Doug_Hutchinson

Skis only, with binding holes professionally plugged. Mounted twice with tele bindings - Hammerheads and G3 shims. Used 2 seasons but in excellent condition. $175. I live in PDX. PM or email me (remove question marks): ?djhutch@?teleport.?com

floodster you obviously know a lot but when anyone talks about G3 revolutionizing tele bindings, I have to laugh. Stainless steel toe plates and compression springs are credited to Mr Rainey. G3 bindings are simply beefed-up versions of ancient tele bindings that offered hardly anything new except additional weight. I know people who have broken about every part on them. Between the problems with their skins and bindings, I think the skeptism with anything G3 is well deserved. With that said, I love what I see in the G3s (finally a replacement for my Tuas?) and I can't wait to try them. I think your review and assessment of the skis were excellent. Sorry for the gripe about the binding comment, I could not resist.

There is one AT mounted and one tele mounted pairs of Reverends to demo at Alta (which is superb right now), however, they were well spoken for during my recent visit so I didn't get the chance to try.

It's a great climb and classic although "following your nose" on the upper pitches can seem like steep bush wacking with a move or two of fifth class (it's fun if you know it, but can seem dirty the first time). There are only 2-3 "real" pitches and a few more 4th - low 5th. Pitch 1 is nice, but the "Cruiser" direct start to the base of the SE Corner 3 pitch is a better start, but a sandbag 5.7 (more like 5.8+). The Corner's 3rd pitch is both the crux and the mega classic pitch. Lots of rope drag since you need to cut around right (near the top) and then left and up to get to the belay on the huge tree ledge. Many rap from here since the 4th pitch is so so and the rest is forgetable and a little hard to follow. If you want to be really safe, bring two ropes so you can retreat whenever you want. The walk off is the way to go since the trail down is cool.

Are you using the standard lace-up liners? If so, they are relatively thick. When I was skiing Garas and SuperGs (same last as the Veloces), I sized the boots so that there was no way to get my foot into boots when using standard liners but they were perfect with my slightly worn, standard thickness thermomoldable liners. With my current boots, I used to have a lot of pain on the sides of one foot due to a tight fit even after 20 days in the liners. I remolded the liner last week and they fits awesome now - no pain at all.

Keep up the good work Keith, Ian and Gary! Everyone else should pick up one of the shiny new "Save Madrone" shirts at your local climbing shop.

There is one - "Bouldering in Portland and the Columbia River Gorge" - by Greg Lyon and published by the Portland Rock Gym, 2000. Call PRG to see if they still sell it.

Last Thurs (11/11) I drove to Cloud Cap with a 4WD and no snow tires. A little tough around some of the higher hair pin turns but should be pretty easy now. As far as skiing on the north side - don't bother. Very little snow up to tie in rock, all ridges are bare and the lower Elliot is all rock. Went to Rainer-Muir the next day and the skiing was pretty decent. The extra drive is well worth it.

Good info and links. That "Turns all Year" site is the best one-stop-shopping for telemetry data that I have seen. Nice!

Atomic 10.ex circa 02-03. 191 cm. Great condition. Mounted twice. Price: $175 skis only, or $375 with Hammerhead (tele) bindings. Email me at djhutch@teleport.com Doug

With a four day weekend in a few days, can anyone suggest any good ski touring in the North Cascades? What's best on Mt. Baker now, or is anything in around Washington Pass? Thanks.

Climbed at Beacon both late Friday night and early Sunday morning. On Sunday, I led "Blood, Sweat, and Smears." Why haven't I climbed this before? 165-feet in length, this may be the best single pitch anywhere.

The trad 5.8 mega classic is the "Diagonal" on Wallface. A true wilderness big wall experience. Hike/scramble five miles in from the Tahawus trail head (nice remote feel - like old mining area THs in the North Cascades), take climber trail to the base of this ~1000 foot high cliff and enjoy lot of nice pitches up to stiff old school 5.8 (lots of long 5.4 ramps). Hella descent but a great day in mountains.

Running shoes would be fine. I climbed the south face on 6/26/04. Minor patches only to the base of the SF then. Post-holing in solid snow from the base of the NF raps back to the west ridge (about 100 yard traverse) but easy due to the soft snow. Could be almost all gone by now. I used approach shoes only.

I'll close the thread by answering my own question. On 6/26/04, we found no snow (except occ. patches) on the approach to the south face. At the base of the NF raps, there was a few feet of soft snow from the base of the raps about 100 yards to Prusik Pass. From there, easy downclimbing or one rap back to the base of the route. No axes or crampons were necessary since the snow was soft enough to kick knee high steps. In a few weeks, you could traverse back to the base in rock shoes, but now approach shoes or boots are nice. Other notes on the south face: 1) Don't get suckered into the left hand chimney on pitch four that has a fixed rope (like I did), the correct chimney is right of the fixed rope; 2) Redoubt was right - you can easily drop a bight of rope to haul a pack up the squeeze chimney; 3) posters from previous threads who recommended avoiding the squeeze chimney also had it right - the squeeze sucks!; and 4) the last pitch is so awesome that you forget how bad the squeeze was by the time you flop onto the summit. (PS - Are the cc.com spell checkers on vacation? I spell Prusik wrong and no one corrects me? How sad.)

