bDubyaH
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Posts posted by bDubyaH
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I am well entrenched in the ever popular "Long-term growth dynamics of young Pacific halibut: evidence of temperature-induced variation"
. But I did manage to sqeeze in " Summit Fever" by Andrew Greig a month or so ago. -
I agree, always try for the very tall dead trees, only problem is pulling your tools back out, they stick too well! Plus you get the added bonus of wondering when said tree is due to fall...much more realistic that way.
One thing not mentioned in that list is that you have to go outside on a zero degree day and kiss a piece of metal to remind you what that biner is going to do to your lips when you forget that this isn't sunny weather rockclimbing
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I usually fly TAT because they have a couple of bunkhouses, but others do to and all of the flight services are equally as good in my mind. Unless you get Paul (owner of TAT) and ask him if he has any "extra" fuel in the tank on your way out then you can sometimes get a really fun (rollercoaster) ride
which always puts a huge grin on my face! -
I've done some aerial sea lion surveys around the juneau area(and tend to spend a lot of time looking for climbing possibilities
) and those towers don't look familiar to me, I bet they are down closer to Petersburg or Wrangell. The Stikine/Devil's Thumb area? -
sorry, but biking in to work today i glanced at the towers and they don't look at all like the photo in question. Those are definitely not the mendenhall towers. I just posted a photo of the towers in the gallery...
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i second playing with hooks. i did my first "real" aid climbing last year in little switzerland, and after dangling in the air past a bulge via a series of hook moves even the manky rusty old fixed tricam rap stations were looking bomber.
in my mind one of the hardest things about aid climbing is keeping everything organized, so keep plugging away until you find a method that works for you and stick with it. i set routes in a gym (don't tell anyone
) so i used that time to get my rope work really honed in and get comfortable transferring my weight from one set of etriers to another. all things that can be practiced on top rope safely!Cheers and have fun
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sal,
dry tooling, while fun, is generally frowned upon at a rock climbing area. but if there is a crappy route that rarely sees traffic then it would be a good place to train. or just come up to alaska, pretty much all of our rock is crap and you can dry tool any of it you want.
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I am thinking about doing a climb this spring, was wondering if anyone has plans to come up here for an expedition. I would really like to get into the Fairweathers or Wrangell/St. Elias as they are close to home and I haven't climbed there yet. Anyone interested?
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I thought all alpine climbs were to be rated Grade V 5.9 A2 AI4???
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Come to think of it...I really hate it when a women is hanging out with a hard man at the crag
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Wow, never realised I could get climbing beta AND relationship therapy/advice at the same website! Ummm this was more of a humorus debate with my girlfriend and I told her I would write it up on this website and ask what others have seen in regards to hard women 99% of the time hanging out with hard men. Oh yeah, men are not necessarily better than women in the mountains because they can pee easily. One of my climbing partners has a freshette, she has no trouble filling up the pee bottle during a storm...and she is always threatening to assault me while I sleep
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So having a conversation with the girlfriend, I mention that I have never seen a female climber who climbs 5.12 or harder in a relationship with a guy who doesn't climb at least as hard. This it turns out was not a good thing to say and opened up a big can of worms, as I was apparently making a comment on all women athletes, and the real reason I was making such a comment was due to my "delicate male ego". I, of course, defended myself (and all males) by stating that this had absolutely nothing to do with my delicate male ego. I was just pointing out a fact, that I personally have observed over the last 10 years. A bit of background, my girlfriend is a total rookie climber who has no experience outside of the local gym, while I have observed this hard women hanging out with hard man climbing relationship thing at the new, the red, the gunks, smith, etc. I have a hunch that the real problem here is that her delicate female ego doesn't like that I can kick her ass in climbing, even though she has me when it comes to cycling...she just doesn't like to lose. I would love to hear words of support in my quest to win this argument with said girlfriend and if you have a dissenting opinion I respectfully ask that you keep it to yourself, as it won't help my cause.
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i learned from videos. got pretty into it for a while...but i always get too distracted with climbing.
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when i was climbing at the gunks 3 days a week it took a serious toll on my left elbow. got to the point i had to drop down to 2 days a week then 1 day a week. so i took a few of the winter months off and worked out like mad. all i lifted was the counter (to climbing) muscle groups, chest, and triceps mostly...worked out really hard on the triceps. when i went back to climbing 3 days a week i had upped my bouldering by two grades and routes were going down easy...sometimes a break is a good thing. now i do yoga which helps me keep from getting to the point where i can't climb anymore.
