jdog

You might check out this place in montana. They cater more to the hunter/fisherman type but they make some expedition bags. My dad bought me one of their expedition bags and it looks indestructible. I have not had a chance to use it and abuse it yet. They are expensive, but it is very well built, compared to the tnf bag I have. You could probably get it custom made if you asked. redoxx bags

i was up there last year and both my climbing partner and i took our randonee boots. i have the scarpa lazers and he used the scarpa denalis. i also brought along my scarpa invernos for the climb. he didn't bring along any other boots. i was in the same boat you are in that i had bindings that were not compatible with climbing boots. i was happy i did too. my partner ended up hating life on summit day because he was in his denalis. i only wore my mountaineering boots on summit days so for the most part they were extra weight, but i was glad i didn't have to wear them for 6000' on summit day. yeah it was an extra 7 lbs i had to haul around, but think of it as training. fwiw the skiing was absolutely phenomenal from 16k to 14k camp. you could yo-yo ski all day long. i will agree that the conditions very from year to year and week to week for that matter, but if it snows every day like when we were up there you will be very happy you had your skis and good boots to kill time while at 14k camp. there is nothing better to do. we were also not up there to ski from the summit. had we not summitted it would have still been a good trip because the skiing was so good out of 14k camp. i think the people that left there skis at 11k were regretting it as they watched people who were skiing every day in fresh powder. also good randonee boots make the ski out much more friendly with that f-in sled. i guess it comes down to what is important to you. i am a big skier, so it was important to me to have my skis up at 14k camp with a good pair of boots. there was a post not to long ago about this same topic. you should look there too.

june and july is the best time of year to go down there. that is when we went down there and the weather was stellar. avalanche danger was not really an issue considering it was blue bird skies and sunny almost everyday.

hey tim are you planning on heading up there in the next couple of weeks?

FWIW when we went up to denali last year I took both scarpa lazers and scarpa invernos. In the end I was happy I did. Yeah I ended up carrying an extra 7 lbs or so, but boy was it worth it being able to ski at 14k camp. It was some of the best powder I have skiied and you could yo-yo ski between 14-16k all day long if you wanted. For me the skiing ended up being the best part of the trip because we did not get to do our intended route. The fact of the matter is we found the weather to be way unpredictable so all the snow made for bad climbing conditions but awesome ski conditions. In the end I wore my mountaineering boots only two days on two separate summit attempts from 14k camp. My climbing partner only took his scarpa denalis and his feet were killing him after the summit days and was jealous that I brought my mountaineering boots. The day we descended the mountain last year, i think it was June 13, it snowed over 3' between 11k camp and 14k camp. It was all you could do to ski motorcycle hill. If I were to do it again I would take my ski boots. I think everyone at 14k camp who left their skis at 11k was completely jealous of the people skiing everyday. What else is there to do. Although you could end up with bullet proof ice and ski conditions will be bad. Such is life on denali though. The weather is completely unpredictable.

Hey Tim you will have to talk to Mr. Radon about his ticket on the way back. FWIW he beat you on the fine. That is some crazy shit that you guys both got tickets. I wonder if it was the same mounty. Good time this weekend.

dude, wtf are you posting for when you should be at work. Slacker!

Grew up in Whitefish. Place rules. Heading back there in a couple of weeks myself. I just talked to the family last night and there currently is a lack of snow. The only thing open on the mountain is the backside. You better have your rockers if you want to be doing some skiing. If you are interested in some in bounds skiing that is always good, head to east rim and stay high, dropping off the backside of east rim. There are plenty of other good stashes as well in bounds. Or if want you can head out of bounds over in the west bowl area. There are so few people skiing at the big that I would say it is not worth hiking for turns because it never gets skied out if you know where to go. If you want some more info pm me and i will try to set you up. If they don't get a dump soon though you will be SOL. Sorry don't have any info on ice climbing up in the park. For sure hit the Northern while you are there. Place is always rockin on the weekends.

Rumr is Da Man? Now that is funny shit. Maybe Da Little Man.

man if it is 50 and the sun is out it should be stellar climbing weather. i will agree that the hand warmer will be a necessity, especially in the am.

#14 rebar would work better

Looking for someone to go climbing with this weekend. Usual partner already has commitments this weekend. Open to going to either squamish, leavenworth, or even an alpine route. Never been climbing around darrington, but if someone is interested that would be cool too. Mainly just looking to get out and get some more time on the rock.

You could do like I did and take both climbing boots and randonee boots. I probably spent 95% of my time in my scarpa lazers, but I was happy to have my invernos for the actual climb. Yeah it added alot of weight for the ski in and they are real bulky, but in the end I was happy that I brought them. I would have been real happy if we would have done our anticipated route. I was up there with Mr. Radon and I know he was jealous of me after having to do 6000' in his denalis. Definitely not good for french technique, which is all you will see on the butt. If you are doing the west butt you will be spending alot of time at 14k and I guarantee you will regret not having good boots if the skiing conditions are prime. The skiing made the trip for me. Plus a good pair of boots makes the ski down a little easier too with that damn sled. As for skis and bindings I was on a pair of Dynastar Big's w/ diamir bindings so they are incompatible with my climbing boots. Fatter ski, awesome in the powder. Go at 188. A little on the heavy side, but I got them on sale. No matter what you do it will be a good adventure.

with regards to stuart: we were up there over labor day and tried the full north ridge of stuart. we were able to traverse below the glacier without an ice axe or crampons. see the write up in the alpine lakes section. i was happy to have them when we bailed though.

