Hal_Burton

I notice I was still on belay at that point. Cool. Thanks pal.

Too bad he included a ticket for littering when he shipped it back to her!

Found an offset at the base of Cruisin' on 11/7. I think it was dropped by a couple who topped out on SE corner. Give me the # and the tape color. Ironically, it was the same nut off my rack I dropped behind the pillar at the Free for All belay and barely managed to retrieve earlier the same day.

Post deleted by jon

Could see the newsies circling. Had no idea what was going on. Unfortunate.

Climb: Hood-Cooper Spur Ice Date of Climb: 11/4/2004 Trip Report: billy, Macchiato and myself went up on Hood yesterday to enjoy some early season ice. Clear and cold weather made it feel very un-Oregon like and made for some nice climbing. Not having studs or chains we left the Macchiato-mobile at the next to last hairpin before the fork. Could be sent to Cloud Cap, especially with chains, as someone else had pushed to the fork earlier. Return on skis was quick down the firm snow on the road. Left skis when we reached the spur. I'd take them up the glacire next time. billy booting up the Elliot. Just over his left shoulder is our first project. The first objective on the right. Pillar on the left is in but dripping heavily. Might be fatter/dryer a little later. Hal leading p.1 . Ice was good although surprisingly brittle and cold. Set up a belay to the left, under the steep curtain, so billy could head up the right side. Tricky move stepping off the top of the pillar to gain the ramp above. We topped out the climb and rapped down a gully further up the spur. Scope out the descents before you go up. We foud a short gully to come down, some are quite long. We then went up and did Slurrpee Crumble or something. Skipped the mixed finish as it was getting dark, rapped from the top of the good ice.

I've been very happy with using a mini-traxion the last few years. They run super smoothly, hardly have to think about it. I use a 9.8 rope that is very new, (shortened by rockfall) and has plenty of spring left in it. This, I hope, will limit the force on the cam/rope connection and lessen the threat of a shred. I've never had any kind of sheath damage while TR'ing with the mini-traxion and I'll pitch off things pretty confidently. I don't do any back-up knots or second rope. Too much trouble. If I was buying a TR-solo-only device I'd get a Troll/Yates Rocker. These also run extremely smoothly and have some designed in slippage at higher forces. The mini-traxion makes a nice little wall hauler as well, so it is somewhat multifunction. For a lengthy analysis of several types of these devices you can thrutch your way through this: www.hse.gov.uk/research/crr_pdf/2001/crr01364.pdf Enjoy!

OMFG! Kansas sux ass so bad. I spent a week there one day while driving across the country! Talk about FLAT! Yeah, but at least they have Rock City!!! Wheeeee!!!

There's always a better ledge "just up there" and the rock is always more pristine on the next ridge!

I'm heading outta PDX north on I5 Sat night. Should have room in the H2 for some extra stuff. Lemee know.

For any serious snow climb I would strongly suggest picking up two more ice axes so that each of you can have your own.

3rd Pillar of Dana, 45min walk from Tioga Rd. Toulumne is chilly in the shade (last week) and cold at night. Sunny routes are perfect. I got to be ataxia boy when the cold wind caught us unprepared on Cryin' Time. Check out Croft's G.G.A. book for stuff like Cardinal Pinnacle near Bishop.

Not to try to glean reliable information from a news article, but "800 feet below the summit" sounds like they were in the Sea of Scree of the approach.

Enchaining the two would make for a nice weekend. Nutsack was fine last w-e, with only minimal glacial ice to deal with. Schrunds should still passable. A screw or two might be nice, + pickets. http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/381196/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1

A fifi hook is another option. The small hole at the top of the hook is made for a small line to be tied to. Your rap line is tied to the big hole. Hook the thing on the rap ring and go. Pull the string and the hook pops off the ring. It very fast because there's no threading of the rope thru the rings. For redundancy you can duct tape two hooks together side by side.

kT must have been mislead by Beckey's quote about the NE Butt of Slesse being "The beauty queen of the North Cascades." Not the first of us to be mislead by the words of Fred!

