Buckaroo

No I'm not. I just have stronger vision to see this one for what it really is.

The experience is diminished in that overall standards have raised as has the capabilities of gear. In addition the pin at the start of Sloe Children has been removed. So now the challenge has been lowered back down in spite of the higher standards of climbing and protection. It's still easy to get to the first placement. The large block was intentionally pried off so that the fall would now be clean, it was not a clean fall before. I can't think of any other reason someone would do something that stupid.

Why? Because you wouldn't be able to deal with it if it wasn't? only as far as you assume. I'm going to argue that it is very vital. Of all my activities climbing is the greatest challenge and keeps me mentally and physically fit more than any other. Here's an example. When Steve House and Marko Prezelj did the 3rd ascent (in 30 years) of North Twin, there was a climbing groupie that said she wanted to have Marko's baby. What do you think is going on there? What do you propose? That we all lie on the couch with no challenges? Where do you think the species is headed in that case? Or hey let's all become sport climbers, our bodies will be fit but we will have fat ass pasty white McDonalds minds, because we have had no mental threat, no mental challenge. Everything should be absolutely safe. We should never have to observe and evaluate a situation for danger. Dumb everything down, there will be no need for intelligent decision making. Also the comparison of sport to trad from a resources standpoint is not all that different. Sport climbers use draws with aluminum beaners and Gri-Gri's which are heavy aluminum devices. I was talking more the impact on the rock faces. I will grant you trad is probably no better from an overall viewpoint.

These are wild hornets. They build their nests on the ground. You probably stepped on or near the nest. They are way meaner than city hornets. They bite and then avoid being hit and fly around to bite again. I stepped near a nest on a Picket approach. Was sprinting through a bushwack with a 30 pound pack to get away.

Here's what it's about at it's foundation. Climbing is not just a game. Climbing is honing the gene pool. We are not fighting wild animals for survival. Fewer and fewer of us are going to war, and that's now being fought by remote control. We have to keep off the couch or we are dead as a race. Hence a pastime that cultivates strong bodies and minds. Climbing can be boiled down to the physical and the mental. Take away the risk and you take away the mental challenge. The bolt drillers are taking away the mental challenge, thereby dulling the gene pool. Furthermore environmental impact is a grave concern. Americans being the most profligate of consumers on the planet have to each try to do their part individually to at least partially mitigate that.

It's unusual but it does happen. Everything is in a melted state and then a sudden front comes in and the upper mountain freezes, turning it all to ice. The ranger that died was on borrowed crampons that didn't fit very well or weren't adjusted properly, one of them came off. Imagine an ice skating rink tilted at 40 degrees.

Make sure your crampons are totally bomber. Make sure all your points are sharp, axe included. What happens is you summit and the weather will turn and the top 1000 ft will turn to boilerplate ice. People have died including a ranger from crampon failure. Once you start sliding no way to stop.

That's fine, the only real problem I have is the flagging tape. As soon as the trail becomes established maybe someone can clean that up. Correct, the start has nothing to do with the trail. Sorry if my post seemed that way.

Agree it was bolt replacement. I'm saying it was questionable it needed replacing and not just removal. Same reason that the pin was removed on the Sloe Children pitch, it wasn't necessary. I didn't advocate chopping in this case, just not placing an un-needed bolt in the first place.

Have to side with Pope on this one. About one month ago I belayed someone on this pitch, he placed one 3/4 wallnut, then fell on it and it held. This is a one move pitch, it's the approach pitch to Sloe Children. If you look at S.C. it has a very hard unprotected start. There used to be a pin at the start but it's been cleaned and S.C. still gets climbed. This is because of the modern standard, not only people climbing harder but using better modern gear like C-3's and HB offsets. I think this pitch is just a warm up for S.C. If you can't get past the nut protected one move crux so you can then take on the unprotected start of S.C., why are you even climbing it? """Finally got around to doing this--replaced that bolt yesterday. Was hoping to use the same hole, but the old bolt broke (very easily) during removal (it was as manky as I suspected). Placed the new bolt a few inches above the old one. Hand drilled the new hole (in a downpour); the hanger's not as perfectly flush to the wall as I'd hoped, but it's bomber.""" So just like the pin was removed on S.C. you should have just removed this bolt. So now there is two holes where before there was only one, and you couldn't even get it straight on flat granite? What is this your practice area for drilling bolts? At the very least you should have been fully competent before even trying this. If you really knew what you were doing you would have been able to get the old bolt out and put the new one in the same place. People say that Raindawg and Pope have a disease. That's the exact opposite of the truth. I'll tell you what the damn disease is. It's trying to make Index safe. Index is a test piece. Stop trying to drag it down to your lame level of "safety". If you can't or won't take time to learn to place gear then go climb something else. There's plenty of stuff at every level. No need to ruin this one for the people that are capable.

There's some flat spots on the south side of the spires sort of below North Early Winter. There's still lots of snow but it's soft. Watch the freezing level though, I doubt it will drop down this low but the weather is strange this year. The only reliable way to get away from the mosquitoes is to car camp East of the hairpin curve. If you bivy anywhere around the spires make sure you have netting on your bivy/tent. I remember one year when we did Liberty Crack. Partner didn't have netting on his bivy sack. He didn't want to totally seal the bivy sack for fear of suffocation. The skeeters bit him all around his mouth all night. Then they followed him up the first 3 pitches as he was prussiking. He almost went insane.

