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I'd skip the bolts for now Blake. As you picked up cracks and such are easy to connect to. There is a whole pocket full of other little tricks to go along with them. Puttin in a bolt sounds easy until you stand on the side of a rock and tap away or drag a power drill up there. Better off climbin somebody elses work till you get a little more adept with the climbin. Find someone who will climb with a newbie is a good idea. Hang out, try a bunch a stuff to get the basics, then start followin them up some rocks so you can see what they did and build your own little bag of tricks. By the way get real good at belayin, if you can't belay your not gunna find any partners. If your anywhere near pubclubs that are posted on here comeon out and hang a little and get to know some folks. Their freindly (pretty near as twisted in person as on the forum) and only bite sometimes. You may even get response to a post lookin for a partner, It's a good idea to say right up front your new and lookin for help. I don't mind helpin sometimes but I hate gettin surprised by a newbie thats posein.

I just talked with Scott at the Y camp on Orcas. They cancelled this years course and next is in question. He is very interested in working with other groups to get it moving again. He brings in instructors usually thanksgiving week and does the full imersion thing. Classes are 8:00 to 5:00 five day week plus a few extra hours. The package would be $610 room and board included. He says that experience is people that live and study the class together due better on the test and much better at the 2 year recert. If you can get away without the room it is $100 or so cheaper. He likes to run the class when he can get his staff to it so no summer times and no winter break slots. Other than that he is flexible on schedule, and will work with groups to make something happen. Is there enough interest to get 8 or more people together for a group thing?

CBS, thats a good question. I suppose rigging some kind of a chest harness would be good. I think that the pressure of the seat harness would make the problem worse. I don't know maybe the extra pressure from spandex pants is the answer. If we all climb with a double set of spandex and don't forget the clean underwear for when you go to the hospital that mom told you about. Then we be prepared for all events.

Crux your definatley on to something with the MAST. In SAR cases and others were inactivity of the body or brain can be present blood often doesn't make it back. It's common in many planned medical procedures for the patient to be fitted with air or massage leggings after surgery or procedures that "impair" function. A fall or just being stuck hanging in harness would possibly count. The knee lock problem is similar. Partly due to heat partly due to locking the knees I have had a few members of performing groups like choirs drop on stages that I have run for the same shock like symptoms. Poor folks oughta get in a group that moves a little

The class on Orcas is no more. I checked on it and it was canceled due to lack of interest. I too have been thinkin about gettin a WFR, so... Anyway I did ask them about gettin another class together and/or lettin me know so that I can get a few more involved. If it happens what kind of interest is out there? It would be run at the YMCA camp and they may do a lodging package also. They run the classes for their staff as they take the kids out camping on little islands and stuff.

KM, Thanks for the info I'll search around a little. I think that your onto something though with the learning to anchor bit. I was building anchors a bit when nuts were nuts with a piece of cord. By the time I started with the cams I was better at placing them and equalizing. That helps a lot in keepin the cams in place if you jerk them around. I'm still not perfect at it, I wonder how much validity in some of these other arguments.

KM, can you point me at any of those discussions. I have by plan not ever had an anchor that was exclusivley SLCD, mostly as I wanted to save my cams for the pitch instead of leaving them behind. I have also been fortunate enough to have never lost a piece of an anchor to start any shock load. My experience though is that with a properly equalized anchor there is less chance of the cam rotating out. I am I outawack or what?

DP, You are so right, there is a huge difference in digital verses slide. I often use both in my presentations. In the low end you can get better quicker with slide. Improvements such as brighter light modules and lower f-stop lens are easy. In the digital world light output is expensive quick. The real bummer is that contrast is also expensive. Most lower end projectors can't project true black and white but instead it's grey and white. If you look around shop contrast ratio and ANSI Lumens to start, some units are native xga some vga that varies too. It doesn't do justice to your digital to arrange it xga and then present it vga. There are some pretty good units available. I do everything from theatre movies to private party slide shows. PM me if you want to chat details. Also I may be able to help in the next show. You should have great stuff to show what sounds to have been an oustanding show.

I agree with both A and B. Sometimes it is a case of complacency, for that we sometimes are a little rough for being "stupid." Other times it is just plain Shit happens. I took one of those a while back. Good pro, fall factor of like 0.17 I peeled and clipped a little ledge after of about 4' of air. The impact shattered my heel and then I completed the fall another two or three feet. I can't think of anything that would have made it any better. In retrospect if my knees would have been a little more bent I may not have taken so much impact on my heel. Hell I had only been in the air a couple feet. I don't know if it would help, I don't want to try it again to find out. I am a lot less complacent with even the little stuff now though, I do my best to not screw up but, ...shit happens. I am open to crticism of how to not make the same mistake. I wasn't too open after the fall to someone sayin I had been an idiot for peelin (at least when they didn't have any idea what was up)

I so agree with many of the posts in this thread. I started climbing in 75. Slowly I got better and climbed whatever I looked good for me until 85ish. I slacked a little then. In 91 I took a fall. Funny a four foot fall and clipped a ledge, left me with a shattered OS Calcis and one foot pinned together. Kept me out for a while, couldn't give it up though. A little over three years ago cancer and surgery held me off for a while. I'm back again. It has been my observation that many of those that bail on the sport are lookin for somethin to conquer. I climb cause I love it, I love the puzzle, I love the challenge, I'm in it for the journey. If your in it for the end you will find it pretty soon. If you go along for the ride it's always a rush.