Climb: Mt. Torment -> Mt. Forbidden-Torment Forbiden Traverse Date of Climb: 7/23/2004 Trip Report: Beat the heat by getting high on this stellar alpine ridge yesterday. An excellent scramble with some looseness here and there, but generally the rock is confidence inspiring. Used Nelson's beta and felt like it worked well. Torment is the red headed step child of the traverse. Very exposed and thought provoking. Its just there to test your mettle. Rapped to the glacier north of Torm. and over the 'schrund. Rounded the first hump on rock, traversed the snow field under the second hump all the way to the third, and final, major hump. Third hump went via a steep ramp/corner on the west side, one friction move, then scrambling. From there its straight forward ridge running. Did one more rap along the ridge at a step. Downclimbed some stuff that had slings to rap. West ridge of Verbotten was nice in that high-traffic-lichen-annihilation-project kind of way. Descended via NE side raps to sketchy traversing for a while, improving to just scary traversing. Crossed over east ridge and had a sweet boot ski down the snow field to B.Basin. T->F Trav is very spectacular. Nice place to put all your alpine skills to use. (The free hanging rap off a snow bollard was memorable!) The feeling of commitment once past the south face of torment is palpable. Your next place to bail would be the Forbidden west ridge gully (Yum!). I think with snow softening and 'schrund/moat expansion, it would be good to get on this soon. Enjoy! Gear Notes: Axe, 'poons, single trekking pole w/o basket for 2nd tool (thx JoshK!) 30m 8mm rope 100ft of p-cord (for the NE face raps). Approach Notes: Entrance to Torment south ridge notch is below a wall of lime green lichen high on the ridge. Once on the Taboo, aim for that.

Yer welcome. We all have our lapses of judgement at that hour of the morning. Nice job on Sandy. We noticed you guys crossing the Reid. Looks like a nice time. Say, are those ice runnels on the cliff bands of the headwall? Anything touching down to the glacier?

Picked up a Thermos on the southside on Memorial day. Anyone here missing their flask?

What was it like at the base of the route? Flat or a disgusting dirty slope of broken glass? New bolts on top? Could the tree have been deciduous?

Rigid keeper loop devices, like the Sheriff, can develop small cracks radiating from the roll pin that attaches the rigid loop to the body. Pin can just be seen on the side of the device below. http://www.sportextreme.com/Se_shop/Images/ProductImages/HB_Wales_SherifRigid_440.jpg Cracks in the body are far scarier than a broken cable. Worth inspecting your device if you use one of these.

You mean the little metal loop on the front of the spike? Why?

I picked up some SuperLoops with crampons this winter. The crampons work well, but I have had some dramatic failures where one or both crampons detatch and hurl back down the slope and almost send me with them. I'd look for something with a more positive attachment. These are held on by mid-boot presure. Guess what. When you're on your lifts, that pressure or goes away! And you poons with it! I'll keep using these, just need to swage some keeper leashes onto them.

What, to keep the Peregrines off you? (hint, hint)

Climb: Hood-Ski Circumnavigicision Date of Climb: 3/23/2004 Trip Report: The ski around Hood is probably my favorite day out on the mtn. The rest of the week looking poor, I headed up last nite to see what I could make of today. Woke at 3ish to precip against the car windows. A leisurely breakfast gave me a little while stew over the weather. Finally headed out round 4:30 with the plan to judge the weather at the saddle. Clouds broke up around the top of Palmer (surprise, surprise) and the low clouds to the west weren't threatening. Dropped across the Reid and took the high route over Yokum. Wind atop the ridge was fierce, nearly throwing me down when it caught my skis. Messed up the exit to the Sandy. Tried to climb down to the glacier, when I should have stayed high and contoured over. Lost a little altitude, but it did keep me higher than the low route we used last year. Shot across the Sandy and the always entertaining serac colony on the far side with the mandatory skier eating ruts and Beetle sized boulders laying about. Hiked it up around Cathedral Ridge and was skiing again across the Coe. Skinned up the Coe to the exit thru the rocks. Booted up to the top of the ridge then started skinning again up a very firm Snodome. About 600 feet of skinning later, a double ski crampon failure jettisonned them both down the slope, back to where I started skinning. Much cursing, some boot skiing, and a few minutes of foot 'pooning back up resolved that. Continued up Snodome to get to the Elliot just below the north face. Just left of the NF routes is a smooth connection onto the Cooper Spur. Took this up, gained the ridge and got back on the planks, just in time for the clouds to engulf the ridge (remember this last year Iain?). At this point the coast is clear, the work is done. Zipping around Newton Clark. Wy'east etc. is a breeze. Got down into White River still hankering for some turns so headed up to Triangle. But,alas, the wind was too cold, clouds too cloudy and the snow still bulletproof. Denied another day of Hood corn. Right now this trip is stellar. The exit from the Elliot to the Spur is faster than dropping way down the Elliot and then slogging back up the Spur. Plus, once you put your skis on where you top out on the Spur, its one downhill shot to T-line. The Yokum crossing, if I had done it right, looks casual too. Go get it! Gear Notes: Skis, skins, axe, crampons.