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I don't have the space for a wall so I just built a crack. I used a couple of 16 2x10s with a several pieces of all thread zig zagged on the back half. I carry it in and put it away then hang it on the side of the place when I want to climb. The all thread lets me change the width and taper of the crack with very little hassle. I got good results from using that rubber grit deck paint that they make for tennis courts. Nothing feels like rock put the rubber grit is good on the hands for the practice.

Sloth, you can still ride your bike. They won't steal it if you put The Club on your handlebars. Then you'll be save for sure.

" Stop Global Whining"

R, thanks for the link. I seldom do the trail on Rainer and not in several years. Cluck, your right I guess RMI has dibs out of paradise and and others get to guide on the Emmons and Winthrop. Can you have half of a monopoly?

Mark, I used to have some of the leather freneys. I wear the XT now. If I remember correct(I switched a while back) the heel cup was narrower on the XT. I think that it was a tad longer. When I wore the leathers neither heel floated on me (one foot a little longer) but when I changed I noticed a bit of heel float in the short foot. It was not much differant as a paying attention to lacing and foot placement took care of it. If you go with the XT's get ready for comments about the space boots. Whenever I make a showing where several others are I always get asked "what kind of boots are Those?"

A friend came up to me last week in town and asked about that other guide group on Rainer. I told him I thought RMI still had a monoploy. Today he showed up with a flyer from the park service advertising Mount Rainer Alpine Guides in addition to RMI. I guess it shows that I don't stay dialed in as to what's goin on down there. Can someone fill me in on this group?

I have Freny XTs Love um. I have about a year and a half worth of use in mine. So far they have held up great. They have been plenty warm in spring and fall. In the summer I have liked them in the higher alpine with a cooler sock. Scarpa does use a wider last for making them Mine fit snug in the heel with a fair amount of toe box space If you have a "standard" foot they might be a little wide.

Iain, I remember that too. If I remember correct the rage about the study was that they showed a significant reduction if the fall occured on the mark. When the marker was layed direct on the edge and took the fall they found a strength loss. If the marker was somewhere that was absorbing the fall there was little reduction. It was something like that. Lots of comments that I seem to remember centered around the mark being at the biener when the fall occured.

I'm not sure on buddies completing the rescue. Some of my partners I would trust in a rescue, some I would rather have a little better trained folk. I do like the idea of calling some other opinions first, especially if it is a route that I've never done before. It' entirely possible that I just misjudged the route ar was "delayed" for a few hours while off route. If my SO called someone with a little perspective it would really help the worry factor.

Yes SB you can get out of jail. If you look back at accident reports on the board this is a perenial problem. people that have accidents post here while they are processing their event. It's nice to have a little sunshine then. A lot of us that climb read the journal every year to look at accidents and learn from them. Your right that our safety and progession is made at their expense but it is the best time. Egos just get inflamed when one persons learning trips anothers sunshine. Once in a while we are nice and start a new thread. Usually we act like the spraylords that we are. This is the part where we group hug and offer a few for the injured

Q, There was a thread about a year back that went on for a couple pages about cellular service. As usual there was a fair amount of spray but there was a lot of good info passed around too. I'm not sure what the title was though. Found it

A man and his wife are awakened at 3 o'clock in the morning by a loud pounding on the door. The man gets up and goes to the door where a drunken stranger, standing in the pouring rain, is asking for a push. "Not a chance," says the husband, "it is 3 o'clock in the morning!" He slams the door and returns to bed. "Who was that?" asked his wife. "Just some drunk guy asking for a push," he answers. "Did you help him?" she asks. "No, I did not, it is 3 o'clock in the morning and it is pouring out there!" "Well, you have a short memory," says his wife. "Can't you remember about three months ago when we broke down and those two guys helped us? I think you should help him, and you should be ashamed of yourself !" The man does as he is told, gets dressed, and goes out into the pounding rain. He calls out into the dark, "Hello, are you still there?" "Yes" comes back the answer. "Do you still need a push?" calls out the husband. "Yes, please!" comes the reply from the dark. "Where are you?" asks the husband. "Over here on the swing!" replies the drunk.

Chuck is right, the best way to control you contribution is to control it. You can also work for a state park pass. 20 hours gets you a local pass for a year, 40 hours gets you a state wide pass for a year. I work for mine so that I can direct what and where My "money" is spent. P.S. I agree that the time doesn't coincide with the funds. One of the rangers told me that the program didn't exist to pay people for working but to get some work done. I told him that I wasn't paying for someone else to "work".

ya, it's a way to figure out what your doin to just do it. I understand that they were all four spaced from 15 - 17 I don't know how many of which. I was a bit peaved rembering the chat with the ranger (Kurt I think). He was hauling out someones summit pack that had thawed out of the Coleman. A little while back he was just below Colefax and met four college kids all in jeans and tennis shoes and all were cold and wet. It was all good after they got down but it just seems like maybe theres a better way. But then again props to the kids that summited in tennis shoes, I've never tried that for a challenge.

So Yesterday afternoon I walk out of the Heliotrope ridge trail with some newbies in tow after a day practiceing on the lower Coleman. As I start to load gear into my truck this guy walks up and asks if I saw any kids up there. Turns out that day before he had let four high school guys head up on there own. No experience, no guide, very little gear, "but they had gone and rented those spike things that go on your shoes." He says there plan was to climb to 9000 ft camp then after the summit they would be backout about 12:00. My first thought is tell him "your'e a stupid shit for lettin em go", but, instead I assure him that they probably won't really be at the trail head till closer to 4:00 and yes I did talk with some of the climbing rangers before they left for the summit that morning. So they will probably be alright, just wait. What do tell a guy waiting out a bad plan?

