glassgowkiss

i worked 2 van marathons. typically the problem with this one is the spring weather. the first one was about 45F and rain with about 20mph winds. last year was better. it's a hilly run, so practice long up-hills. i work a lot with marathon runners. my advice is- start with half, knock a couple of them and then try a full one. don't think about time (or how fast is your mile), but just don't get injured and finish a few races. but long distance running is a very harsh sport, takes a lot of your time. add some muscle balancing, use good footbeds with your shoes. i ma moving back to seattle at the end of feb, so i can help you out. have fun- r

ok alex, his and hers don't think are anymore there at this point, grotto is kind of wet and most of the pillars in johnston fell off http://www.live-the-vision.com/wwwboard/messages/9142.html http://www.live-the-vision.com/wwwboard/messages/9160.html and from gravsports.com: After a month of really crazy weather things are starting to settle out. The avi hazard is generally lower, and most of the roads are back open (the Parkway is still closed from Saskatchewan River Crossing to Jasper but is supposed to fully open today, crazy quantities of ice on the road!). The extreme rain/freeze/tropics/-40 combinations have both laid in some interesting ice and destroyed the same. Cascade has fallen down and is currently not a climb (note the really huge debris piles in the middle and at the bottom), but Sea of Vapors still looks good, as do the other routes like Professor's (again, check out the huge debris piles for an illustration of why this route is bad in high avi hazard conditions). Hafner is still in surprisingly good shape, and the Hoar House cave has a full compliment of hoar. Neolithic is substantially different than it used to be, as is Cave Man, but both are still climbable at M10- and powerful M11 respectively. Overall the ice weathered the crazy weather pretty well, the concern now is sudden heating and avi hazard, about normal for the Rockies this time of year. shades of beauty is more like 4.5 hour drive from calgary and has a huge slope above it and maseys has only about one mile of slope to the top of mt stephen- i would consider it one of the more dangerous places in high avi conditions.

technically it is not the highest point in europe. this topic was discussed in exess on www.wspinanie.pl. according to Jerzy Wala (who is somewhat an authority on euorpe and asian mtn ranges)Elbrus is outside of geographical borders of europe, so it can't be the highest point.

her thighs are fat!

ok as usual the topic drifted waaaay away from what i was saying. it wasn't about gender differances or other shit like that. my point was that this woman in particuar writes a book about the events that took place many years ago. first of all there is nothing more you can write on this topic, since people involved are dead. so there is no chance to obtain information first hand and charachters involved can answer to any of it. it's an analysis of an analysis. and to play is safe she wraps it into a nice "feminist package"- so nobody can critique her- that's all i'm saying and that's what i call bullshit. a little fucking honesty can go a long way. there were at least a dozen books written on this subject. on the other hand why not write about some female climber, who is still alive and does high altitude climbing? hey, maybe because she could not write a bunch of hyped up bullshit and make money off it. or maybe because it's much easier to be called on your bullshit by people who are alive? like i said - a little honesty please....

talked to some reliable people who were there during festiglass. there is plenty of ice for all the climbers.

that's my point about avi danger and easier routes. for the latest conditions check www.gravsports.com . also www.live-the-vision.com the exeption would be fron range and ghost valley (as low avi hazard), but i don't know what driving into ghost is. like i said fly red-eye, rent a car, climb for 3 or 4 days and fly back

i am sure the biggest sales will be golf clubs.

no longer free parking. now it's 4 or 6 bucks a day.

for what you want- the answer is yes. you want to climb moderate climbs. at this point there aren't that many routes in the rockies that would fit your profile, are avalanche safe and would not be crowded. i was very much impressed with quality of climbing in quebec. other suggestion would be to fly to thunder bay, but in feb you might be dealing with very low temps. the thing about Ponte Rogue is if you don't feel like leading it is fairly easy to hang a tr, as it is a gorge.

where do you live? if in seattle, drive up to vancouver, fly to montreal red eye o west jet. right now they have 120Can sale (one way) plus taxes, so you'll pay about 390 Can RT with one plave change in toronto.

my suggestion would be to go to quebec. ponte rogue, san alban. you can fly to montreal, rent a car, drive 2 hours north east and climb your little butt off. ponte rogue has a motel you can stay for 58 CAN/ night (don't remember the name). it has everything from WI3 to WI7. you can climb in the shade or the sun. also around quebec city there are some climbs, some multi pitch, you can find info in the new edition of the guide. forget colorado, forget slc.