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adventuregal,
Since your leading is limited to the gym that is probably a good thing for now. Learning how to clip bolts in a "safe" enviro is also a good thing. Just realize that gym climbing does not necessarily transfer to outdoor climbing...not even sport climbing. There is quite a bit more that happens outside ie. changing over at the anchors, crap weather, crappier anchors, dropped gear, etc. So a month of climbing is plenty to be clipping bolts in the gym, but when you head outside lower the grades down a bit and take plenty of time...hopefully with someone who knows how to do things safely. Cheers!
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After spending a few weeks in my Koflachs Arctics I couldn't feel a few of my toes at all for several months. I would aggrivate the situation every time I went out for some weekend ice. I found that my toes were getting bent backwards a bit with every step, since the soles of the boots are so rigid. Solved the problem by removing the stock insoles and putting in some superfeet. Helps hold my feet in a better position and they are no longer numb....at least because of those boots.
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I just uploaded some photos two of which i mistakenly put in the general climbing catagory, when i meant to put them in the alaska gallery. i tried to change them, but was told that i wasn't allowed to
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Thanks Dru,
I couldn't remember what the rock out there was like. Seems there are a few bands of good rock that run through the icefield and the rest is of rather poor quality....kinda like most of alaska. There is still plenty of virgin rock left on the towers and they are closer to town, so I will just stick with them for now!
Cheers!
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Borders Canada on the Juneau Icefield next to Devil's Paw. I know Beckey headed out that way years ago. I'm trying to find some info on it: established routes, rock quality, any info would be great.
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Last friday I used a pair of Grivel G-12 new-matic crampons on an 800m snow/ice chute. They are great on hard snow, but tended to rattle a bit when kicking into hard vertical ice, but I was also wearing lightweight leather boots (trango plus). For easy mixed they are good as well, the horizontal front points can make it less wobbly to stand on small holds than vertical points. If you are mostly climbing routes that don't have tons of vertical ice then they are great. But for really technical ice (anything above grade III for me) or hard mixed I tend towards full step in crampons. Oh yeah, new-matics are also really great on glacier ice. Really I think it is mostly mind over matter. If you don't mind, it don't matter which crampons you got on, just climb it.
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The Juneau to Skagway road was voted down the last time it was on the ballot, but we have a new governer who is determined to pave, drill, mine, and log everything in this state. He seems to think that if we build a road people will want to drive 20 hours from Anchorage to have a chat with their representatives. But nobody mentions who will pay to maintain the road since it goes through 20 or 30 major avalanche paths. As much as I would like to get out of Juneau from time to time...such as now when we have no snow or ice, I think that a road to Skagway is a really silly idea.
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pete,
i second the walkman, actually a mini-disc player is even better. alcohol is always good and you will make friends real quick with it.
we usually go for a few bottles of whiskey, or single malt, plus some buried guiness at base camp makes for a great treat to return to. whatever you do, don't put the same power bar etc. in your lunch every day. get as much variety as possible. that being said i love Skor bars 220 calories, 120 from fat and they taste best when frozen! for food, dehydrate your own. find some recipes you like and dehydrate them. they taste so much better.
cheers and have a great trip.
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My last trip to Little Switzerland included a fantastic breakfast of GU and whiskey (Knob Creek). It must have worked, because we had a blast. Plus the all female group of NOLS women took pity on us and fed us some chocolate chip pancakes. mmmmm.
If you want good food then get a dehydrator and make your own. Don't buy any of that pre packaged stuff or you'll just end up putting your fartfilter (sleeping bag) to maximum use. Oh yeah don't forget you want watery food and chuncky water at every meal.
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Whoa, glad I moved out of Columbus. Alaska is much better...oh wait we have Murkowski as governer, who just appointed his daughter to take his US Senate seat (which is the definition of nepotism), and he wants to make Alaska better by drilling, mining, clearcutting, and building roads. On second thought Springer would be a great person to have in the Senate. At least you could punch him in the face if he screws up and he would be more or less used to that sort of thing. Maybe we can get him to move up north.
climbing fees up at mt. rainer
in Climber's Board
Posted
Hey at least it isn't up to $150 like Denali. You also get to pay that money to climb Mt. Foraker where there are no toilets
. I still am undecided on user fees 
, I understand the merits, but also see the pitfalls. I figure if the money goes to keeping heavily used routes in good shape, then it is worth it and you gotta pay em whether you are in Patagonia or the Himalayas so it may be best just to get used to them in the US too 
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