genepires

been many years since I was last there but i remember the slope below the ice cliff as being crevasse free. interesting.

American alpine institute usually goes up that route every week with their alpine ice course. You can talk to their office for any beta. I think Cale Hoopes went up there recently also. He is on the site sometimes. Not sure of his log in name.

His view will be a vitriolic diatribe replete with course language. Of course he hates Trump, whatever Trump says or does, and would express the most negative opinion possible on the matter. Bob is actually quite generous and helpful once you get to know him.

And that is how to humble brag. Nice work! Which route did you climb? a route called "the nectar". don't get excited about me climbing a beast like that. I just saw it on her facebook page.

the ledge to approach the start of ragged edge will def have snow. a small unbelayed slip on that ledge would be death. route should be snow free but i would expect snow on peak.

also this http://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1155449/Re_Pics_Beta_on_North_Ridge_of#Post1155449 a couple weeks old though.

no idea about right now. but if you bring a large dromedary bag, you can load up with a lot of water when you get off the glacier onto the n ridge itself.

I guess the downside of having the ends tied to your harness is that if there is any twist inducing elements in your rap setup, all those twists will build up and accumulate to a mess. But yes, twists suck less than death.

Maybe we need a rappel fuck up confession thread. I could start with that I rapped off the end of my uneven, unknotted ends, rope at index. Fell about 15 to 20 ft to a ledge then rolled off that the ground below, another 15 or so feet. Below Rodgers corner some 12 years ago. Got real lucky with only a simple spine fracture (no surgery needed) and a broken forearm bone.

from what I read from that article, it sounds like the one fellow got to the ledge and then loss control of his brake hand therefore letting the rope go through the device. this would lower the other fellow and when speed got high enough, it would be impossible to regain the brake side of the rope before it went through the device. I could imagine the fellow on the ledge was clipping into the anchor. Just pure conjecture from a news article on my part. no knot to stop the end, but in this case, a knot may not even have stopped it. Knots have been known to blow off in hard dynamic testing. This is so sad. Not only for the poor fellow who died but also for the other three guys on the climb. Can't imagine the hell they are going through right now.

Can we decide that simu rapping is a bad idea? Whoever is teaching this technique needs to stop.

there are some small kid friendly crags at playground point. (appropriate name) I can't remember the crag name or route but if you walk up the main trail for playground point, go past all the buffed out boulderers and it is the first real crag you get to. I think there are 4 or 5 easy kid climbs on this bolted face. Has a big tree at base to hide from sun and the consequence of a base trip is small. A stumble would result in cuts, scrapes and bruises but still be ok. Lots of l-worth crags have pretty bad bases for squirelly kids who may accidentally stumble around while not roped up. you can walk around to setup TR. enjoy!

I have climbed it in may, june, july and august. in august and september, you should expect that the glacier to the route to get more challenging as well as getting up the initial part of the ridge. Rockfall and bergschrunds make it tough. FWIW, there is some rock walled bivy spots about a pitch or two below the seracs pitch. If there is icefall from the icewall, it should fall away from the bivy spot as it is pretty much on the ridge proper. this makes for a nice day. hike in and do the complex glacier in daylight, get up to the bivy on day one. this leaves plenty of time for summit and hike out on day 2. Of course this involves bringing lightweight bivy gear for the carry over. going from glacier camp to summit and hike out is a big day but the pack would be lighter. your call. the bivy was pretty nice experience.

IMO, a houdini or similar and a exp weight top would be more versatile than a soft shell jacket. prolly weighs the same. FWIW, I did not feel the need for a front zipper to vent. I was fine with a anorak level of venting. I was rather surprised by the ability of goretex to breathe up there. I think I brought softshell pants never just carried it to 14K camp realizing that it is dead weight because I still had thin and thick bottom layers in addition to puffy pants. Basic rule is if you can not wear all your layers on in one time (extra skivvy and socks excluded) then you brought too much. I would add that if you can not adjust to the micro differences in temp, then you did not bring enough. One needs to keep the body under low stress. There are a lot of stresses already like hauling crap up the hill and altitude. Adding stresses like too hot or too cold only takes away from the bodies ability to adapt to the other physical stresses. insufficient calories and dehydration are other stresses that are critical to be minimized also. basically a obsessive compulsive dedication to personal maintenance will help with the ability to adapt to altitude. the main take away is that the clothing system should be able to micro manage the body temp so that you are always neither a little too hot or a little too cold. always just perfect like the bed goldilocks was looking for, hence the preference for multiple wearable layers.

same thing with pants. tight stretchy type pants down low and add goretex pants for mid and high mountain life. never had breath ability issues. no need for softshell pants.

only been up west buttress denali once. Since the air is so dry and cold, goretex actually does a good job with breath-ability, which is atypical for goretex. my system that worked well for outwear is either the down puffy or simple goretex over various layers or a real simple nylon windbreaker. Something like the pataguchi houdini. I think that this very lightweight nylon windbreaker was worn 80% of the time. Even when it was snowing, the windbreaker was fine. When it got windy or up high, the goretex jacket or puffy was the thing. i think a softshell jacket is just going to add weight as you need a goretex jacket anyway. (for cutting the wind, the softshell is not adequate. think 30 mph winds) You will be having 2 items for the same purpose.

Paging Kurt Hicks. KUrt Hicks please report to the exit 38 question area. Paging Kurt Hicks.

Try these guys https://squamishclimbing.com/squamish_climbing_bb/

Star Chek! 5.9. 3 pitch. Easy approach. Rappel down to river and climb back to highway. Very scenic. I have the whistler rock climbs guidebook but I have no idea if that is still available. If so, that would have other option for you as well. There must be other guidebooks available for sport only climbs. I am old school and need to work with guidebooks and not the smartphone. You would prolly find other ideas online too. There are sport climbs tucked in and around the classic trad areas in Squamish as well. Usually bolted slab climbs is that is acceptable to you.

I have not been up there this spring yet but this http://leavenworth.org/weatherwebcams/ Shows a web cam pointing at the mountains from Leavenworth. Seems to me that the rocks facing south and near the entrance to the icicle may be climbable. I would suspect that icicle buttress has snow on descent but rock is dry. Looks like everything on the north facing side is snowy. As far as being dry after a couple days, most things should be. In the summer and fall, if it rains for a couple hours, it usually dries up fairly quick. what is unknown is the amount of seepage from a long wet winter still draining out. The seeps would be coming out of cracks so I would suggest find face climbs.

south ridge/face of ingals peak should be climbable, weather permitting. still sporty but doable. would need snowshoes/skiis to get there. maybe a trip up to eldorado east ridge? I think it would be somewhat avi reasonable but would have to be avi permitting also.

I thought AAC had some kind,of,insurance but it may be just rescue insurance. Maybe they have a connection for other insurance that deals with climbers?

Whatever you can do to make the rescuers job easier, the better the outcome. 2 way communication will make their job easier. It is all about intel to make the mission go smoothly. They will be prepared for anything as they are professionals, but maybe victims should act professionally also?

I hate running but the real difference is that I really do hate running. Walking, that is my speed. Knees and achilles like walking.

any winter ascent is still something to be proud about. good job. if you have the time, a trip report would be great reading/viewing for us low land monkeys.