Montana_Climber

Need details. Costs, approximate dates, number of team members, route ideas, etc.

The Arc'Teryx Sirrus is the other jacket I'm looking at in this category. I can't go wrong with either. I used to work and ski with the marketing director at Cloudveil and used to work and paddle with several of the reps for Arc'Teryx. Cost isn't the issue so much as function and fit. Thanks for the input.

After BD, for their nice range in size, my favorite cams are the Wired Bliss cams. I can't remember who bought them out, maybe ABC, but I've been using them for years and love them. They used to be made in the guys garage. No official ratings on them as the guy was too cheap but they look solid and haven't failed me yet.

It's for direct application to a wound. It is impregnated with a material that accelerates the clotting cascade and other coagulation factors. Potatoes and their products have been shown to have similar characteristics.

"No shit! There I was .... "

The top bag manufacturer is Feathered Friends. Marmot and Western Mountaineering, last I checked, came in at second. Then there's the companies below them like The North Face, Moonstone, Mountain Hardwear, Sierra Designs, etc. I have a Marmot Col (-25F) and have had excellent results with it. I bought it directly from Marmot by calling a customer rep and asking if they had any seconds. It saved me about $200. It's worked for me in temps from 20 above to 60 below (although I did require wearing full clothes as well at this temp). Whatever you get, you're going to want to get Gore Dry-Loft or something similar, especially in a wet environment like the Cascades. But even with it, you're bag will be useless within a week if it's down and it's wet. Have you considered something synthetic? It's much more practical in wet climates. The disadvantages are that they aren't as compressible, light, durable, or have as much of a temperature range as down. The advantages are that they are MUCH less expensive, keep you cold when the material is damp, and (initially) less prone to cold spots from the material shifting. I use my down bag for my longer expedition to high altitudes. For everything else, I use my 35+ F North Face Climber bag. It is made of polarguard 3D, has Gore Dry-Loft on it, and only weighs 1 1/2 lbs. For me, this bag covers everything but the high altitude. I sleep very warm and have gotten away with everything from the middle of the summer in the South (+80F) to the middle of the winter in Montana (-40F). In colder climates, I throw on my fleece pants and down parka to stay perfectly warm.

Does anyone have any experience with this piece? I'm looking to replace my Feathered Friends Jackorak. The Jackorak is just too light weight and doesn't have taped seams. Anything more than a slight drizzle gets me soaking wet in about 10 minutes. The other shell I'm considering is one of the GoLite shells. I think I prefer the pit zips on the Cloudveil with only the marginal (1-2 oz) weight difference.

There's been a lot of controversy over this issue. The idea of hairline fractures is bogus with the current materials for carabiners. It was much more of a problem with the old steel biners. Those are susceptible to hairline fractures and showed up under x-ray. Aluminum either dings, remains intact, or shears. If you don't see any visible deformities upon close inspection then I wouldn't worry about it. The only carabiner I've actually had to retire was a BD Hotwire. I took a 40' clean aid fall on it which happened to also get cross-loaded. The sight of the gate bent open 20' below the piece was more horrifying than the fall. I keep it as a reminder so now everytime I unclip my water bottle from it I remember my luck.

If Dru was really American, then instead of a .45, it would have said, "Pull out the .454 Casull". Americans always go big. Then if you're not up for the guns, climb the 5.10 next to them and laugh that they chose such an "easy" line.

The other nice thing about them is that you can use low-cut Gore-Tex shoes with gaiters and the crampons and travel through snow just the same as heavier, bulkier gear. This is great for summer climbs like in the Tetons where crossing snow fields is a constant pain after having a 5 mile approach on a dirt trail and not wanting to wear full winter boots.

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.