Alpinfox

Stephen_Ramsey said: Wow Steve, you and I sure feel differently about "The Man" and the mountains. I hope there aren't a lot of people out there that feel the same way as you about wilderness/mountain access or we'll all be kissing our "privileges" goodbye in the near future.

Nope second one is also from the book "Axe Handles". That poem is actually part of a larger "poem medley" called "Little Songs for Gaia". Here is the eponymous poem from the book: Axe Handles One afternoon the last week in April Showing Kai how to throw a hatchet One-half turn and it sticks in a stump. He revalls the hatchet-head Without a handle, in the shop And go gets it, and wants it for his own. A broken-off axe handle behind the door Is long enough for a hatchet, We cut it to length and take it With the hatchet head And working hatchet, to the wood block. There I begin to shape the old handle With the hatchet, and the phrase First learned from Ezra Pound Rings in my ears! "When making an axe handle the pattern is not far off." And I say this to Kai "Look: We'll shape the handle By checking the handle Of the axe we cut with-" And he sees. And I hear it again: It's in Lu Ji's "Wen Fu", fourth centure A.D. "Essay on Literature" -in the Preface: "In making the handle Of an axe By cutting wood with an axe The model is indeed near at hand." My teacher Shih-hsiang Chen Translated that and taught it years ago And I see: Pound was an axe, Chen was an axe, I am an axe Any my son a handle, soon To be shaping again, model And tool, craft and culture, How we go on.

On Top All this new stuff goes on top turn it over turn it over wait and water down. From the dark bottom turn it inside out let it spread through, sift down, even. Watch it sprout. A mind like compost -Gary Snyder I dreamed I was a god last night. Melting the winter snows with my warm breath. Bending low over snowy mountains with the black sharp scattered fir and pine, breathing, "Haaaaaah" -Gary Snyder Both of the above poems are from a book called "Axe Handles". For those of you who don't know, Gary Snyder is a pacifc northwest native (though he currently lives in California) who did a lot of climbing and tromping around in the woods around here. He is the inspiration for the main character "Joffe" in Kerouac's "Dharma Bums".

John Muir - One of the first Americans to climb technically difficult routes for the thrill of climbing itself and experiencing the majesty of the mountains. One of John Muir's TRs Zebulon Pike - One of the first gapers Warren Harding - He was a heretic (bolt ladders!), but he sure was a visionary and very influential. John Bachar - first person (that I know of) to do technically hard free soloing. From the new school: Lynn Hill - Maybe the most talented all-around rock climber ever! And, she's a woman! Dean Potter - Soloing hard new mixed routes in patagonia! Chris Sharma & Tommy Caldwell - 5.15 I don't have a great depth of knowledge of climbing history like a lot of people on this website and I look forward to reading ya'll's responses! Good topic!

Cool! I graduated in 97, I think Squid graduated in 96. Small world! It sure has changed a lot since I graduated...

Hey Jon, How about making it so we can edit our photo gallery comments too! -AlpinWhiner

Cool! I'll be interested to hear your impressions. BTW: You are welcome to borrow any of the books I listed above. Here's a little something to bring back some fond (?) memories Iliad

BP! Index or Leavenworth sounds good to me for those days weather permitting.

I see someone else reads the NYT. Apparently Der Governator (Schwarzeneger) owns two of these things.

recommended Me Talk Pretty One Day - David Sedaris (laugh out loud funny, ) The Island Within - Richard Nelson (brilliant ecopoetic prose) Desert Solitaire - Edward Abbey (better than Monkey Wrench Gang ) Into the Wild - Krakhauer Ishmael - Daniel Quinn (the most poorly written good book ever) The Only Dance There Is - Ram Dass (Oh, I've said too much) The Human Zoo or The Naked Ape - Desmond Morris (Sociology) Catch22 - Joseph Heller (brilliant "pointlessness of war"-type book) The Family of Man - Time Life photography collection (very cool) Bugaboo Rock - Green & Benson (Faster Summer! Faster!) None of Chomsky's political books really stand out as being better than all the rest, but I have some you can borrow if you wish (Prosperous few and the restless many, Media Control: The spectacular achievements of propaganda, 911, maybe some others...) Anything by Ayn Rand, Franz Kafka, John Muir, or Jack Kerouac that you haven't read already And Squid! Maybe it's time to re-read the Iliad SHIT! I totally forgot about Tom Stoppard! Thanks Dru. I got a really cheap copy of the Bugs guide, but I'll look for that other one too. Arcadia - Tom Stoppard (my favorite play of all time) Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead - Tom Stoppard (also rent the movie! ) For the sake of brevity, my top two rec's are: Island Within Arcadia This was my 911th post and I recommended a book titled "911"

Do the RCMP carry gameboys for roadside Tetris sobriety checks?

