Off_White

I fixed it for you.

Yep, White Pass is open year round. There's a lot to love about the crags up and down that canyon. Really big picture of Ride The Lightning

I think Wayne had a video TR that included the clinking sound those platters make as you move over the whole stack. I triple concur on "be the first party on the route", probably true for any route on the crag. Helmets for sure.

Kev, from the Couv you'll get there by going north on I-5 to exit 68, then Hwy 12 over White Pass. We did a car bivy on a forest road right nearby, but as noted there is lots of "dispersed camping" available in the National Forest. We did Ride the Lightning on Memorial Day weekend, conditions were great and clearly it had been dry for awhile. It's adventure climbing, not at all sport climbing. There is loose rock and route finding issues, and the odd bit of technical dirt and stacked pie plates. Its good if you like that sort of thing, I'm looking forward to doing a couple other routes there...

A friend and I almost put an offer in on a lot in the small settlement at Courtright Reservoir at 9000' above Fresno. It's a lot like Tuoloumne Meadows but National Forest, uncrowded, and free to camp. Long ways away though, (I usually think) passing was the right decision.

KKKKK, there's nothing voodoo about the math, though its all estimated back-of-the-envelope stuff, a serious comparison would require more data and research. You pay for the bathrooms in your house before you ever use them too, though truth be told the bank usually owns your toilets. Fact is, the cost is much more complicated than you think, and covers much more than just the cost of construction. Here's the explanation from (link) WSDOT:

Fairweather said: Sure, Obama is a huge disappointment to progressives, for the reasons you've mentioned and more. He's hardly the liberal socialist some would label him, and he's done nothing to reverse the trend towards an imperial presidency. Like Neil Young said, "A kinder, gentler machine gun hand." He's much more like that endangered species, the Moderate Republican. I'm going to vote for him anyway, because I don't see the Republicans offering anything that's an improvement, and there is no viable option to the left of the mainstream. Would I be making a noticeable statement by voting for the Green Party candidate? Not a good one if it puts Mitt Romney in the White House. Obama talks a populist line, but acts relatively conservative: he's predictable. Romney says any old thing he thinks might get him elected, but who knows what a man who doesn't actually believe anything will do? He claims he's focused on the middle class, but his economic proposals are pure self interest and a vast boon to the very wealthy. I've always (always) felt disenfranchised by national political choices, so it doesn't feel that different than any election to me, voting for the least harm, the best of a bad lot. Have you been satisfied with your choices in other elections? I was pleased with Obama's election, but I was never his spear carrier. I was a Kucinich delegate in the caucus, I've got serious windmill tilting cred, so disappointment is a familiar friend. I can imagine its jarring to others less immured.

Thanks for the nudge to read it, interesting indeed. Is having the most difficult to amend constitution a good thing or a bad thing? I don't know that being susceptible to any passing whimsey is a good thing for a constitution, having rights be determined by a simple majority is not desirable in my book.

Patience grasshopper, I'll get back to you, life is just overfull right now. Gotta date with my wife, so it won't be tonight.

Klenke, I'm talking a per-use basis. Your house: assume you have two bathrooms, one's a 60sf half bath and the other is your 120sf master bath. $300 per square foot makes your bathrooms cost $54,000. You don't live alone, call it an average of 6 uses per day, over 10 years, equals 21,900 uses at $2.47 per use. Rest area: 300 uses a day over the same time period yields a per use cost of $2.92. Its within shouting distance of the same cost. I don't know how many uses the rest area will actually get, I just pulled that number out of my, uhm, ass.

Nice to see a pic of Phydeaux. Have a great weekend Sobo.

thanks for keeping things, err, straight Sobo.

Do you mean that the uniformed might mistakenly believe I was speaking about American Liberals rather than as an American Liberal? I don't think careful reading supports that interpretation, but feel free to get excited if you want, it is Friday evening.

How do you know Kev isn't just playing along, doing a little call and response? Don't short change the Bone...

It kind of sounds that way, but on a per-poop basis amortized over 10 years, its probably cheaper than the bathrooms in your house. Still, I'm pretty sure I could have built that for $3.15 million...

I don't hate them, I just don't think they should be allowed to marry, or be mentioned in teh public schools. No special rights for those kinds of people.

Yeah, science, belief in the coming of god's son 18,000 years ago in the new world, Native American's dark skins due to original sin, gravitational theory, germ theory of disease: its all the same, right?

I'm sure you meant to type "commend", and I do commend them, its a notable thing. I don't even meet Newt's 3% level, though if I made 3+million a year I would. However, I don't give anyone's church a pass as you suggest. Romney belongs to a religion that mandates a 10% tithe, and to my mind its no more a charity contribution than giving money to the Scientologists, Aryan Nations, or any other cult (including your generic Mega Church or the Pastafarians as well). I suppose my oppostion to tax exempt status for religious organizations is an entirely different subject though, so just for the sake of this thread I'll accept your "don't quibble" request.

I haven't found the rock quality to be suspect at Royal Columns, and I still think it offers the most concentrated collection of moderate crack climbs I've encountered in the NW, but YMMV.

I'm requesting that the seasonal onset of Bitching About Beacon not occur this year, or I'll be making some deletions. Its not a positive or acceptable use of this forum.

The OP didn't mention grade, but I think you'd be hard pressed around here to do better than a trip to Royal Columns in the Tieton. Lots of cracks, though the nature of the rock sometimes makes protection a little more thoughtful than straight granite cam plugging: its not uncommon for the crack to open up more on the inside, and your best placement may be a hex. Day one, do all the 5.7's at the crag, you'll do at least 15 pitches of all sizes. I you can still move, do all the 5.8's the next day. I guarantee First Blood will be educational. All in all, an excellent compact crag for crack school, and I think the overall crack mileage really matters if you're learning. Pick the Index plums when you've got the skills.

Yeah, like I said FW, its not much, unless you're an average citizen, then its a helluva lot. The perception gap is what irks me. A lot of Romney's "charity" giving is tithing to the Mormon church, though its all done through his foundation, which is where that charitable donation mostly goes. I saw an income comparison between Obama, Romney, & Gingrich recently which included charitable giving. While Obama is way in the back with "only" 1.7 million in income, his percentage to charity was the highest. Romney was in the 10% range, and Newt was lower. I did find it amusing that Gingrich rails against "the elites" when he makes well over 3 million a year. Sure, I'm just a working class chump, but that meets my definition of "elite". Would you share who you're thinking of voting for? I think of you as a fairly mainline Republican, not out there on the wild eyed fringes, and I really wonder what the party currently offers those folks. People like my dad, a lifelong Republican who's (relatively) socially liberal but fiscally conservative, and truly offended by the evangelical wing. Where do you go?

Oooh, points for an inside joke that only a poster with history could make!

Sorry Jim, but you're wrong. It WAS calculated in Mitt's returns, he simply didn't pay any because he didn't "earn" any of his money by working, its almost all investment income of one sort or another. There isn't a snowball's chance in hell he'll ever move to raise the capital gains tax, that tax cut has been the biggest personal bonus plan for him ever. Mitt makes noises like this focus on his income is about hating "success" and implies anyone can have what he has, though he's the ultra rich son of an extremely rich family. Certainly anyone born to vast wealth has an option to expand it, but you'll never get there if you're doing something as mundane as actually working. Mitt is so out of touch with real people, he described his income from giving speeches as "not very much really" and couldn't be bothered to keep track of how much money was involved. While for him, it really is "not very much", most of us would consider $374,000 a year a fair chunk of change. Mitt and his millions and millions doesn't create jobs either,unless you count maids, gardeners, and servants. That's what millionaire "job creators" do.