tanstaafl

Thanks Jon for the beta. Respect for soloing that glacier; that would have made me nervous. We went in loaded up for the SW Buttress but it was so dang cold on Saturday night that we opted for Maximum Enjoyment and did the NW Ridge instead. Never have I had such a lackadaisical alpine day; we left camp at 10 AM! This turned out to be perfect as we were in the sun all day except for a few minutes in the notch. Even so I was wearing two jackets on the whole climb. Summer's over. Note: while we were out, some tweaker broke into all the vehicles at the Eldorado trailhead and apparently was siphoning gas from them—all had gas caps off. The climbing rangers came up while we were at Eldo camp and let us know that Ken's was the only vehicle without a window broken; possibly because his gas cap didn't lock. Evidently this has been happening quite a bit at Eldorado, Boston Basin, and Thornton Lakes trailheads. Be warned.

no kidding. wow. beautiful. you sure do some nice-looking trips.

thanks!

True, Wayne Wallace would know; I remember he once did a Pickets traverse with no stove. Didn't sound fun. I've even had some *actually tasty* meals that are meant to be made with cold water (e.g., Mango Curry Chicken Salad by Pack-It Gourmet, yum) — but I knew I wouldn't be able to stomach that first thing in the morning even if it did rehydrate. Thank God I took Pop Tarts for breakfast instead of something hot! It was a good trip; I'm glad I went. Sooo much better than sitting in front of a computer. You appear to have been having a good summer as well! Are you still funemployed?

Alpendog! Love the nose shot. He's a happy pup. And to be fair, all excuses pale in comparison to "I'm going to have a heart procedure." Jason thanks for the lumpsucker pic, that thing is amazing; it looks like it's made of amethysts. Way prettier than its name.

Just came across this in my daily trawl through the NYT headlines: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/14/climate/patagonia-climate-philanthropy-chouinard.html

Jon, how was the gully going down to the Eldorado glacier? Still got any snow in it?

Impressive ascent! Congrats on a super successful trip. Love that "psyched" photo. I'm always amazed at how people can take such great photos while climbing hard at the same time.

After asking 15+ people to go climbing with me and getting no takers (best excuse: "I'm having a heart procedure on Monday"—whoa), I soloed this over Tues/Wed since the Olympics were just about the only place in the state not on fire/right next to something on fire and with a decent forecast. I used Kuato's excellent trip report above for beta along with the guidebook description and was astounded to discover my times were more or less in line with his. I assume that's because he took lots of breaks and I took almost none. High points: 1. On the ferry I parked next to a NOAA vessel with this stupendous name: 2. They played December 1963 on the radio on the way in and Brick House on the way out, allowing me to indulge in dancing while driving. 3. Chilling out and reading Luis Sagsti's Fireflies at the 4300' bivy was stellar. Though if you haven't read Sagasti yet, I recommend starting with A Musical Offering. So good. 4. I found a fun 4th class way up the last bit to the ridge. 5. I saw lots of sooty grouse, though never could get a decent photo of one. I did get one of my bivy companion however. Low points: 1. South Brother is a choss pile—it would be way better earlier in the year when snow covers all that scree. 2. I failed to stop in Kingston for food, resulting in a breakfast that consisted of a moderately disgusting gas station bear claw. 3. I realized somewhere between 3600' and 4300' that I also failed to pack a pot, which meant no hot water, which meant a few handfuls of trail mix and an envelope of "lemon pepper tuna" for dinner. I thought I had grabbed an envelope of "zesty lemon pepper" chicken, so doubly disappointing. Don't pack and talk on the phone at the same time. Useless: Medium point: 1. Summitting is always nice, but the views pretty much sucked: Highest point of all: 1. Coming home to my sweetie who made garlic & olive oil pasta for dinner. yum.

well thanks for this! I have all next week off and am suddenly partnerless, so definitely filing this away as an option...

Ha! I can so envision this scene. Nice report Darin; if Eric was willing to repeat it, it must be good.

Thanks for the reply. I was guessing you probably were going off the UN member states or something close to that. That's fascinating about the termite mounds, and I applaud your choice to exclude them. So in that case I assume Mawson Peak is not included? What's the highest point after that? Ball's Pyramid seems like the coolest thing you could climb that is Aussie, but it's not that tall and getting a permit sounds extremely challenging.

Gorgeous pics. Thanks for the update on the state of things re. Mustard Glacier/O-H col, etc. Maybe it's because I have no ability to climb hard anymore, if I ever did, but at least these days I definitely see the draw of the Pickets more as just being there than in the difficulty of the route. Also, Adrien Costa is badass.

Thanks. It was easily the smoothest outing I've had except for maybe doing Inspiration in 2008. The first two times I tried to do anything in the Pickets I never even set foot on rock. Of course the first time I tried it was Memorial Day weekend and snowing sideways. I wasn't very smart back then.

Great report and killer photos. Congratulations on your summit! I'm curious about your country list. It seems like an odd question, but how do you decide what counts as a country? For example, do you count the UK as one country or do you count England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland as separate countries? What about disputed or unrecognized countries like Northern Cyprus or Tibet or Taiwan or Palestine? What about dependencies and territories like the British Virgin Islands or Puerto Rico or Greenland? It seems like there are many different criteria you could use, so I'm curious about yours. When we were in Tenerife a few years ago, I was surprised to find that it was the home of Spain's tallest mountain, which I would not have guessed was in the Canary Islands.