JayB

I'd second the recommendation for the Finger. Looked like it was in great shape a couple of weeks ago, and (argueably) exposes climbers to less severe objective hazards than the Kautz route.

What John said. I'm sure that the total tab for looking after cyclist vegetables is dwarfed by the cost that obesity induced diabetes alone imposes on the health care system. Moreover, the figures state that 88% of brain injuries in cyclists could have been prevented by the use of a helmet. I've been riding to work every day for a few months now, and have not seen a single bicycle commuter without a helmet - which suggests to me that most of the brain-impaired former cyclists out there probably not commuters, but folks who hop on the bike for a ride now and then and bite it sans helmet. I agree with you that riding to work exposes us to more uncontrolled risks than climbing does, but the notion that we are social parasites hellbent on bleeding the health-care system dry is off the mark, amigo.

Roped up without intermediate pro on moderate slopes and glaciers in arrestable conditions - not dumb. Roped up without intermediate pro on steep, exposed pitches, or glare ice - dumb.

I don't know anything about the area under discussion, so I'll refrain from making comments about these particular routes. What I will say is that I really don't think that a closely bolted route here and there at established sport areas is going to destroy the last vestiges of the old school ethic any more than someone putting up death routes at such areas is going to turn everyone into a hardman that won't touch anything without an R or an X rating. I do think that they should be relatively rare, and should not be the result of retrobolting an established line, or put up in an area with a contrary ethic, but as long as these criteria are met a soft route or two for first time leaders, kids, or whoever else might find them appealing at any given moment (mea culpa) shouldn't cause anyone too much grief. I have heard from people in the know that Tex leads scary stuff all of the time and has some credibility in this matter, but when I read these discussions I wonder how often many of the people that sing the praises of dangerous routes from behind the computer actually get out and lead them on a regular basis. I know that for me, claiming I want to lead something and actually getting out and doing it are two very different things....

Thinker is right. When climbing, the risks you encounter are in large part determined by the decisions you make. This is much less true when riding in the city.

Yipes. That's part of the route that I ride every day. I'd put my money on someone from one of the side streets pulling out in front of the cyclist as he was descending Dexter towards downtown - as many drivers, especially those in cars that ride low to the ground - can have a hard time seeing cyclists over all of the cars parked along the side of the road, and most cyclists are moving along at a pretty good clip on this stretch. I'd like to hear more details about this accident if anyone knows them....

It's been at least a week since someone asked about when the Guidebook will be out so.....

Got it. Thanks for taking the time to spell that out for me. Definitely sounds like a much safer and more enjoyable way to exit the upper Kautz than slogging up the Chute O' Death underneath the icecliff. I'm not a real fan of unnecessary exposure to objective hazards, so the trip back under that thing was probably the least enjoyable part of the day for me, including the puking. Thanks again,

Good info. I want to make sure that I totally understand what you did though. Did you just keep descending straight down once you hit the base of the ice chute, then just veer to the (descending) climber's left once you cleared the intermediate rock band? How far below the chute is the rock band? Which side was the rope on? I'm trying to piece this together based on what I remember of the route. The big picture - keep descending then climb the break on the left - makes sense but I can't quite place the rock band. Thanks,

Nope.

Don't worry - I did not and do not have any intention of ever getting on that route myself. Just wondering if anyone besides the FAs had ever done it. I'd be willing to help replace the bolts for the benefit of climbers bolder than myself though...

And while I've got Static on the brain... Anyone know if Artie Rip has had any repeat ascents?

Nice to meet you guys too. Sorry for subjecting you two to the Lamaze breathing at the crux . In hindsight, I'd have to say that was the best pitch I've climbed at Static so far although, as with the business pitch on Online, it may be a while before I feel the need to do it again. The next visit out there will definitely begin at the Spaceport....

Nice! Post photos.

Speaking of Static Point and Bolts.... Gaston_Lagoffe and I were planning to upgrade some of the hardware out there this weekend, but we didn't pull all of the gear together in time so we just went climbing there instead to do some "Research." Anyone looking for a project should look no further than Offline, as most of the bolts below the 9+ pitch that parallels Online's crux are rusty, 1/4" buttonheads. Anyhow - it was a beautiful day up there And we ran into Smoker and Co. at the crux pitch of Online.. Making us look like a couple of pansies in our double Carhartt's while they climbed in shorts.... Great routes, great day, great setting...

Nice going Bill! I should be able to burn the photos onto a CD today and get them in the mail next week. Some of them didn't turn out as well as I had hoped, but I think one or two of them will be worth hanging on to.

