glen

I was experiencing a bout of BLS right off the belay. Lambone just said to me, "Just think how much better your life will be after you commit to that move." You know what, he was right. Those are the moments in climbing that require the most focus and attention- which is a big part of what climbing is about, and what separates it from 'vertical hiking'.

Ever seen a broken Leeper hanger? I have. I downclimbed rather than rap on the one remaining rusty trusty next to it. The manufacturer recalled Leeper hangers becuse they have been known to fail under *body weight*. They should be replaced. When new, 1/4 inch bolts are fine and easier to place. No argument there. 1/4 inch bolts that are 30 years old and manufactured out of pig iron are generally not. If someone is willing to spend the time and money to do you a service by replacing them, don't give them a hard time about it on the grounds that you are doing 'real' climbing. By the way, washed potholes and washouts shouldn't be fixed on account of people doing 'real' driving. blah blah blah.

cheap nuts: http://gear.overstock.com/cgi-bin/d2.cgi?PAGE=PROFRAME&PROD_ID=31370 If you don't mind euro brands, remember to check out barrabes.com. Cheap!

there are a lot of answers to this question. One approach that seems to work well is to climb with people with full racks, figure out what works for you, and spend wisely from there. In the absense of partners with full racks, or partners with climing gear for that matter, I would recommend the following: A set of nuts. Double the midrange if you can. A set of BD camalots 1,2,3, skip the smallest stuff. If you can, double up on the 1 and 2. for smaller sizes I prefer wired bliss and aliens. BD are preferred because they have about the best size range per cam. This makes them quite versatile. So, while you will be able to afford fewer cams overall, each individual cam can be used in a broader array of placements. You are likely to see lots of criticism of this, but it's a good starting point. Remember to shy away from the epicly long pitches when you have a small rack, as you can end up painfully short of gear in unfortunate circumstances in a hurry. Gear is expensive, but a good starter rack is still cheaper than a ride in an ambulance. have fun out there!

This info has probably gone out before, but there ar enough Leeper Hangers out there to throw it out again. Apparently, the rate of failure for Leeper hangers has approached 1 in 100. For the full scoop, see: http://www.safeclimbing.org/Leeper_recall_0402.pdf Climb safe!

Harding Lives!

If you are so into risk in climbing why don't you just stop using the manko bolts and a rope too? Don't impose your world view of climbing on others (that goes two ways of course). Even when safe, it is far from vertical hiking. Certainly risk is a part of climbing, but I do not believe that risk is the goal of climbing. Another aspect, to be historical in a non-material object sense, is the experience of the first party. They climbed on those spinners when they were fresh as a daisy, not rusty trustys. Saying the rusty bolts are in some way better is similar to arguing that you should keep driving your classic car with original tires until they bald, blow out and cause an accient- minor or major. I've replaced scary ass bolts on lines before and I feel that it was the right thing to do. I added no additional placements, just maintained the level of protection. G

Lambone, Is that "hard at work" or "hardly workin'?"

If you plan to stay in the 'regular' campgrounds, you will need reservations in advance. A google search on Yosemite campground reservations will send you to the internet reservations page. Check back on a regular basis as people do cancel reservations. Whether or not camp 4 has too much debauchery probably depends on your girlfriend. If Tuoulumne is open and you're heading there, half of the campground is first come, first serve, so show up early in the morning and you'll probably get a site, no problemo, even if the reservations are all full. In general, the people on the phones at th reservation service (not in Yosemite) don't have a clue. You can also check out reservations at Crane Flat, about 1/2 hour outside of the Valley. I think that the regular sites ar $15-18 a night, I think. camp 4 is cheaper ($3/person/nite???). enjoy! Granite is good.

Cool. Thanks for the info. Perhaps the ice axe is useful this time of year to clear mounties out of the way as opposed to snow? climb on.

Climbed a few pitches up at Index. It was an awesome day up there. Sunny, mostly dry rock, snowy peaks for a backdrop. Granite is good. Followed that up with a by the river.

