Off_White

I wonder about who is going to pick up the torch Beckey is still carrying. The latest green guide had two errors that I caught in a cursory bookstore scan. One was a trivial route on Fortress that I submitted via email (so it's not the fault of my sloppy penmanship) that is mangled enough as to be impossible to follow, and the other on Thunder Peak (as noted by Lowell Skoog in a thread in N Cascades route reports) that identifies the wrong rib by 180 degrees and only references the AAJ issue with the route report as a description. Two errors in a book is not a big deal, but these were the only two I knew to look for, so I found it alarming. Writer or publisher, I don't know from blame (and don't care to point fingers, writing a guide is a largly thankless task, a real labor of love), but I do wonder who will inherit the mantle? I'm all for adventure, and the odd "obvious gully" is all part of the alpine game, but it's always nice to have some indication of what face the climb is actually on. Before all you Friend-Of-Fred's play dogpile on me, I'd like to acknowledge that his Cascade alpine guides are pretty amazing and comprehensive, far more ambitious and unmatched by anything I've ever seen published for any other range, but the select guides are just not an adequate substitute, any more than McLanes Alpine Select for Canada is a one for one replacement for Fairly's guide, and I think it's a matter of substantial concern as to who CAN step into Fred's shoes, especially if he's starting to lose track of the details. I think Lowell's question about a Cascade Alpine Journal is in part about a way to address this concern.

Damn, the snow/ice traverse actually had a trail!

I'd never be so incoherent whilst (vainly) trying to curb your pagetopping ass ya worthless bitch.

Kunza is a great climb, but it forever has a bad association in my mind. The time I did it, my friend who lead it had a hard time, and her boyfriend (another friend) was just vicious in his criticism, reduced her to tears. It made for an uncomfortable experience for the six or seven of us there as spectators. Relationship meltdown in a very public forum is not necessarily entertaining, but I dunno, I don't think I've ever been reduced to screaming at my climbing partner.

Actually, I've always wanted to do this, but stepping back even further, wearing wool knickers and a pair of robbins blue boots, with a rack of pins and a goldline rope, capped off with a natty white cap like Robbins wore back in the day. If it went off well, you could even take the performance art piece on the road, bill it as "The Return of the Wack and Dangle Merchants."

Good ones Sisu, and like everyone else says, the grandpa joke That one's a keeper.

This thread has been weeded of spray (mostly) and put back up. Sorry about the host of deleted posts, but there was no way to do it cleaner. Express your opinions, stay on topic, and keep it civil, I think the topic merits the serious consideration many here have given it.

Here's an appropriate one Dru: game

Maybe not, I've been a sucker for that post apocalyptic shit ever since I read On The Beach ages ago.

Probably because it was based on a good novel of the same name by David Brin, I recommend it. Boundary Dam up in the NE corner of the state made a guest appearance in the movie, I thought that was the high point...

The picture of Malachite has made it look attractive to me, looks to be in a great position, and I took the description to suggest it might be an easy early season day...

Yes indeed, and Bill & Ted's was the good kind of bad, like Dude Where's My Car. Sequel sucked though. I don't see how any discussion of bad movies could overlook

Saturday was spent working in Portland, but we did squeeze in a first visit to Broughton Bluff in the afternoon. It was an interesting encounter with boot polished holds covered in a fine layer of dust. What I found particularly interesting was gawking along the base, trying to match up the confusing array of cracks, roofs, and such in the columnar basalt with the hand drawn guidebook, and none of the 6 parties I spoke with could tell me what route they were on, and most had no clue of the rating. Fun though. What's the best time of year for this crag? Sunday and Monday were spent at the Puyallup Fair providing parental support while my daughter was showing her goats.

We tried following the description in Beckey, climbed up some gully type feature more or less in line with the buttress. It got steeper, turned into technical munge with small rock ribs & grooves at maybe 70 degrees, all filled with dirt & veg. The only color I remember is green. I think we flaked the rope, but it was pretty much psychological for the leader, maybe possible to excavate a piece here or there, but mostly just pucker and go. We had mountain boots, and they were the right tool for the job. I wasn't joking about the devils club and ferns, when you've got to pull on them you notice the difference in the root structures. At some point we moved right on a ledge system, maybe as the thing we were in petered out. Ledge ended with a 20' dripping overhanging mossy rock step, looked like lots of forest climbing ahead, and we'd just had enough, convinced ourselves we were not on route and turned tail. Definitely rapped the scary grooves, but I can't recall how long that part was, maybe two pitches? We didn't make much of a dent in the thing, its a big piece of adventure for sure. I've probably got some old slides around somewhere but I'm sure they show nothing more than brush and bugged out eyeballs.