Thanks, all that what I suspected. I usually am on a two man rope and we practice escapeing the rope and setting up anchors just usually stop short of the actual z-pulley. It's kinda like once I've got a couple anchors in and I'm free of the rope the rest is pretty easy. Maybe I'll carry the process all the way next round. When it's a short team I always use my prussic that is already there for the initial escape and it is already a 4mm that one works great.

Seems like this forum would be the right place for this question. At least a good place to show off my lazy attitude. Last spring I moved over to a 7.7 x 60 Ice floss for my glacier rope, I've really loved that. Usually when I'm showing stuff to newbies and practiceing I use a heavier line still though. Yesterday I was back on a glacier with some relative new folks and one commented that he was trying to remember setting up a z-pulley. I said" lets work on that right now." Here's my challenge. I usually set up a z-pulley with Bachman knots (tied with 5mm cord loops) for both hitches. When I set this one up (first time with the floss) both of them needed to be futzed with a bit to hold tight. Should I go to a smaller cord loop or change the knot? I felt kinda silly. I had never practiced this with the new line, but it was cool that in the time since I changed I had never needed to use a z-pulley either.

The Yellow/ amber lighting is not much help for obscured conditions. Your eyes are quite sensitive to the blue/white and it also alters your night vision the most. With Red light has very little effect on the night vision but also you cannot see very well. The presence of white or blue virtually eliminates what use it is(ever try a red flashlight on a moonlit night?). Yellow light is in the middle slightly on the red end of the stick. It gives you fair vision without much damage to night vision. The real help in whiteout/fog is to not have a focused beam. The more difuse the beam is the less it will reflect back to blind you. Even a clear diffuser works for this. Thats why you can buy white fog lights for your car. Anecdoteally fog lights are now built this way (short diffuse beam) but the discovery was made in a foggy rally. When the driveing lights were blinding one of the drivers He taped a newspaper over the lens as a diffuser. It worked great, his competiters colored their lights yellow with celophane thinking that it was the color that did it. They left again just as blind as before. It was the diffusion of the newspaper reducing the bounce back.

I don't know about gettin shut down but, several years ago I was climbin a fun .9 in Arizona just after thanksgiving. A little over 150' up I found a nice ledge that seemed like it would make a good belay. As I pulled over the edge I found a whole pile of hibernating snakes tucked in a little hole. Back down I went and created a .10+ alternate to go around I wasn't into that scene one bit.

Climb: Mt Baker-Off Route, but not groveling Date of Climb: 8/11/2004 Trip Report: Made up my own Off route for Baker on Aug 11,12. Started out with a partner that bailed, new partner with a bit more experience and we hatched a plan for a C-D to Park carryover. He didn't show up so I figured what the hay I'm doin something. I picked up my pack and headed in, at the wye I stayed left to hit the side of the Roosevelt glacier with intents of climbing around and practiceing route finding. (the lower roosevelt is pretty broken as usual). After a while of messin around it didn't look that bad so I ascended to the flats and traversed to pick up the Coleman Deming route. Followed that up to a favorite camp at about 7700ft below Lincon peak. What an awsome spot to watch the Persaids and relax (soon forgot about jerk expartners). The meteors were still out for breakfast when I headed up. At the bottom of the Roman headwall it was apparant that it was pretty melted out and that it was mostly dirty ice with water running over it. I decided to traverse again and pickup the Easton Route for the finish. Once I reached the shadowed area on the Easton it was good going right up. I found that once you clear the ridge that even that route is starting to melt out. There are a few new end runs that are apperant. The Easton route showed lots of activity (four teams on that route coming up behind me) The standard CD is in fair shape for being late season (only saw two teams though). Several large open crevasses no real tough route finding challenges. It is melting out quick enough that the cow path disappears before it gets real set. Lots of recent reroutes evident. I wil post a few pics if any are good in a couple days. Gear Notes: A partner would have been nice I only brought slow film so that I could get some pictures. If I would have thought about the meteors I would have brought some fast stuff. Missed several good night sky shots. Approach Notes: Route mostly in good shape. despite my goofing off I was 4.5 hours from trailhead to 7700. 3:50 to summit from camp. Caution would be good on the traverse from the pumice ridge across to the Easton route as that is getting a bit soggy. A helmet also as there were several rocks headed down the hill.

BB, Thanks for the info. I think I talked to the man on the way up. Were you in that four man team or the couple that was not far behind?

I have to add another vote for looking at leather or composite. I have to favor a foot and I use Scarpa Freney XTs Great boots. Scarpa bills them as Ice boots but they have done me good the other three seasons even in summer slogs I've never had wet feet and are good to walk around in. If your really set on plastics I think that Mountain gear in Spokane was running a sale on Arctis Expes that was worth looking at.

I was on Baker today (trip report to come later) About the time I was getting back to camp the rescue chopper showed up and I would sware he landed on the summit. About 40 min or so later the Coasties showed up and were searching up and down the Easton and Demming. When I was coming down I crossed paths with a 5 person and two 4 person groups on the Easton, and a 4 and a 2 that had come up CD but the Roman headwall is getting pretty ugly so we all traversed to finish via the Easton. I only saw the 4 person rope come back down the CD. Does anyone know about what the action was?

I would second the Ferratas. I have the pants and they have done me real well. Them and the jacket make a wonderful soft shell (aside from them being the only coordinated items in my whole pile of clothes).

I took my mom on a trip out the Lake Ozette,cape Alava trail, she loved it. Very little gain, and a short beach walk south is a little shelter that sometimes has space available. Lots of marshland flowers and pretty stuff. It pushes the 4 hour limit and I havn't been out there in a few years. Thought I would share it as it's one that mom wanted to do again. (big brownie points)