ivan

sadly, i couldn't convince the wife n' family it was time to learn how to jug as that was indeed my favored plan

indeed, a long hike in the enchantments is hard to beat but really, am i crazy in my recollections? i dont' recall really having to contend w/ crevasses at all on the ptarmigan? we brought a rope, but i don't recall really ever using it (except for rapping the red ledges as we headed for the exit at cascade pass) now, running out of booze n' smokes i DO remember, as it resulted in us covering more ground in a single day than we had in all days combined prior to

7/31 -day 7, lap 4 - volunteered to do some camp counseling w/ the fam this week for reasons passing understanding (well, not really - who doesn't like money?) - a humogoniod heat-wave in the offing starting tomorrow, so soon after we concluded i hit beacon as the south face passed into the shade - jimbo n' sal bandying w/ babes below cruise'n, i paused to soak in the ambiance n' let the heat break a bit the scorpion n' snake from the other day have fled the scene - i hiked my hoe-boi shorts way up above my belly-button to avoid the other awful thing the river's nice n' cool n' slow now, allowing a most pleasant soak n' paddle after the pleasantries n' the festivities

worst bugs/bushwhack i've ever seen in the pnw was there by lake holden

sounds like you needed a vacation after that there vacation

cack

7/28 - day 5 - lap 3 been running and swimming lately a good bit more than usual and feeling wicked sluggish perhaps as the result, panting from pitch to pitch, wondering what the fuck happened to the old me? 3 little terrors in just 30 minutes today - the first a scotched scorpion, just a few feet up the start, mayhap placed by some malicious fool to put fear into the heart of the mortals - the third a fattish snake snug-deep in the finger crack on the first step of pitch 3 - and the middle the oddest of all, going to pull the 2nd crux of the slab pitch, right where you lie back above one pin to get to the place where you can clip the last one and scoot around and up to the tree ledge - caught my right short leg on the pin, and promptly my pants shot down, making further movement uphill impossible but just as difficult in the other direction, and suddenly i was on the verge of being found dead w/ only my drawers between me n' dignity - my first instinct was just to pull through, but it was a bad one, and w/ a bit of a whimper i had to half-reverse the move, hanging off of just one hand, to get shit unsnagged n' the situation resolved

6/18 - jeebus, 6 months in the can and only my 2nd climbing trip to beacon for this foul year of our lord, 2017 fadder's day morning dawned foul in more ways than i care to cofvefe - mike gave me the big head-fake, biking bound for cape horn - so just geoff instead - the plan to get some jugging laps in to make tower more tolerable - he leads stone soup 1 while i contemplate the hms haunted house of my life burning to the water-line and just how wonderful maybe that might be had fun tearing out 500 yards of police tape from the general vicinity of the parking lot ledge - didn't quite get it all - don't understand why whoever take down the old fixed line from the ledge as it would have made that enterprise much easier... summer's here, squamish the plan for next week, assuming the canuckistani's allow us passage 7/19 n' 7/26 - lapz 1 n' 2 - back from hated virginia on a long flight made slightly less painful by sitting in the emergency row - i said i'd help, but secretly i planned to leave all those foolz behind at the first hint of danger the first lap an exploration in just how creaky i've become - hot and sunny but fun, my feet not always cooperating the way they're supposed too - afterwards i hiked the cape horn trail circuit w/ a few beerz n' ended up w/ wierd blisters after weeks of inactivity in the sultry south, air-conditioned bound and beer-dependent the second lap a day after a long run after a long time of not running - jesus, how does this world work? panting n' perspiring after each pitch, i made my way from shade to shade, then went out to battle ground lake for a long, lazy swim

whatever...all i learnt real good this trip was the members of ABBA

good to know these old boys can manage the 3rd-world roads back to tower - glad we didn't need their service - all that blood n' sudden mania sure harshed on my mellow

if you can't get a permit for forbidden, there's never a line on johannesberg across the way http://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=484182

