Montana_Climber

I have used several Mtn. Hardwear products. I first became familiar with them while using the Exposure Parka while on Denali. This is a 2-ply Gore-Tex construction which makes it very heavy, especially for a mountaineering parka, but it took good care of me in 100+ mph winds and temps of -40 degrees F. It even held up to a climbing partner landing on me with his crampons after a rappel. I only needed to perform minor surgery on the parka to repair it. It also did very well in the South American Andes. Again, my biggest complaint with it was that it was very heavy and the outer fabric soaked up a lot of rain if not recently treated with one of those Gore-Tex renewer sprays. This made it almost impracticle in the Cascades as you normally approach with a high liklihood of rain. From there, I went onto the Ethereal FTX parka. This is a 3-ply Gore-Tex parka. I found the features to be perfect for my needs and I really like the double "Napolean" pockets. I did find, however, that the hood does not fit as well around a helmet as the Exposure. The weight problems and amount of soakage were greatly alleviated with the new addition. Overall, I would highly recommend Mtn. Hardwear as a great company to buy from. I've had mixed experiences with their customer service department. On one hand, I walked into their place in Berkeley and they gave me a tent fly that someone had returned for a warranty issue. I was only interested in the material so I didn't care about the condition. On the otherhand, I sent in a fleece jacket to have the elastic cuff resewn and it took 3 months to get it back. I'm just glad I had a back-up. I have used their tents as well and have found them to be on par with the best of the other companies, in relationship to double-walled tents. I am still partial to a Bibler single wall for mountaineering in respect to weight, durability, and performance.

From my experience, the Titanl II's are the best bindings to give you a downhill feel. The boots come from just whatever is comfortable. I like the Dynafit boots since they are almost as stiff as my downhill boots when "locked" into the ski position. Then I can unlock them and make them more flexible for walking. The key to lightening up the boots are to get thermoflex liners in them. They drop 3-4 pounds off of standard boot liners. For the skis, I'm using Dynafit All Terrain skis (190 cm). They are quite a bit softer than my downhill setup (207 Kastle RXI) which I use to race in as well as anything else on the mountain but I can still manage them fine. I've skiied up to 50 degrees on them and I can still carve turns in deep powder or on wind packed crust. Something I can't do well on my downhill boards since they're not quite as versatile. The bottom line here, like has been said before, is get a good pair of bindings, a pair of boots that fit, and skis that work for your style and most likely conditions you're going to run into. I've gone almost exclusively to using my AT setup when I'm out to have fun. Bridger Bowl, Jackson Hole, and Big Sky have enough in-bounds "out of bounds" skiing to make it much more enjoyable to have flexible boots and a lighter setup. When I'm racing or patrolling, I use my downhill setup as I need the extra control and sturdiness.

Damn, so that's what it looks like. I tried to do a winter ascent in 1996, right around the beginning of January. That was a wet year. As I recall, it rained nearly every day from November to February. I made it to the lake, went up the talus, then began up the ridge. We made it another 3-4 hours up the ridge before stopping. We had no idea where we were on the mountain or how much further we had to go. We spent the night there, still below treeline, and turned around the next morning. It was my initiation into Cascade climbing in the winter. I was in the process of moving to Seattle and wanted to hit a few peaks before starting to work.

Just buy Camp. Cheaper anyways.... Oops, forgot about them.

The only news I see on the BD website is that BD was named a sales partner of the year with REI. Here's a link to the latest BD press releases: http://www.blackdiamondequipment.com/bd/press.html#021003 It also mentions the other companies "associated" with BD: Ascension, Beal Ropes, Bibler Tents, Franklin Climbing Equipment and SCARPA Footwear. With a major corner on American pitons, I seriously doubt they would give that up. Grivel is probably the second most prolific distributor of pitons with smaller companies like Leeper behind them.

"It was unclear how the foursome ended up together, she said." Seems pretty obvious to me...

Wow! JB you have some excellent photos. The areas around Capital Reef and Escalante are the better areas for slots. The eastern side with Moab, Arches, etc, are better for climbing and biking.