Thanks. I thought about ski poles, but hauling or climbing with poles or axes through the South Face chimney pitch seems like a really bad idea. So...how do you deal with that chimney and packs?

After climbing the South Face, I assume we'll descend the West Ridge. To get back down to the Snow Lakes basin area (or whatever the smaller lake basin at the base is called) from Prussik Pass will we need axes and crampons at this time of year? I assume that area will be completely snow covered so how steep is the descent? Thanks.

Nice TR. I skied it two days earlier on 6/19 and approached via the Morrison Creek Campground TH. I have not done anything from Cold Springs TH in years so was wondering: anyone approach this route from both Morrison Creek and Cold Springs and got an opinion about which way is better? Obviously, more elevation to gain from Morrison Cr but no round-the-mtn slog to get back to the car which I heard can be mildly painful.

Shows you what little I know. Yeah, Frozen's got it right. "Beer Garden" is the climb above the log platform as the trail meets the wall and climbs up and left (right goes towards the 4th class descent). "Bottlecap" is the crack to a roof (broken basalt column) a few cracks right of the "Schoolroom" cracks. Substitute "Schoolroom" for BeerGarden" in my first post and most of the info is sorta right. (Don't believe what you read online - as you can see by my previously post, it's mostly incorrect!)

Pete's Pile rocks. Classic columnar basalt - up to 200 feet high in the middle with potential for hundreds of routes. I did some route development there about 5 years ago so all my knowledge is dated but it seems like not much has been done in the past few years since: 1) Pete moved to CO, 2) the Forest Service emplaced a limited closure on one (undeveloped) section of the crag due to the protection of the rare violet rock brake plant, and 3) development of Bulo Point meant all the sport climbers from Hood River could drive by the Pile with a second thought about this trad mecca. As far as routes, it's mostly 5.8-5.9 with one 5.10 ("Bottlecap" - a few cracks right of the right most Beer Garden crack). The main area is called Beer Garden which is across from the benches. This has about 5-7 good single pitch climbs in the 5.7-.9 range with chain anchors. To the right of the closed area (well signed) or about one hundred yards right of beer garden are two classics: "Even" 5.8 which is just right of a large fir tree against the rock, and a few climbs right of that is "Guillotine" 5.9 which looks like a huge blade (about 50 feet up) waiting to fall supported by facing corners. These are only really clean climbs in this area. Right of Guillotine the trail drops down and past a small wooden log platform which is at the base of a nice 5.8 or .9. The mega classic (because I put it up, of course) is "Pumpin' for the Man" (named after the Ween classic) 5.9 or 9+ which is about 75 left of the Beer Garden bench. Three great pitches of sustained climbing with bolted anchors. Like all climbs at the Pile, it's hard to describe how to find the route, but it starts in subtle cave-like thing just left of a nice belay platform but before the trail starts dropping down the hill. You go up and step right into a bombay diheldral (OK - so it's only 10 feet off the ground) leading to some looser orange rock below a small roof which is the just above the belay for the first pitch. Step right off the belay and pull the roof. Step right off again at the start of the third pitch for another 100 feet of exposed, awesome climbing. Alright, I've taken too much time to say nothing useful. Reply if you want any clarification to my crystal clear descriptions (or just hit "print" and bam! instant guidebook).

Last Sat, the poison oak was in full force on both sides of the that trail!

No pics - I only shoot slides but didn't bring a camera, too bad because the route looked awesome. Way windy!! Kept things up high solid though.

I have had a change of heart and now am considering cutting/grinding off the pinky pommel thing on my Vipers so they plunge easily. Anyone done this?

Climb: Mt. Washington-North Ridge Date of Climb: 4/10/2004 Trip Report: Keith Daellenbach and I realized Keith's dream of a "winter" ascent of Washington about three weeks too late. We skied from the Ray Benson snowpark to the base of the west bowl. Ran up bowl to the NR notch. The crux was the first 5.1 pitch which was mostly snow covered rock and a little water ice for some nice mixed spice. We answered the age-old question to confirm that a shitty choss pitch covered with snow still climbs like a shitty choss pitch. From there, mostly steep snow to summit. Another beautiful day (will it ever end?) in the Cascades. Gear Notes: XC skis 2 tools Pickets, 1 screw, few cams GPS with waypoints from Keith's dad (thanks Dad!) Approach Notes: Get GPS from Keith's dad

Has the bridge been replaced to the Royal Columns? (I haven't been to Tieton since last Spring).