trip #16 - july 21-22 rapunzel's back in rehab is now ready for whatever rude, idle-minded customers might care to come her way - she ain't particular and man, for a hillbilly woman all moss-covered and whiskey addled, she sure is purty it took the metaphorical third shot to see her finished, but after a weapons-grade-retard attempt last cock-tober and another last month that went off the rails w/o warning, me, big bill, n' gentleman geoff finally managed to malinger our way through the 13 steps of rehab this weekend and can now confidently claim ourselves to be Redeemed Men swimming in the shade w/ the fam on thursday turned into sangria in the backseat on the long voyage north afterwards, and then ended indignantly w/ me sharting myself upon arriving at the dark, dank forest trailhead - not the most auspicious of augors, but thank the sweet baby-back-rib jeebus i'd brought another pair of shorts... not ones to turn in early, geoff n' i stayed up late howling at the moon and indulging in new-found muzak, swilling n' smoking n' what not and therefore needled poor bill the next morning with our torpor to rise n' get to the bidness, which he'd been chomping at the bit for since sunup still, in the end, we eventually got our shit straight and wandered up the hill for the umpteenth time, me sweating like a purblind lesbian at pike's place on a sultry summer afternoon - a half-hour later we were at the base and i relaxed, letting them two boys tangle w/ the first 2 pitches while i debauched myself in regal splendour, watching the game unfold above me i jugged up and did the dog-day-long p3 as geoff went back down to the ground, leaving bill to do the wild p4 and giving me the pleasure of following it for the first time - the work of the first day done, we then fixed back down to the ground and returned to camp it was weird to be back and idle by the middle of the afternoon, but we made do, getting our vittles on and preparing for an early sleep in order to rise w/ the sun on saturday, swatting black flies and bull-shiting about days gone by saturday's dawn came just after 430, and soon thereafter we Did the Necessaries n' noodled on up the track, me gut-weary and wondering if a half-frozen don miguel breakfast burrito was really what me wounded bowels wanted the first 2 jugs are easy, but the 3rd was a horrible sweat-fest, partly b/c we didn't have a long enough static to use the midpoint anchor to break up the long jug (it's more or less exactly 60 meters from the top of p4 to the top of p2, and relentlessly overhanging, especially at the end) - the one thing in our favor was the marine layer of clouds that kept the sun off us as we each took the better part of an hour to thrutch up it p5 is another long one, but i did it last month and so i volunteered for it on the basis i'd get us through it fastest, though i was already feeling a wee bit whupped p6-7 we cruised through easily for reasons the 2nd ascent team will quickly appreciate, though not w/o incident as bill, despite endless warnings, accidentally kicked off a belayer-slayer atop p6 that nearly made the world a lawyer shorter as poor geoff was just below excitement waxed john holmes large once we hit "the fault" and p8 - the summit now is close enough to look conceivable, and after all the incredible steepness of the lower wall, now it's a reasonable angle to get up to the base of the upper wall - bill shot across it w/o complaint p9 is the "dances w/ death" pitch, and i was mortal concerned w/ how to rig it so that no one got kilt - geoff figured he'd rather lead it than sweat below, waiting for big blocks to plummet on him, so i hung at the bottom of the fault and watched the show while bill belayed - my fears proved pretty unwarranted, though geoff's eyes got big-around enough at what he'd wandered through that i at least felt vindicated in my caution - he made good time up the fresh and fearful steep way while bill n' i chuckled n' took in the scenery, hoping another f-15 eagle would come roaring through the valley below as it had the day before, just a football field or two away bill and i each relead p9 on top-rope - we didn't jug the line b/c there are so many sharp edges and fresh blocks that either chopping the line or weighting a block such that it crashes down is all too imaginable for a fear-fucked modern mammal once in the rotten notch we felt good n' giddy - the scary part done, we had a good bit of light left and were only 3 rope-lengths from the top - bill, whose shoulder ailments seemed to have all but disappeared after 2 years of constant complaint, linked p9&10, fixing a static 2/3 up such that i could reach him far faster than belayer geoff - i howled in pain after a small rock, dislodged by bill's rope, bounced down the gully n' peeled back the flesh of my thumb p12 i lead in unorthodox style, on a static line as geoff was still coming up the leadline - i'd done it so many damn times i figured there was no fear of falling - what was aggravating was yet again my adjustable daisy had given up the ghost after holding my fat-ass in place too long, and the replacement i borrowed off bill promptly died too - 12 is so steep it's a bit of a nut-kicker trying to do it old school w/ just a fifi the shadows were growing damn long, but we figured to link 13 & 14 and be on top w/ daylight left - geoff got the honor of bringing this pleasing project to its ultimate ejaculation, and up he went - amusingly, though he'd put this one up last summer, he'd forgotten he'd made something of a challenge out of it then, and thus conspired to short-cock himself, killing himself w/ drag and letting me do p14 (all 50-some-odd feet of it) and be the first to flop onto the dusty summit i guess we should have had a good hullabaloo on top but the combination of weariness and worry at the prospect of the jungle-thrash downhill in the dusk left us with little more inclination than for a perfunctory handshake and a quick glance around at the alpen-glow after ditching all our gear at the summit saddle (we figured we'd drop in the next day from above and pick it all up), we banged down like bob-sledders on fire, hoping to regain the base before total dark and just managed to pull it off - i sucked down my victory can of pbr as the stars started to rise, and then by headlamp we made the short trip back to camp, where low-n-behold ole'kyle was, thus solving the mystery of who'd been hooting up at us periodically through the day our dreams fulfilled, we wallowed in sweet weariness n' got our party on, me too tired but to drink gatorade n' burgundy n' suck down smoke n' cackle at this chapter of life concluded - the sun rose the next day and once again we were only ordinary men many more routes to manufacture up the teetering tower, should anyone have the taste for it - i fear these fellows may be shot of it now i hope to remember these past 26 or so months of wandering back and forth with this parcel of fools fondly - ben, kyle, bryan, geoff and bill (the last 2 especially) all made their contributions, the usual result being a mixture of fear, elation and gut-laffs that doesn't appear to have a name that comes quick to mind go get it people - i'll be very surprised if you don't find it worth your time - after all, how many grade V big wall climbs are there in washington, and all bolts to boot? throw in the close distance to portland/seattle and the relatively easy approach/descent, and i'd think this tawdry little lady's got a chance at classic status topo bill leading p8 to base of "dances with death" bill on p10, leading out of the rotten notch top of p12 me just below p13 anchor, a few feet below summit

