large leader rack that can stitch up any route with placements 4 feet apart! I don't know where the idea that just because a newbie can afford the latest and greatest makes him/her ignorant. What makes you think people are not getting good instruction along with their new gear? What makes you thin k people do not know how to use their gear? Oh and as far as markup. Yes I think 40-80% margins are quite high. I worked in the sporting goods business for 7 years (Alpine skiing not climbing). Everyone knows how hard it is for a little shop to make it. You must have a nitch. I think many of these shops make most of their profits off service (gear maintenance, rentals, instruction, guiding . . . ) rather than the hardgoods. In skiing (and I assume in climbing too) the manufactures have rules about how much you can sell their gear for and when. Ever wonder why you never see brand new skis at Costco? Because Costco would not be allowed to sell them below retail price. There is a reason a #1 camalot is $59.95. Outside a few selected times a year American stores are not permitted to sell them for less. In my mind this is price fixing. So a little competition from abroad is a good thing! I'd love to by all my gear from a local store, but the manufacturers make it hard.

That is ridiculous! Essentially what you are saying is. Pay more to support your local climbers. Why not put a big tip jar next to the cash register. Or a "Will climb for food" sign. Of course I'm going to buy something at the cheaps place. Do you know how much mark up there is on gear! Not just at the retail level. Sure the little shops may not get too much of it, but so what? How much do you really think a cam costs to make? Buying gear from the cheapest place has the effect of increasing the amount of gear people buy, hence increasing profits for the manufacturer. In the long run everyone wins because there are fewer middle men and the manufactures can take smaller margins. Yes, some shops will go out of business. Too bad. And why is everybody so down on REI? Good selection, OK prices and decent gear. Don't like it? Go to Jim Nelson's shop. The climbing community in the Northwest would be a very different and less interesting place were in not for the like of large organizations like REI and the Mountaineers.

It is perhaps a little sad that Abbey is best remembered by those who didn't read him for "The Monkey Wrench Gang". A great little piece of fiction IMHO. Abbey always wanted to be know for his fiction, though I'd say his best work was his non-fiction. Desert Solitaire, and numerous essays. It is easy to think of him as a terrorist. He would have loved it because doing so would prove his point that most Americans are simple minded people who don't take the time or effort to see things for what they really are. It's much easier to sit in you air conditioned car and drive to the top than climb a mountain. So to is it easier to call someone a terrorist for writing a novel about monkey wrenching. If Abbey is a terrorist for suggesting someone disable a bulldozer with karo syrup, isn't Former Governor Bush a terrorist for suggesting we destroy ANWR for a few barrels of oil? I second the thought to think before you write. If not I trust you have a big towel for all the spray you will provoke.

This weekend a humming bird mistook my nose for a flower and tried to extract some "nectar" from my left nostril.

Like a lot of people here I learned to climb indoors at the gym. I'm now starting to do multi-pitch trad routes outside and I find I'm stymied by the cracks. I know the basic techniques but for some reason I nothing sticks. I'd like to tick off outerspace and orbit this summer but the crack scares me a little. Any recommendations for moderate (5.7-5.9) 1-2 pitch routes to hone my crack skills on? Sport (yeah I'd clip a bolt next to a crack), trad or alpine. Top Rope or Lead. Any suggestions?

They are F!@ked

<a href=http://forum.fuckedcompany.com/phpcomments/index.php?newsid=10877700834&page=1&parentid=0&crapfilter=1>They are F!@ked

I've got to put a plug in here for thw UW Bone and Joint center. I had a major shoulder reconstruction (my second) last August. They did a wonderful job and I'm litterally stronger than ever. Dr. Matsen ddid my shoulder (his specialty), but I'm sure they have finger specialists as well. Not that anything would go wrong w/ a finger surgery, but its nice to know you have a full teaching hospital at you disposal should there be a problem during the procedure.

DC route for me. If the weather holds.

Ive got a set of Camalots and Aliens. I'd go for double axle Camalots and aliens for the smaller sizes. One thing I've noticed and perhaps its just me, but it seems like evert stuck cam I've come across is a Metolius. Any one else seen this?

We did Sahale via Quien Sabe glacier and Forbidden peak this weekend. The glacier was just starting to open up. No major crevasse problems as all on the Quien Sabe. From the top of Forbidden it looked as if the Boston glaicer was really opening up though. There was a steep snow ramp/couior up to the base of shark fin. If you are comfortable on steep snow it looked like you could get to the base of Shark fin with out too much trouble. We saw a couple of groups make good time through there. Things were melting out pretty fast and I doubt it will hold up long.

I'm thinking about going up there next weekend. I've read about the route in the "Cascade Alpine Guide". How technical is is? What kind of rack am I going to need to haul up there? Any suggestions/hints are more than welcome.