and this was my point all together. so first of all i wanted to say that i climb with female partners a lot. and this is exactly how a lot of my climbing friends and i think. if i want to climb a hard route i want a partner that can manage- male or female. my problem with this situation is: she decides to write a book about events that took place many years ago and the players are dead. so people described in her book can't respond to so called "facts" in her writtings. there was always unspoken law among alpinists not to write about people who are no longer with us. some things are better left alone. as i stated before: to me stuff like this is just analysis of an analysis. there are plenty of subjects and people to write about, people who can respond. and to wrap it into a so called "feminist packge" leaves very bad aftertaste. tregedy sells, controversy sells. i can say this for fact- she always called it F(irstF(ree)A(ascent) of elcap in a day, not the FFFA (first free female ascent) let me go back to this- this is what i was writing about- crash and burn. tragedy sells, controversy sells. and to continue topic of boundries- krakauer was the first to brake it down. what was said in the article in outside should have been enough. imo some of the shit he put in the book was nothing more then slander.

any route topos or at least ratings?

too bad -i'll be in the rockies.

oh yeah, like it's worth to drive for 4 hours for yet another bout on some shitty wet ice, let soaking wet, have water run down to your arm pits and later down under. might as well put a bag of ice cubes in a washer, turn it on, dip yourself in it, smash your cold wet fingers with a lid a couple of times and call it good. pretty much the same. desperate, but not that despaerate

now it says 2C, it was 7 earlier. my point is that when it's sunny you can climb even when it's only 5C. and there is pretty much no decent ice left, avi forecast sucks, this sucks donkey dick.

plastic fantastic!

couldn't say it better myself

that ties to the whole political and constitutional system. 200 years ago this country was created as a rebelion against the establishment of british empire. well, while the rest of the world went on and now we have a parliament with prime minister in GB, this country operates under the same set of laws from 200 years ago. and the same mentality which prevents political change causes this "christian" attitude/behavior. as these religions (starting with luther) were created against the dominance of catholic church. even this last institution reformed itself many times since a lot of fundamental christians want to turn the world to 17th century (as well as muslim fundamentalism is trying to turn it into 11th century). it's also about public preception: there is almost identical number of abuse cases in protestant churches, yet the media is not blowing the horn on this one. let's take the divorce rate: #1 nevada with Missouri not far behing. as the matter of fact 9 out of 10 states are from south-east (ie bible belt)- so what's up with that? this administration has nothing to do with christianity or moral values. while clinton lied about receiving a blow job from the intern (guilty of boning an ugly chick) this administration waged a war lying to the public about wmd. ok as the result over 1300 us soldiers dead, similar figures among soldiers of fortune(private contractors), how many iraqis- we will never find out. bin laden is out and about (remember he not husain is responsible for sep 11th) NATO contributed 16 000 troops to afganistan, while us keeps about 11 000! this administration uses "moral values" only as it is convinient for them, words like honesty and integrity do not exist in their vocabulary. i am talking not only about GWB but the whole administration. and their hand-in-hand policies with russia- that's criminal.

forrest M wrote:"thank you, that is exactly my point. the story of them being the first women in this instance is interesting because in addition to the mountaineering story, there is also the issue of overcoming prejudice and stereotypes. though i have not read the book, i can certainly imagine that this COULD make an interesting story. in the hands of a hack, it could be patronizing and it might make me want to puke, but it could also be inspiring. i certainly don't know one way or the other. what pisses me off is the blanket dismissal of this author as "feminist bullshit", as if feminism is some kind of bad word. to me, people overcoming the limitations that other people want to put on them is inspiring. at heart, that's what feminism is about. bob, i'm not sure what the point of listing WR's impressive resume is. noone is disputing the fact that she was a badass climber. but why do you think women started putting together "women's" expeditions in the 1970s. Could it be because many talented women climbers couldn't get their foot in the door with the climbing establishment that controlled funding for the more conventional expeditions? it seems to me that the fact that WR climbed everest with an austrian team before being invited to join later polish expeditions kind of proves my point, but i don't know the details, so maybe not. women's expeditions have gone out of fashion and maybe they're no longer necessary. maybe that's a sign of progress, but it doesn't mean that they were ridiculous in their time." forrest, i just posted earlier some of the names of polish female 8000m summiters. http://www.gia.alpinizm.pl/pismo/gia/pol8000.htm so in the top 25 climbers there are 4 women. you must agree, that's pretty much the ratio you will see in the mountains (actually normally is more like 40:1). so this is my point. if among these 25 climbers there wouldn't be any women or one- yeah you can call discrimination. but if there is a 20% ratio of female climbers and the same ration goes to 8000m peaks, then what's your point about boys club? it would be good to hear opinion of real female alpinist. and i am sorry, but neither numbers nor my personal experience agree with your statement.

let's close this thred and go to spray, it's where it's at.

van leaves bellingham for skaha, space aviable this weekend

depends if sun is out or not. but it is 8C in Penticton now.

JayB - nice explanation. (and my point). someone said i am dissing the book without reading it. yes- and this is why: 10 years or more passed since these events. there were several books already on the market and climbers involved are dead, so what new can you write after all thse years? looks like analysis of the analysis. and wrap it into feminism- oh yeah, i'll make some ca$h and have speaking tour. bogus.