is the galley currently not working? i get a rude "access denied" message when i click on it

perhaps an uber to cloud cap is more the thing?

put it into a plaintext converter here's one: https://jhy.io/tools/convert-word-to-plain-text

i had a blow out in february

they all took up biking and vegan fucking cooking :puke:

dunno, who was he?

yosemite ain't easy for would-be campers who don't plan their thing a year in advance - getting a spot at camp 4 ain't impossible, but you gotta be in line at 4 a.m. to do it you end up blowing much of a day as a result - hardin flats ain't so bad...

hardin flats, just outside the 120 park entrance, has ample car camping in not totally awful ambiance - skeetery as hell though, and turds in all directions, plus an hour from the valley, which is sorta lame you can always jug the heart ledge fixed lines and camp in grand style on mammoth terraces if you have a sweet climbers van, you can pretty much just park outside the 140 entrance and be only 20 minutes from el cap meadow

6/18 - jeebus, 6 months in the can and only my 2nd climbing trip to beacon for this foul year of our lord, 2017 fadder's day morning dawned foul in more ways than i care to cofvefe - mike gave me the big head-fake, biking bound for cape horn - so just geoff instead - the plan to get some jugging laps in to make tower more tolerable - he leads stone soup 1 while i contemplate the hms haunted house of my life burning to the water-line and just how wonderful maybe that might be had fun tearing out 500 yards of police tape from the general vicinity of the parking lot ledge - didn't quite get it all - don't understand why whoever take down the old fixed line from the ledge as it would have made that enterprise much easier... summer's here, squamish the plan for next week, assuming the canuckistani's allow us passage

is it really blue collar is you're not frequently tied in, but still scared to death?

the north and west sides are, boy-o, but not the s side gonna be out there sunday, should you wish to fuck w/ stone-soup (i think you'd dig it - certainly ain't simple free climbing) - most of the classic n side routes will be too wet

how hard, esse? gotta get back up to d-ton sometime - nothing like the smella pine n' a whole lotta nobody....