OlympicMtnBoy

Nice work, what a way to do a "long weekend"!

Cool, I still need to do that one!

Where are you at? If you are on the east side Wenatchee Outdoors has an informal climbers forum and a few folks who get out regularly weekday afternoon. If you are in the Seattle area hit me up or post up here, sometime I can sneak out of work. Index was nice on Tuesday.

Old Lawn Chair? Probably a good story with that! Cushy belay seat?

Nice pics, sounds like a fun trip! I need to head up there in winter one of these years. Snowshoer sounds kinda badass to make a sound call and bivy safely, but obviously nicer to get to the lookout. Even nicer when other people bring you the wine and whiskey!

I like all the people poking their heads in on this forum. I've been casually lazy about posting TRs for several years, but I'll get something up eventually. It does seem like there is a little more activity lately, hopefully the new system helps. Our lack of an ice season doesn't help the winter TRs much either.

Welcome Khattak! Yes, you are a long ways from the Cascade Mountains but you are certainly welcome to post up here. We have a few big wall climbers on the site and some pretty nice wall climbs in the area (Index, Squamish, Smith Rock, Washington Pass, etc). You should post up some pictures of the walls in the Karakorum you are looking to climb! Maybe that will entice someone to visit. If you are interested in big walling and A5 gear you should also check out the forum on supertopo.com. There are a lot of Yosemite climbers who post there including John Middendorf who designed the A5 Haulbag and is still making innovative gear (he recently had a kickstarter for a new D4 portaledge). He also has the site bigwalls.net which is a wealth of info on his gear designs. Cheers, OlympicMtnBoy

Another great TR, I love reading these! How the heck do you event find the route at places like Duiwelskloof? The lines don't look obvious at all for my NW sense of trad climbing!

Nice! Now I feel like I've been missing out! Way to get at it in these odd conditions!

Sweet, thanks JSG! That is great beta, we'll have to check some of those spots out! Do you normally just rent a car there then? And any thoughts on renting BC gear? We will probably only be skiing for a portion of the trip so not sure about dragging our skis around if we might be able to reasonably find some powder boards over there better than ours anyways? Probably take our own boots.

Good to hear! We are heading to Hokkaido, but really don't have anything set in our itinerary other than tickets to/from Tokyo. I've done a fair amount of touring and ski mountaineering but my wife is not quite as good of a skier so we are probably aiming more from scenic and moderate. My powder skis are K2 Sidestashs, 108mm underfoot, she doesn't have good powder boards and may just try to rent, we haven't decided that yet. Any suggestions?

Hey CC.comies! My wife and I are planning a two week trip to Japan the second half of Feb. Anyone skied over there and have tips/suggestions? We'd like to do some resort and some BC skiing. Neither of us has been there so we were considering joining a ski tour group or getting a guide for a couple days. Also trying to decide about gear as neither of us has a great powder skis right now. I'm also open to non-skiing suggestions! Cheers, OMB

Nah, good beer is far better than cams, I have lots of those by now. Unless the cams are newer and shinier than mine, then I guess I just found some old beat up cams in that spot you left yours . . . Also PBR doesn't count.

Sweet, I missed this the first time around. I liked Crystal Lake Tower, I need to get back in to Crystal Basin again this spring. I'm not sure I agree that Aasgard is the best way to get there though, Crystal Creek really isn't bad if you find the right drainage! It's the 7 miles on the Ingalls trail that kinda drags on.

Nice TR Bump! Now we need some ice for this season!

Woohoo! I like the new look, thanks guys for the work! I've only been poking around a few minutes so these thoughts may change, but my initial comments: The front page looks good and snazzy. It highlights the blog posts and articles, but TRs are not mentioned at all except in a tiny box at the bottom (which leads to error code: 1S160/2 BTW). IMHO the best part of this site as a regular user are TRs and the Forum, I would love to see recent TRs and Forum posts highlighted up front. Or maybe TRs should be considered like articles/blog posts? That and I really hope my and everyone elses old TRs are accessible again eventually. I'm still figuring out this whole "recent activity" thing, not quite as easy to browse as the old "past 24 hrs" list, but I'll probably learn. The font and layout makes for a lot of scrolling there, maybe that can be optimized to not show "in the last hour" as it's own category (until we have a crazy busy site)? I am guessing this was a ton of work, so props to everyone!

Nice, thanks for some rainy weather stoke for D-town!

Thanks! It's probably not fairing well with this warmer spell, but hopefully back soon!

Thanks for sharing, nice article.

Along similar lines as others, I was reminded of this quote from Malcolm Bates on Beckey's Bible from the NWMJ: Yea, though I contour gently on talus slopes and beneath the obvious arete and across the firn into the hanging valley of Despair, I shall fear no exfoliation (although I should be on the lookout for hidden crevasses and friable rock). Thy route and approaches, they comfort me . . . I was lucky enough to share a few trips with Fred over the last decade or so. Even in his late eighties though we amazingly even saw to top of a few routes together. On of my fondest memories though is of high camp on a ridge on Mt. Monarch. We roped up for the glacier and Fred insisted on carrying his own pack (which we discreetly lightened for him). He had to use an ascender to get up the last steep snow bit but he made it on his own. It was clear that he wouldn't be able to make it to the top but he hung out while Bill P. and I summitted the next day. Sitting on that high ridge with a beautiful sunset and only a few climbers around for miles and miles, Fred was clearly in his right place. I'm glad I got to share a few of those moments. You will be missed Fred, your mountains and routes will endure.

Hah, I was on Mt. Holyoke this summer. Maybe that means I should try this next year? Hah, unlikely I could manage. Nice work and thanks for the TR!

Mountain Equipment Co-op (MEC) recently redid their climbing packs and a crag pack. If you are passing through Vancouver or something it could be worth a look. I wasn't in the market at the time but I fondled a couple packs in the store in Victoria and the crag pack looked burley (for not being a haul bag material pack).

Nice TR and way to get back at it after the first time!

Last minute but worth a try, anyone wanna get out tomorrow (Sunday)? I'm up for most anything but probably clipping bolts is easiest. 20+ years experience, plenty of gear, probably only leading 10ish trad or 10+ sport right now but happy to follow harder or ropegun for you! Hit me up via pm with your number if you are interested. I'd just like to get out, even if it's only a half day. Cheers, Stewart

DPS for the thread win!