Off_White

Your friend is just sending you right wing christian bulk spam, he didn't write it. I suggest you send him a Care Bear.

Sorry Jibby, but actual experience with the route in question and the ability climb it hinders pontification.

Beck! Nice to see you remember your password, this is your ninth post in the last five years. You going to Ropeup this year?

Unless you're feeble like me. Negative self talk will hold you back from reaching your full potential. Read Performance Rock Climbing or spend time with John Frieh. I've eaten John Frieh's dust and never left the parking lot. My point is that off the couch does not lend itself to 5000' round trip days. I know how to be less feeble, I just have to want it more.

I thought you were a tool user! Cordless sawzall is the obvious solution.

Unless you're feeble like me.

Hey Joe, I like you just fine, so no offense, but since your stated goal with regards to climbing is to chase off 85% of the people currently engaged in "your" sport, your advice tends towards selfish self-serving bullshit. Your gear skills are admirable, as is your personal approach and acceptance of risk. It seems to work well for you. Note that the key word is YOU.

Nice, I've been anticipating this TR since you'd intimated where you had been the other week.

Glad to hear you're over that. I doubt you got flack from anyone who's opinion matters to you. I'm glad to hear Jimmy's okay, he's my buddy.

I'd suggest E Ridge, N Ridge, or NW Face on Forbidden. S Ridge on Torment, either on it's own or as access to the excellent Torment Forbidden Traverse (note that the north side snow traverses may offer significant late season challenges). Sharkfin always seemed like a long ways for not much, but that's just me. A high alpine traverse over to the Eldorado area after you're done in Boston Basin could offer some scenic and challenging travel with something like Early Morning Spire or Dorado Needle waiting for you.

It's been a long time, but I sort of share the assessment of that route: a few good pitches and a long not so great upper part. I've done four routes on Dragontail and that one was my least favorite, for all that the couple pitches on the pillar were wonderful. I recall it as a walk off the backside too, though my last trip up there left us on top of the NE Towers which do require a couple single rope raps to hit the walking terrain.

My wife was psyched to get us tickets to the Curling event, until she found out how much they were. [video:youtube]

Yeah, I think maybe Pete wins.

Most of the people that I know who died in the mountains, did it while climbing. Most of the people that I know who died climbing, did it in the mountains. I've had one friend die in a car and six of them climbing. None have died skiing. Maybe the moral of the story is don't be friends with skiers.

According to the Investors Business Daily, in an editorial about how horrible overhauling healthcare would be, asserted "People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn't have a chance in the U.K., where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless." Never mind that Stephen Hawking is in fact a life long UK citizen currently residing in Cambridge.

We'd found new slings tied around the waist of the peanut shaped boulder and evidence the last party had rapped straight down over the edge. It looked like a stupid idea, I easily imagined pulling the whole boulder over the edge on top of me, what with the sloping rock and ball bearing grit base. As we had reset each and every rap anchor (all the same color slings with initials) on the way down from bad crap to solid locations, we untied their sling and relocated it to the contact point, rapping skier's left off the step using a lower angled area where you could keep some weight on your feet. If it's really the same spot, I'm sort of shocked that boulder is still there twenty some years on.

We got a lot of rain overnight, and it persisted into the morning. The wall doesn't look bad, but holds feel slightly damp and I thing the sandstone will be a little tender and prone to breakage. I'd really like to climb, but prudence dictates that its not in the cards for tonight. Sorry everyone.

That's quite the tale Mark, I'm glad you're telling it yourself. When you get around to posting pictures I'd be very interested in seeing what you have of the descent and where the accident happened. I'm trying to square it with my memories of a late September rappel descent of the Sherpa which included rapping over what I think is the same rock step with a sling tied around one of the two contact points of a big boulder on the lip of the rock step. I recalled that as the last rappel we did, with nothing but walking after. It was quite awhile ago. Hope you have a smooth recovery, that's a pretty chilling account.

Yes, you're probably right about that route. Inappropriate bolting next to cracks and ridiculously close bolt spacing does happen, and I'm not a supporter of that sort of thing. I just wanted to make the point that pictures don't tell the whole story. Even with the bolt there, I'd thump on that flake before I yarded on it. Thanks Bill for providing a concrete example, that's just the sort of thing I had in mind.

Yes, the idea that Luck trumps Skill and Experience is unsettling. All those stories we tell ourselves about control and judgment feel a little hollow at this moment.

Thanks for the heads up Blake.

My point was that the rush to judgment from your desk chair based solely on one photo and no experience with the route is a bunch of reactionary hot air, and I'd love to hear from someone with actual knowledge. Its not a defense, its a series of questions to point out that all the information needed to form a reasoned opinion is not contained in a single image. What does it sound like when you thump on that flake? Sure, if it's that hollow it would be pretty darn poor judgment to yard on it like that fellow, but we can't really tell from our respective keyboards, can we? There's bolt protection on Wheat Thin, it's a flake all the way, why did that punk ass creep Bridwell do that? Well, chances are you have a lot more information about Wheat Thin than you do about that thing in the picture, so we both have a more informed answer to that question. In the same vein, you just know from one photo that the person in the picture is some little creep. What, because he's using some bolts that someone else put in? Can you tell someone is a creep based on your fashion bias? When you sit fuming at the keyboard, do you imagine yourself as Clint Eastwood in Grand Torino? I'm sure it's just me, but that's the voice I hear in my head when I read your post. You're right though about the bolt at his navel as he's gearing up to clip a next piece. It appears pretty silly, but I have very limited information about the route in question. The hat however is Poofterelle, a yarn hand spun from academic navel lint by starving interns in a grade-slavery scandal you'll read all about in the next National Geographic. Oh yeah, insert the "whoa there Kreskin" reply about what the hell you know about how I think, how dare you put your response in my mouth. The gap between what you think you know and what you actually know is far wider than you think.

You know in those sort of instructions where they tell you to test in a small inconspicuous area? That's a good idea. Helluva first post