I'm almost there. I'll post a how-to book with photos when I'm done. I think that my first post on this thread has been misconstrued. What I really meant was:

Do you have examples of where this was ever done, or is this just a straw man? C'est un homme de straw. Rhetorical device. Canard. Though someone can surely find an example, I am sure. More common (I think) is someone doing a crap/dangerous bolting job (groundfall potential while clipping the third bolt, etc) and getting upset when someone rebolts it. I am not against dangerous routes in principle - they have their place - I just don't think that they belong in popular, easily acessible areas that have been developed with a different ethic. I have no more problem with someone rebolting a dangerously bolted route in an area like this than I do with someone chopping an overbolted route in an area know for lots of commitment and long run-outs.

I think that I am pretty much with you on this one Matt - what I am talking about not so much the placement of individual bolts as it rap-bolting an R/X line with serious groundfall potential for no other reason than stroking one's own ego. Not a very common phenomenon, and when it does occur it is rarely, if ever done at a popular crag with a sport ethic.

Yeah- pretty much. The word that comes to mind is contrived. It seems like most of the run-out routes out there were put up in that fashion for a variety of genuine reasons, e.g. the bolts were going in by hand, or on lead, it was getting dark, a storm was rolling in, the route was too remote to drag in a hilti, etc. - or that was just how things were done in that time/and or place. This certainly does not apply to all such routes, but in the places that I am most familiar with the last thing on the FA's mind was intentionally making a route that would be excessively dangerous, even if that is how the routes turned out in the end. Putting up death routes on rappell in the middle of a popular sport-climbing area is just as lame as putting up a grid-bolted cruiser at an area with a bolt-free ethic.

It was all Cytomax and Gu. Consider it an emergency stash, ready for all of my fellow climbers to melt and re-use.

It's a point worth considering, and the best compromise I've found is to let local ethics prevail. Most places sporting long "thought provoking" run-outs and various other frightening aspects tend to be a bit on the remote side. They also tend to have serious reputations, which, along with the long approaches, tend to keep folks who aren't up to climbing such routes from getting in over their heads. Crags like this are the ideal place for R/X stuff. Anyone who climbs there will likely be looking for more serious routes, and a sparsely bolted route that is in character with the routes around it will most likely not suffer from a lack of traffic and hence be "innacessible" to most folks who climb in the area. At the same time, I think that anyone who deliberately puts up dangerously bolted routes at popular crags (especially on rappel) sucks, as the route will be both seldom climbed and perhaps even a danger to new climbers who may not realize what they are getting themselves into. I'm cool with lots of bolts at popular sport climbing areas, but think that places with a different ethic should be left alone. So if there is a route that's dangerously bolted at a place like Vantage or 38 and someone adds a new bolt there, I could care less. If someone were to add bolts to a place like Static, I'd pitch in for the crowbar. Respecting the local ethic, like respecting the style of the FA, is less than perfect, but it's the best way that I know to keep the bolt wars at bay.

I was up there last year during the first weekend of June, and there was quite a bit of open, running water in the stream next to the hot springs. The springs themselves looked like a thousand Jerry Garcia's had been using it for a bathing trough all winter, but if you are hard up for a soak I suppose they'd do. There was no running water on the ridge itself, but we could hear running water in the gully to our left at the very top of the ridge near the campsites (just below the Kennedy Glacier), but it was still way under the snow at the time. We also got hit with a good foot of snow while we were there last year, which pretty much put the almighty Kibosh on our climb. Have fun/post a TR of the conditions when you get back.

Yeah - the pictures came out okay. I've been trying to summon up the will for a TR but have yet to do so. I suppose it will ruin the story if I give away the ending, but right after we hit the crater rim and I was about to say "We should just drop the packs and tag the summit from here if we are going to make our turn around time" my body said "Actually, what we need to do is engage in a massive fit of vomiting that the rope team a few hundred feet down the mountain will hear loud and clear." I think that we were at about 14,000 feet or so when that happened, and my ropemates graciously agreed to accompany me when I said that I should probably head down. I wish I would have had a camera to document it, as it was in all likelihood a record setting performance. I felt fine after losing a couple thousand feet of altitude, as was the case the last time I got hit by the altitude around 3 years ago. Note to the 3 guys I met while picking up the remains of the mystery camp that blew to pieces* - I have the photos of your group and will mail a CD to someone if you'll post your address here or send it to me via the e-mail address listed on my profile. * More in the TR whenever I get around to it.