A good place for cheap static line is Wespur. It's an arborist supply with a shop in seattle and one in B'ham. Preety good folks there.

Ya for a top that works. No roll no fuss. I think I would prefer a clove for lowerin. I used to haul logs with a timberline followed by a single half at the high end. Worked good, I never did feel like it was bomber. Point is the timberline is just a cinch it don't even count as a knot and in the right spot we never dropped a thing.

Alpine Your right about tree guys and practical experiance. I'm not quite sure that it applies here. In my experience with tree stuff, limbs and pieces were lowered away with a clove and sometimes a half hitch a little further up to add directional control if needed. A clove works great for that as it is constantly loaded. It does exactly what it is made for. If you introduce slack into the system (ie rolling the knot or falls) the clove can roll in a similar fashion to the EDk inverting. It is still a strong knot just best suited for it's purpose. I don't know anybody that ties in with a clove hitch. I like the figure of eight with yosemite finish. It adds a good back up, gets the tail out of the way, and the best part is that if you fall on it when you jerk the finish first it reintroduces slack into the knot and it unties way easier. Just as a side note. The riggers tell me that a bowline tied outside (like was talked about way back in this thread) you lose and additional 10% over being tied inside. I havn't looked that up as I don't intend on tying them outside anyway.

Not a climbin story but still Bat. A couple years back my uncle took me up to find a cave he thought I would like. Seems that when he was in high school he wanted to prank a little. He went up to this cave and painted all the Bats with glow in the dark paint. I guess it was pretty funny until glowing bats started being seen all around three counties. Guess there was a few freaked guys lookin for how that happened.

I started climbing with my son when he was 12. No epics no challenges. I do think that for a teen boy and a dad it was by far the best way to stay connected during those challenges. We both had a great time doin stuff. We started sailing when he was younger. One humorous epic, he was 10 we were sailing with a large genoa up. The wind started to pick up quick and we talked through again getting it down. I went up to bag it as he lowered. Suddenly it all was on my head. I saw the next part comin and grabed hold. As the sail filled on the deck it pitched me right off the bow. I drug for a moment off the pulpit and then pulled myself back aboard. The kid was still holding the rope eyes big as butter plates sayin it just slipped. All was good and we got over it. Maybe that's why there we havn't yet had any climbin epics.

mattp ; i think that your on the right track in revisiting the 5 piece idea. I recall that some of the early kind were a bit more challenging than the rawls. I think the big issue here is how many of the old studs have you tried to replace once they get real manky. It's a long way off but the nature of a bolted route is that it's there for a long time

Does this count? totally extreme I don't know if it counts, but it looks like it would be hilarious after a few brews. Can you take it outside

I was shootin the breeze with some friends early this week and was reminded of my longest seeming bivy. As it happened I had worked out a technique with some buds to climb a large brick chimney at my High school. I set three others up with a swammi belt and a biner brake. Each of us stood at a corner with a rope tied off on our belt and then leading to the right through the next brake. After that it was all coordinated effort. we all leaned back and held our line locked off. It was walk up until were leaning way back, then everybody one, two, three, pull we all leaned in and hauled some slack. Then lean back and walk. So it went on the way up. It all worked sweet until about 55 - 60 feet up. The Man shows up and bull horns "you kids come down" my buddy yells down "Heck no, you come up here." So came the long bivy we spent all night standing on a chimney while they sat in the car waiting. They bailed around 5:00 ish and we scampered down so we could make it back to school. A long post to ask if there's any other advanced buildering techniques out there. Other cool stories would be sweet too.

Ya know I think that I have an old phone. if I can find it you can use Dru idea and than trade their phone for the pile of my ex phone. If they ask you can let um have theirs back. If ya want "a little less suttle"

RB You may have a pull or you may just want to have the local Bone cruncher check it out. I had a similar sounding pain in the right side. It started right after a period where I slacked for a while. Then a little bad style and a little hurray to get to where I wanted to be . I had the same symptoms most of the time no problem move just so and it locked right up.

PP One more vote for Verizon. I spend a lt of time between Darrington, Big Lake, and Anacortes. I often have better reception than others in my group. Next best is NEXTEL but their way more expensive on minutes.

lummox, Your right I think it was three times. occupational hazard I guess, ya ever read one of these press release sheets. The one I have has his name plastered all over in bold. In any case I am one of those that says me when I know what I am talkin bout and uses their names if it's their word. I'm not much of a freshie but the second reel of this flick looks pretty good to a tech geek

I just got two reels of Beta tape. "Journey" looks great after the first reel but gotta do some normal work for a while. The venue says there is still lots of tickets so the sat afternoon might not happen. I'll post again when I get the rest checked out.

Yeh there right, I am set to move in next thursday with screen and projector. Checks are Friday morning, show that night and Sat night. I haven't heard from Orcas Center as to the ticket sales but I know the place holds 213. Warren will be there along with a bunch of his art work. It sounds kinda fun

If you are Warren Miller fan I've got a scoop. I was just contacted by Warren to do the World premere of this years movie. He wants to do a fund raiser for the community theatre on Orcas Island. He is bringing this years movie (still in preproduction but due to be released by end of October) to Orcas for a few showings. He will show it Sept 19 and 20 at 7:30. I talked with Warren he said tell anyone. The venue says if enough people get tickets they may consider a Sat matinae to be more ferry friendly. Give em a call at (360)376-2281 if you want tickets or prices. I've only seen story board and talked with Warren it looks good, he says it's his best yet.