That's not autoblocking mode. In fact in this pic the belay device is doing exactly ZERO of anything.

Here's the latest topo http://www.jeremyfrimer.com/visitor/Crossover_Pass_Descent.pdf I disagree with the fact this guy put in a trail and I think it will grow over in a year, especially the way things grew this year. And if he put up flagging tape someone should take it down and put up cairns. I have never understood why anyone would do the shortcut start, you miss about 8 pitches that way including the first which is one of the best. I've always done it from the toe. It's like doing the Salathe and not doing Freeblast. Either way I would sneak up on the glacier through the trees that come up between the two glacier snowfields to the climbers left of the toe. Then either climb up the hanging glacier skirting near its top to the bypass, or run across the rock to the toe. It's pretty flat right there, we ran it before sunrise the last time we did it.

Hi snow year srsly doubt pocket glacier will melt out. Snow will def be on bivy ledge. Standard descent is now crossover. New topo available. West side road is locked

Post to the forum on www.Summitpost.com also

WWWWWhhhhhhooooooaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!!!!

If there was a web cam pointed at the upper cliff you could see if there was any timed pattern to the calving. I bet there is to a certain extent, because it's just a glacier that's moving over the cliff. So after there's a huge calving there shouldn't be another one from that section for a certain period. It would be nice to confirm that theory with a web cam, with maybe some kind of motion sensor so you wouldn't have to search through hours of footage. I don't think there's any affect from temp or time of day. I remember watching the glaciers on Slesse. They seemed to calve at random, even throughout the night. Maybe they did calve more during the heat of the day, but that was well below freezing level and the Willis Wall cliffs should be above it. I think if you just go up without trying to get a feel for the place you are def rolling the dice. I recon'd Curtis ridge a couple of times and spent the night there each time at 10K. Out of those couple days I think the upper cliffs had only 1 major calving. That calving was only a medium sized section of the upper cliff so it might be hard to predict if a section next to it would go soon after.

First of all, Rainier, even by the walk ups is not a "hike" it's a climb. Food intake depends on what kind of shape you are in and your age. If you have excess conditioning and are acclimatized you can get by with whatever. If you have marginal conditioning for this climb you should really pay attention to what you eat especially on summit day. Rainier is pretty hard in the normal 2 day push, it's easily compared to a 24 mile marathon. Ask any marathoner and they will tell you they race on an empty stomach, and they use power gels. Power gels are essentially pre-digested. They require very little energy expended on digesting them. This is especially important when you are near maximum aerobic capacity, which is what happens on the upper half of summit day in a two day push. When you eat something that's harder to digest, like peanuts, a lot of blood/energy has to go to your stomach/intestines, blood/energy that would be better utilized aerobically. Your body has reserves to last for 24 hours plus during exercise when it comes to most nutrition. The gels target just those things that can use immediate replacement. If you are in good shape eat whatever you want on the climb to high camp. Also try to eat something with fat in it for dinner. Yvonne Chounaird would down shots of olive oil. While it is true that some people can get away with eating whatever they want, even near the summit, they might find that their performance would be that much better if they tried the power gel system. If expense is an issue, which I understand with RocketParrot being a student, then just save the gels for only those peak events. Even more important than food intake is hydration, especially up high hydration takes precedence over calorie intake. Stay hydrated first, then worry about calories. I would avoid the Gels with caffeine on summit day. Caffeine is a diuretic which is the opposite of what you want at altitude. Again while some may get away with it, for most it will have a detrimental affect. I've actually switched from the gel to the energy blocks, which are exactly the same thing just in a gummy bear consistency. They are much easier to deal with than the sticky messy gels.

Who said beginner? I would classify Sunset Ridge as intermediate and Success Cleaver as beginner/intermediate.

He didn't qualify which routes, he made a general statement that is problematic. The key difference is not crevasse hazard, and there are 2 ways to ascend Rainier without crevasse hazard, Success cleaver as you mentioned and Sunset Ridge. I think people should be ready for crevasse hazard on any of the 10k+ volcanoes. Success cleaver is probably a beginner/intermediate climb, I soloed it during my first year as a climber. Don't let the problems you mention put you off Rainier, there's 30+ routes and only 2 or 3 of them are crowded. Success is a fun one and very seldom traveled.

So thats why those hikers I bought at REI didnt stick on wet rock worth a crap.

Rocketparrotlet and I tagged it today, got baked by the sun, thank God the walk off is in the forest. TR when I find time

that's not Amy... and it does say "art of trolling" at the bottom.

Amy was da bomb, RIP babe. [video:youtube]

I've done this before especially when it's steep. Weight is better carried at the waist, at the shoulders it pulls you over backwards. This is a relatively small amount of stuff, approach shoes, rain shells and water basically. It seems the light weight ethic hasn't entered the lumbar pack arena yet. There isn't anything comparable to the GoLite line of regular packs.