fleblebleb my explanation for lie backing that crack is that i am a hack crack climber and did not feel comfortable jamming through the bulge. i found it much easier just to commit to the move as a layback. yeah it is pretty difficult to set pro in a lieback, but i knew once i got over the bulge i was money. the steepness eased off immediately and there was plenty of good pro.

saturday and sunday this weekend tried the full north ridge of stuart. we ended up descending after we reached the notch for the standard nr route as we had had enough of the wind, rain, and all around crap weather. tr: the weather was great all day saturday. had no problems reaching the base of the north ridge. there were a few sketchy spots below the stuart glacier where it was calving, but we managed to get through without crampons. if you are planning on doing the entire ridge i would recommend not taking crampons as they are not necessary since you can traverse below the glacier. took us about 5.5 hours to reach the base from the parking lot. started up the route about 3 pm. planned on getting as far as possible. we wanted to do the eastside variation, but i don't think we were on route for the first couple of pitches. nothing looked familiar with respect to the beckey guide. the first hard pitch seemed alot harder than a 5.7 layback. actually was a layback with a overhanging bulge. ended up setting a belay off a fixed piton. i hauled my backpack through this section and it was a bitch. i don't ever recall the squeeze slot unless this first pitch was it. didn't seem right though. i think we were too far to the east. i think we ended up back on route a pitch later after a long righthand traverse. from here we had 2-3 good mid fifth class pitches. passed a couple of fixed cams so i am assuming this was on route. ended up bivying where the west side variation ties in with the east side. cool bivy spot. not the most comfortable but great exposure. i have to say that the ice cliff glacier is the most active glacier i have ever heard. it was calving all day and night and it made for some wild noise. watched the weather move in all night. in the morning we decided to keep going up as we were still below the fog. first pitch was nice lead and after that it was scrambling with short sections of 5th class. took a leader fall on a #4 tcu due to wet lichen and rock. scary crap with the exposure. tried to follow gullies whenever possible, but had to do some leading in between and these were sketchy due to the wet rock. visibility was low due to the fog and this complicated route finding as we could not see very far. made it to the notch at about 11 am. took a little break out of the wind and then started the descent. wind was ripping up the notch. pretty straight forward down the gully and the wind let up the lower you got. after that it was just a long slog back to the car. the glacier crossing was pretty easy, but i was glad i had crampons and a small tool. would have been alot dicier without. the wind was strong on all exposed ridges for entire descent all the way down to ingalls pass. all in all it was a great route. i wish the weather would have held and we could have finished the whole ridge. but good learning experience none the less. if anyone has any pictures of the 5.7 layback or 5.8 squeeze slot i would be interested in seeing them to see if they look familiar at all. seems to be alot of variations on the start of the ridge.

we were up on stuart on saturday and sunday trying to do the full north ridge. weather was great all day saturday, then during the bivy on saturday night it turned to crap. we were below the fog level most of the night, but throughout the night i periodically woke up and it kept coming lower and the winds increased. as for sunday the weather was crap. nothing worse than climbing 5th class in wet and very windy conditions. we managed to make it to the notch, though, in one piece. i estimate the wind at the notch was blowing at over 60 mph. the standard gully created a nice funnel for all the wind to exit through. rain going up not down. made for an interesting rappell. the rescuers made it back to the trailhead about the same time we did on sunday evening. i was wondering why they were carrying litters and rescue gear. had no idea that a rescue was going on on the mountain. don't remember hearing a helicopter all day.

Don't listen to RuMR. He doesn't know anything about climbing.

i have to agree with everyone elses response on this one. i just got back a couple of weeks ago and we went with geeting as well. we had great luck and everyone seemed to be very cool that worked for him. yeah there were some delays, but that is life. on our flight out we got crammed into a 185 with all our gear and a couple of tourists, yet it didn't bother us one bit because of where we were. enjoy the place, it is a once in a lifetime experience. i would have been pissed if i was one of those tourists. they are paying a crapload of money for a short flight with no gear. we got lucky on our way out and caught a plane right when we got to basecamp. the pilot actually turned around to come and get us. on the way back he did some acrobatics and buzzed the talkeetna river. now that is f-in service. i heard from alot of climbers up there that TAT is the service to go with if you are climbing, but it sounds like they have the same problems as geeting even though they are the climbers air taxi. you should be thankful you weren't on one of planes that wrecked. by the way were you with that group from boeing that left about on the 14th or 15th? if so did you summit? j

Why do you recommend the mammut over the other two transceivers?

I am planning on buying an avalanche transceiver and am looking at either the Backcountry Access Tracker DTS or the Ortovox F-1. Which one of these transceivers would you recommend? Any pros or cons? Thanks in Advance. J

climbed the north face of chair peak on sunday. been on this route before and it was definitely not in the best of shape, but better than last year. the approach sucked in spots because we were breaking trail in knee to waste deep snow on snowshoes, but there is a trail now. the first 50' was the only decent ice. lots of spin drift, in fact there was alot of spin drift the whole route. after the first pitch there was alot of post holing in deep snow with little bits of verglas covered rock, and some short sections of mediocre ice. topped out and the wind was blowing like 50 mph. getting off sucked. i would recommend downclimbing (easy) the first descent couloir (aka wind tunnel). the rap was not worth it, as our ropes got hung up and gave us more time in the wind tunnel of pain. nothing like snow and ice hitting you in the face at 50 mph. there was a nice 10 foot cornice on the 2nd rap. if the weather would have remained stable it would have been a whole lot more fun, but it was still a good time. the route on the ridge facing source lake (northeast buttress?) looked like it might be some fun too. the skiing in the valley above source lake would have been phenomenal. i cannot believe how much snow is up there.