Norman_Clyde

Croft also gives a limited account of his Enchantments traverse in his chapter in the big coffee table book "Fifty Climbs". He talks about being very thirsty. One liter is not much water for a 12,000 foot day.

Thanks for the poem, Alpinfox. IMO there are too few that get it right on this subject. This one nails it.

Climbing Glacier this year, trails in their current condition, must have felt more remote than the Pickets.

Just the excuse I need to purchase another piece of gear. Inexpensive to boot!

Not to betray extreme ignorance, but how does a reverso allow you to take in 2 ropes at different rates, using only 2 hands? All right, I just re-read the original thread and I think I get the idea: one rope in standard mode, one in autoblock mode. Reverso allows this, yes?

Helmet use is a lot like seat belt use: there are enough obvious, well documented benefits of their use that most communities consider helmet/seat belt laws to be fair and just. The rugged individualist likes to believe that his life choices affect no one except himself/herself, but it's just not true. Whether or not you choose to acknowledge the fact, society is compelled to do a certain amount for you if you're incapacitated by injury. This is also true if you get killed, but the burden to society from a dead person is much less. If you survive another 30 years in a vegetative state in a nursing home somewhere, you'll be consuming public funds and resources eventually, no matter how good your insurance. Therefore society has some degree of authority over how much risk you may assume in certain situations. Society can't quite justify mandating a healthy diet for you, because the question of benefit vs. risk is not nearly so clear-cut. This is not true for use of helmets or seat belts.

I've been up the glacier twice in Oct. (1989 and 1996). The western half of the unnamed glacier was no more than 4 or 5 feet thick on its upper stretches, at one point even opening a 100 foot wide "crevasse" requiring us to climb off the glacier, walk across the rock, climb back onto the ice; nothing more technical than that. A rock scramble was required at the top of the "headwall" (not very steep) to gain the small promontory at the base of the couloir. We had no bergschrund problem there, because so much meltage had gone on. I think conditions vary quite a bit at this particular spot, and would seek more recent beta. But there's no need to rule out a late season ascent.

Hiked up to the upper Enchantments on Friday. Bailed on the plan to climb Stuart due to weather and anticipated snow. Headed up the Colchuck Lake trail, considering a solo of Colchuck North Buttress which is reputed to be class 3 to 4. From below it looked not very pleasant, more like 4th to 5th class, chossy. I debated soloing this but thought better of it and headed up Aasgard instead. Quite a crowd was heading up the trail. I bypassed the llama train by scrambling the slabs on climber's right-- much more fun and interesting, highly recommended if you don't happen to have a heavy pack. Cloud ceiling was at about 8500 all day, but no rain. Went up Little Annapurna and Witches Tower. Saw that as expected Stuart had new snow on the upper reaches. Admired the views, pondering that the upper Enchantments are something like God's own Zen garden, with vanished glaciers taking the role of the sand rake. No new snow in the Enchantments at all. Brought crampons and a whippet but didn't need either.

Be warned that the Nike watch housing can fracture where the watchband pins seat. This renders the watch unwearable, and can only be fixed by sending it to the factory for a new housing. I did this once, waiting months for the return, paying about 75 dollars for the trouble, then it broke again less than a month later. My watch still works, but it's not so convenient to use because I can't wear it.

Found 8/27 at 6:15 pm. Almost brand new, socks tucked in, looks like somebody took them off and drove away. Tell me the brand and the size and they're yours.

No snow at all as of yesterday.

No worries, I'm just having fun.

PDX'er's hijacking my post!! 190 miles is a little far to drive. I have decided against a trail run today, in favor of a longer outing tomorrow. Have fun, Y'all.

The current weather being perfectly timed to coincide with my midweek days off, I'm all dressed up with no place to go except lower elevation trail runs. Midafternoon today I'll be heading someplace like Si, or Mailbox, or Alpental valley. Speed will not be of paramount concern. Send a PM if you're up for it.

Did you solo?

I climbed the Disappointment Peak route in mid August 1998. I bushwacked in via Baekos Creek (not recommended), so I can't comment on the area between White Mt. and White Chuck Glacier. However, it should not pose a problem. Photo on page 99 of the green Beckey guide shows that this area is non-technical open country. You could even take the Pacific Crest Trail to the base of White Chuck if you wanted. The crux of the route was a short vertical gully, just beneath the summit of Disappointment Peak, composed of crumbling volcanic mud and ice. I chose to go straight up this, but it likely can be bypassed on either side. Most of the climb above the heather was laborious volcanic talus. I went down the Sitkum which was low angle, firm neve, very easy, but bring crampons. Descending your planned ascent route would be a real pain. I don't know the condition of the PCT where the spur trail to Boulder Basin joins it, but if I were you I'd take the PCT back, even if you have to work a bit to find it at first.

Thanks, Y'all.

Steve, How's the routefinding? Foolish to go solo if I've never been on the route before? I've been to the summit via Ulrichs so (presumably) I can get down once I get up, if I can get up that way.

I camped on the Adams summit plateau one September after climbing the N ridge. This was one of the nicest high camps in memory, fantastic views, though of course you'd need a mellow weather forecast. Going up and down in one day would be tedious, even with a start from high camp. This climb is made better by a night on the summit in my view.

The Chopping Block Just bring your crampons for the bushwack.

Re: burning more calories at altitude: up to a point you have to work harder to exert the same energy, but once you're up really high, you can't burn the same calories because there is not enough OXYGEN. This is one of the reasons why 8000 m. climbers not using supplemental oxygen have a higher risk of frostbite. Your metabolic furnace barely stays lit at that altitude.

I used to be snooty about climbing registers, avoiding signing them because that makes it look like I came all that way just to brag and show off. Now, of course, I'm wiser and I realize that signing the register is a poor substitute for a chestbeat TR on cc.com. Seriously, I did once avoid signing registers, but as I gain respect for local history, including the less obviously historic events that may later become important, I have decided that summit registers are a valuable archive. Everyone who summits should sign, and the record should be preserved.

Lots of 4th and low 5th. Lost count of how many 30 meter pitches. At least half were very comfortable for simulclimbing. The only 5.7 was one short friction traverse, about 1/3 of the way up the buttress. We suspected that we had strayed from the easiest route at this point. We tried a couple of other ways to go around the difficulty, but did not explore them fully. Once past this obstacle, it was back to simulclimbing for most of the way. The final arete is very sharp and photogenic, but no more tricky than the rest (no 5.8+ found). Then there's one 3rd class downclimb, and about 200 yards of loose 3rd class to the summit. Himmelhorn-Ottohorn col was about 45 degree snow on the south side, steep and broken snow and rock to the north. We scrambled on the rock and took one rappel to reach easy snow. The remaining traverse is straightforward: no further crevasse or moat problems prevent access to the base of the route. Probably the most dangerous part of the whole climb is the descent gully, which is a major bowling alley. The talus on the W. Ridge just beneath the summit is also much looser than it appears.

A whopping six of us did Terror N. Face on 7/25: Jim, Morris, Teleross, Jason, Skykilo and myself. No TR as yet, maybe because everyone is waiting for someone else to post. I have a few photos but no really good ones. I just tried to attach, but they're all too many MB and I have no good program to compress. I sent a few to Skykilo who has better software, and can probably get a few up.

You could probably call the UW main number and ask to be connected to the dept. of pulmonary medicine. As this is an academic medical center, the departments have clinics but also offices not devoted directly to patient care. There should be a receptionist who can tell you how to connect with him. (I don't know him personally, and have no idea if he will welcome this attention or not; but this is how I proceed if I need to reach someone in the system.)