Heh, probably a good choice. I thrashed around where those guys did one fall 20 some years ago, even with the leaves shed it was not a fun time, and we didn't get any farther. Later on, a friend and I made an attempt on the Tower Route, far left side of the face, and petered out in technical brush and soggy rock steps. It was then that I learned to love devils club, because it makes a much more secure handhold than ferns. But still, the damned thing is so big and so right there, maybe its not as bad as I remember, might be worth another look....

There's probably more than one case like that, since the one I'm thinking of is probably different than the one you have in mind. I think Caveman is spot on in his bit about local communities being at odds. I'm not a Der local and don't really know who the parties involved are, but I'd guess that all of those putting up any significant number of new routes consider themselves "local" and that includes those willing to bolt next to decent placements. I only know of a couple such instances, but I don't get out that often, so I don't think my awareness of things counts for much.

The piece might have more meaning if were written in, say, Baghdad? Or if the Iraqi writing it hadn't left the country 32 years ago. Are things going so well he's ready to go back? Aside from Ayad Rahim's genetic heritage, what makes him any more credible as an observer than any other citizen of Cleveland (or Phoenix if you'd prefer)? That he's the grown up child of a family that fled Iraq in Saddam Hussein's early days as ruler? Aside from two unspecified polls, what information does he have? Don't get me wrong, I'd like to hear some good news from Iraq, but I'd like it substantiated. I certainly hope the Iraqi people come out of this better than they were pre-sanctions (Clinton policy), and they have a better chance with Saddam Hussein gone, but it's not a slam dunk by any means.

Dwayner, Sphinx is just more blunt and crude about it, but he's not any more insulting than the "clever" put downs, which are simply more effective ways to to needle people. Besides, I think what you quoted was actually intended as a compliment, and Glacierdog took it as one.

Well, I guess I've had that done to a route I helped put up years ago at Darrington. We did leave it in somewhat daunting condition, complete with 1/4" bolts, and the last one was mostly sticking out with no hanger (used a wired nut over the stud) and a 40' runout ahead. Came from drilling with a holder that had no handle, using a 12oz ball peen hammer with a cord tied to it. Drilling went sort of like: tap, tap, tap, fuck! as the hammer struck the hand holding the narrow bit holder, end eventually enough was enough. If we were diligent, we'd have gone back and tidied up. As it was, years later someone came in and poorly rap bolted (bolts not in the right place on the stance) much of the line, putting in lots of bolts but curiously leaving the scary stud in place. They stuck a hanging station in the middle of the best climbing, and generally made a mess of a sort of okay line. David Whitelaw has encouraged me to go back and restore things, essentially to do what we should have done so many years ago, but I get so little time for climbing I haven't gotten around to doing the work. I figure that makes the botched modern route at least partly my fault, due to a failure to do the right thing on the first ascent. Is leaving your first ascent a mungy dirty mess the same thing?

Yeah, I was thinking about that route this morning, I think the big issue was what was done to the Brown Dihedral, turning a great aid pitch into a bolt ladder. For me the question is somewhat academic, as I neither climb 5.12 nor am I much taken with aid climbing, but I find the question of whether free climbing is more "valuable" than aid climbing an interesting one, and a very current one with the freeing of various classic wall routes on El Cap. What about the Grand Wall, an enormously popular free (mostly free for most) climb. I'm sure it doesn't much resemble the aid climb it used to be, but I haven't heard anyone advocate for returning it to it's first ascent condition.

You know, when I find myself agreeing with Greg_W, the phrase "broad based coalition" springs to mind.

I'd guess a mashie, pre-copperhead technology.

I think Lance's observation is quite relevant to our corner of the world. Our current big tussle over bolts, about which I tend to agree with Mattp that it doesn't really seem like much of an issue in the real world, may well distract from or actually work counter to more pressing concerns like access itself. Moreover, this is a very public board, and there are lots more lurkers reading than there are people writing, and to be sure some of those watching and making notes are both media representatives and folks from the National Park Service and the Forest Service. People act as if this is all just on the internet and doesn't matter a hill of beans, but in fact its written down in a public forum that's far more durable than any conversation over a pitcher of beer somewhere. While the roosters try to assert their place in the pecking order, the fox may be checking out the henhouse.

I know the style, Sisu. Practical people live longer too.