JoshK

Translated as: "I'm really too stupid to form my own opinion, so I'm just going to repeat what I read on NAMBLA What the fuck is NAMBLA? Yeah, it's my opinion that he is an asshole and a terrible descretary of defense. I formed that just fine, thanks. So you support Rumsfeld? Ha...fucking moron.

Hey Lowell, interestingly enough I think our Donelley may be the pesron that has skied the most of the ice cliff glacier at this point.

And here are the skiing pictures:

Here are some pictures. Full size ones are in the gallery.

Like a good way to die, at the moment! Just to make double sure, you are talking about to the right of the girth pillar, on the slabby face that leads up to the north ridge, correct? It sill has quite a few patches of snow ready to slide off in the next warm weather...

CRAP CRAP...I meant to place this in the Alpine Lakes forum. Could a moderator pretty please move this for me??

Climb: Mt. Stuart-Ice Cliff Glacier, Sherpa Glacier Ski Date of Climb: 5/10/2004 Trip Report: Yesterday eric (paco), sky, jason and josh hummel and myself climbed the ice cliff glacier. Climbing in a group this large was a new experience for me as far as I can remember. It was a whole lot of fun! Credit goes to Eric for nailing the approach spot on. Not a single moment was wasted getting up to the basin beneath Stuart. The climb itself was great, with very good snow conditions for climbing. The ice cliff itself was a nice quick challenge with everybody sort of picking their own path through it. The bust through the cornice at the very top provided the only other technical challenge. Sky and Eric had already topped out when the rest of us got to the cornice and were kind enough to toss a rope down for us. Jason, Sky, Eric and myself went to the true summit and Josh (very intelligently) took what looked like a very comfortable nap in the sun at the notch where the ice cliff tops out. Eric downclimbed the sherpa glacier while the rest of us skied it. The middle section in the coulior sucked as it was quite icy, but a few sections of good turns were still had. Starting about 200 feet above the shrund the snow got awesome and perfect corn was ridden for 2500 feet or so back to the basin. It was well worth the weight of carrying skis up the ice cliff! Conclusions: *Having two guys with the same name (Josh, in this case) on a climb makes for the phrase "no, not you" being said a *LOT* *Climbing the blue glacier ice solo on the ice cliff with a lightweight ice axe, a whippet and aluminum crampons is NOT something I would recommended. This definitely provided the sketch crux of the trip for me. We also had a 6th guess. Donelley (sp?), who lives up at Hyak, joined us. He ended up turning around and skiing down just beneath the ice cliff, which I thought was a pretty damn good effort for a guy who had never climbed anything besides volcanos (I think that's what he said) and was climbing in true alpine ski boots! Gear Notes: 4 out 5 off us hauled skis up As for tools, we had a wide assortment of systems, ranging from the intelligently chosen 2 technical tools to the moronically chosen whipet, lightweight axe and alum. crampons combo. Approach Notes: Pretty easy, esp. if you take an Eric with you. Those of us hauling ski boots walked in sneakers until you leave the trail for the cross country route.

HAHHA. I'm not saying I am putting my weighty and influencial endorsement behind anybody...just expressing my opinion about the pile of shit that is our defense secretary.

...is a cumgurgling cocksmoker. Thank you, we now return you to your normally scheduled programming.

I still think the frame offers more than just load carrying capibilities. It allows you to just stuff crap in and out of the pack a lot without distoring the shape. My small pack is light, with a frame and nobody would ever accuse me of carrying too much. Also, the thing about skis is true...a suspension makes things way nicer for that.

Or bring a girl as a climbing partner, then you won't even really care about summiting

FWIW, I've heard from a couple of folks that going up Access Creek is not nearly as bad as legend holds.

I'm not sure if somebody posted this yet or not... http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/news/story?id=1797903&partnersite=espn Very sad to hear.

Yeah, it's funny that people would let 6 miles stop them. It's 2 hours, 3 if you are slow. That isn't enough to make a climb that much harder.

I have both a pair of MLT4s and a pair of TLT700s (haven't used them yet) which just replaced my TLT ATs. The MLT4s really do climb awesome. They are practically the same thing as plastics. With an intuition liner my pair of MLT4s comes to 4lbs 10oz, which is like a pound lighter than scarpa invernos, etc. They ski alright, but certainly not nearly as well as a real AT ski boot. I wouldn't ski anything really hard (or exposed) in them, but they can't be beat for long traverses.

Wow, fairweather and I agree. Of course he couldn't help but throw in the comment about those damn liberal pinko environmentalist commies! If the road can be routed so that it does very little to impact watersheds, etc. Fixing one 5 mile stretch of road is hardly going to be destroying the wilderness. As it is we easily have the top 2 national parks in the country and the rest of the country doesn't even really know about them since they contain so little in the way of roads. It could be a lot worse...it could be yellowstone.

Thanks for everybody's comments. I ended up getting a Mega-light and I look forward to trying it out!

The shadow looks like a great pack, but I've never used one. After much experimentation I have finally decided I am willing to spend an extra pound to have a frame and suspension. It makes packing the pack easier (which is nice for frequently pulling things out and putting things in the pack, and it just carries better all and all.

How many others are going with you? I haven't read what Beckey says about it, and I am not familiar with Challenger arm in particular, but if you are a group of 3 or more, then I would simply concentrate on basic glacier travel skills. Here are the points you probably want to touch on: *Basic roped team walking on glacier *Crevasse navigation (esentially being able to pick a route through the slots and follow it to avoid double backing, etc. *Being able to arrest a crevasse fall and set an anchor while down *Being able to extract the unlucky bastard who is in the crevasse If you are at least 3 strong and all posess these basic skills then I would feel that is a good margin of safety. I would leave 2-man glacier travel alone until you have more experience. Try to get your partners to go climb Baker via the coleman-deming with you. It may not be the most glorious route technically, but the coleman is definitely very broken later in the year and will make use of these skills.

Umm, I think it was white, with maybe some blue lines or leterring? I know planes, but not helis, so I couldn't tell you what model it was. I wonder why, then, on reality shows, cops, and other such crap they blur out standers-by? In any event, next time I'd really rather have whoever is up there think twice about hovering right over somebody. It's kind of obnoxious and not exactly what I think of as enjoyable in my wilderness experience. Then again, it obviously made for a good story.

Farrakhan is an evil son of a bitch. He's a complete racist and anti-semite. He's hardly an example of postive Islamic leadership or anything like that.

Like I said then, I just figured my mom or my girlfriend got their days confused and called in a rescue or something.

Ha...I know. The little crying dude was my sarcasm back. Hmm...seems these little faces aren't as good at implying subtleties as we thought. Anyway, I'm off to the mosque...

Yeah, ya never know. I would imagine if you threw somebody's picture on an advertisment for supergaper sports drink you would get in trouble for sure. In case anybody was confused I was making a crack at our over-lawsuit-happy society. I would never sue for something that stupid.