You get to ride in helicopters as part of your job. I don't feel too sorry for you.

I sent you guys (MisterE and Yos) an email with a link so you can see all the pictures on www.snapfish.com. Anybody know GaperJeffy's email address? Please PM me with it.

Hey Distel, I figured after your Joe's trip you'd post a bunch of pictures and regain the dubious honor of being the #1 photo uploader on cc.com. I've gotcha beat right now, but where are the Joe's pics??? You ain't lettin' the punk-ass beyotches on this site keep you from posting are you? Let's see a few!

WOW! Very nice!

YOU DON'T FUCK WITH THE JESUS!!!

Nice Lance. You should read "The Island Within" by Richard Nelson. Sorry for the thread drift.

Indeed! Indeed!

So he called the police right?

Hey TomTom, No need to get all high and mighty. You don't know what contributions MisterE (or I) have made to the park in the past. I can assure you that MisterE is not just bitching on the internet and not planning to do anything about it. He told me he plans to talk to the rangers/management. Talking about the issue here is just a prelude and may uncover some important issues/info like this from the post you provided: Posted by "Mike" on smithrock.com: "The closure is supposed to be temporary until a trail is built to prevent erosion. The park ranger ask for trail volunteers but nothing came of it. People interested in volunteering for projects should contact Dave Slaght at 541-480-1683" What doesn't make sense about this is that there is NO EROSION CONTROL ISSUE in this case. The area below GoDogGo is a series of man made retaining walls/rocky platforms. There is no trail or natural area between these and the belaying areas for Captain Xenolith & Helium Woman. I've worked on trail improvement/restoration projects before and I will do it again. Thanks for providing the info, but for the attitude.

Well I'll be damned! Thanks for the correction. SC, it's not my hardest lead to date, but one of my few 5.11 leads at Smith.

They were random peeps (Bend locals) but they weren't hiking in the closed area because the closed area is only five feet away from the open area. It's really dumb.

Climb: Smiff-Wartleys, Overboard, Morning Star, Heresy, et al Date of Climb: 3/19/2004 Trip Report: YO YO YO!!! MisterE and I managed to herd a couple of cats (Yos and GaperJeff) into the MisterE Van and rolled on South for a little Tuff Lovin' over a long weekend. Got down to Smiffy late on Thursday night so we could get an early start on MisterE's ultra-cool, ultra-secret, hush-hush new project. He cleaned it a bit and we each TR'd on it a bit and did some cleaning, but some gaper's were upset that we were dropping shit on their 5.9 wonder-climb, so we decided to cease and desist. Should be a good climb when it's finished though. We climbed some good schtuff, including "Overboard" which was one of my harder leads at Smith: MisterE must have been bored with the rock climbing at this point, because he climbed up this tree and we had a hell of a time getting him down. I don't know why he climbed up there. Maybe he was on drugs or something. He eventually collected himself enough to lead "Wartley's Revenge" by placing four pieces of pro and carrying a cooler full of beer to the anchors. He's got that climb wired. The promise of beer at the top was enough to motivate Yos to get up there in fine style: On Sunday Yos, GaperJeff, and I headed down to the gorge while MisterE went in search of unclimbed prana babes and tuff. I led "Morning Star" which thouroughly kicked my ass, and still felt hard even when I did it on TR. It's got lots of sharp, thin finger locks that you DO NOT want to fall on. It also has a really cool engraving in the basalt at the base of the climb: We headed home early on Sunday and entered some kind of worm hole, making it from Smiff to Seattle in just over 5hrs!!! WTF!?!?! I guess those portals in space/time open up for homies that be representin' Thanks to MisterE for the driving & evening's entertainment; thanks to GaperJeff and Yos for the rockin' company, great photos, and for putting up with the wiggers. Gear Notes: A laptop with DVD player in a VW vanagon = mobile cinema! Approach Notes: Yeah. Lots of snow.