Facts are facts. We should be careful not to ignore facts at the sake of not liking them, or their implications. Fact: A ibg chunk of ice fell off an Antarctic ice shelf. Fact: Global warming has been happeing for several thousand years. Just look at any 14,000 year old moraine in the Cascades, sierras, rockies, Andes, etc to see this. Fact: The trend in global warming increases above the baseline level of increase proportional to industrialization starting around the 1860's (think coal factories). Speculation: this will lead to the collapse of democracy and our consumer-driven service economy. Speculation: If we cease all greehouse as production, everything will be okay. We are still cutting down CO2 sinks (aka rain forest, etc...) at an alarming rate. Speculation: environmentalism is a plot to remove your freedoms. The martian ice caps fluctuate on a yearly basis. 50% of the atmosperic CO2 sublimates between dry ice at the cap and gas phase as spring and fall come and go. This is detectable by changes in atmospheric pressure at the surface in addition to global surveyor data. Apples and Oranges. Spray on...

Anyone been up by the Tooth lately? If so, how much has it melted out? Is the actual rock route still a snowy ice-axe fest, or is it a rock route again?

By the same argument as above, St Helens has a far shorter eruptive recurrence interval. Heck, the pre 1980 edifice was only a few thousands of years old, which puts it considerably younger than Yellowstone. Does that mean I want to run into snowmobiles on a daily basis there? No. Does volcanic recurrence interval have anything to do with snowmobile impacts on wildlife and the environment on a daily basis? No. The yellowstone argument works about as well as saying that you are going to get old and die anyways, so why bother having a good and enjoyable life in the meantime. On the other hand, each volcano has a nice piece of granite forming up below it. Give it a few million years of erosion to get to the surface and you've got yourself another splitter crag. Yummy! G

Is that advice for Lambone?

Did you mean: go to Smith and Vantage with a Rifle? Seriously though, how would you view it if you had to leave your kid behind because bikers decided your living room was the best place to burn some tread? A bit of inconvenience isn't that bad. The stakes are a bit higher for the birds. Also, if any of you guys run into 'Link' in the Valley, he's worth talking to. It's too bad the upper levels of the NPS don't have more people like him.

I was on the easy end of the rope, so I can't say a thing. I do remeber thinking, "Shite, this is pretty stout for 5.8..." and "so that's why he said "watch me" ... not bad if you're expecting 1960's yosemite 5.8's. It is pretty stiff if you've gotten softened by most of the grades in WA though.

Q: When you say 'retrobolted', do yo mean that rusty spinners were replaced at the same location, or that additional bolts were added at new locations on the route? I've heard the term used both ways. I'm just curious about the evolution of the climb.

Lambone, Remember when you hopped on Princely Ambitions thinking the '5.8' in the guidebook was correct?

Forgot to mention the day... Saturday. Too much at work, I guess...

Anyone up for running up some routes at Index? It's early in the season so I'll look to be leading 5.8's, but will follow harder. Open to doing aid too.

Best I got was 0.298s. Maybe I should get rid of the coffee jitters.

A couple of things have become apparent reading over the sets of posts on Fee Demo: 1. A number of people are unhappy for a number of reasons, not all of which are consistent with eaach other. 2. Not buying a pass is consistent with non-support of fee demo, and certainly cheaper. However this seems to be a rather ineffective approach in terms of actually causing a change. 3. The small number of letters being written to a diverse set of agencies is recieving little attention outside the context of form letters. 4. Protests (ie, June 15th) are useful more as an agent of public awareness gathering than actually causing immediate change. Without media coverage, this is likely to be ineffective also. 5. The discontent with Fee Demo, specifics aside, seem to be part of a larger disgruntlement with uncle sam. Sorry if this seems like a wet blanket, but I'm just trying to get my head around what might *actually* make a difference, not just make me feel like I put in at least a minimum of effort so I don't feel like a total bump on a log.

Tim, I'm with you. Royal Robbins or maybe Doug Robinson. Spam anyone who says they want to be John Krakauer (or however you spell his name)!