Ed_Seedhouse

In the situation shown, where the rope is running straight it makes perfectly good sense. Slings will straighten the run of the rope where the route turns corners, but here a sling will do nothing about that. IMHO

Darry also did "Negro Lesbian" at Squamish, just left of "Black Dyke". I was, alas, personally responsible for the unfortunate name, having irresponsibly indulged my penchant for punning when discussing the route possibilities in that area of Grand with Darryl. Of course he decided on the spot that this would be the name of the climb when he did it.

Sorry, my error. That's my internal url on my home network behind my firewall. Naturally an external computer can't access that url (I certainly hope so, anyway!) The right address for the directions page is of course http://members.shaw.ca/eseedhouse/wapiti/directions.html A google search on "wapiti climb" will bring up several links to the guide pages on page one of the return list. Also a google on "ed seedhouse" will bring up a link to my home page as the first hit, and the wapiti guide web pages are linked there.

Well, the annual "en-masse" migration to the Nomash River Valley near Zeballos on Vancouver island starts tomorrow. Around 8 or a dozen climbers and hangers-on (and for this area that's a whole bunch) will be camped out all week and a few rocks should get climbed. Several ascents of Wapiti Mainline on Dale Earnhardt Dome will be in order and maybe completion of "Full Throttle" to the dome summit if things go well. It looks like no power drill available this year, though. If you're interested in coming up and joining the fun you can get directions at my web page "http://zulu/wapiti/directions.html". The weather outlook is improving, but this is Northern VI after all, and nearly on the West Coast at that. Or, if you are into the alpine, Mount Rugged accross the valley invites exploration.

Climb: Northern V.I. - The Nomash Valley (Wapiti Valley)-Dale Earnhardt Dome and area Date of Climb: 8/14/2004 Trip Report: Well the annual en-masse migration to the Nomash Valley starts tomorrow. Around a dozen or so climbers should be hanging around and sometimes even actually climbing stuff all next week. For Zeballos, that's definitely en-masse. If you've meant to check this area out it might be a good time to get some pre-route beta in camp. If you want to know how to get there see my pages at members.shaw.ca/eseedhouse/wapiti/

Heh. Well now you know you were right.

http://srmwww.gov.bc.ca/g/makeamap.html Looks like this is the latest try at providing an official web page for this application.

>Seems very useful for checking out exactly actual existence of > spur roads Well, in areas I happen to know fairly well the roads I hapen to know are there are not really very prominent, but if you *can* see it you are pretty sure it's really there. But the fact that it's faint or nearly invisible doesn't necessarily seem to mean it isn't there and passable, on foot at least. > However, it shows all rock as red And not all that is red is rock. > and is shot from the south for this area, You wanna see something weird, zoom in on Baffin Island. Ed

I'd just like to add that there is a nice server for worldwide sattelite pics down to 1/2" per pixel at http://onearth.jpl.nasa.gov/ I find zooming in on Vancouver Island is fun, but I obviously have a location bias. The Nomash valley is quite prominent and the whole geography of the area becomes quite plain - including the bright green clearcuts. Also, nice pics of Mt Ranier from space.

Looks kinda slightly like Hamish Fraser to my old tired eyes. Somplace on Grand wall, but not Grand. Maybe Cruel Shoes?

The site has changed again - the "basemap" now has very little detail on it. However the link for "Land and Resource Data Warehouse Catalogue" has all the old stuff. Just go to maps.gov.bc.ca and click on the link, or the direct url is as follows: http://maps.gov.bc.ca/imf406/imf.jsp?site=lrdw_catalog_ext

> The chasing numbers thread got me thinkin about what I > am chasing. What I am really chasing is the moment. The > moment when there is nothing else, no past, no future, > just now. Futile. First, if you think about it, actually every moment is like that anyway and, second, the harder you try to find it the more you push it away.

That's on Bananna Peel alright. I did it with my niece Alison on Friday. Ali belayed on one of the small trees just below the climber and that gave her enough rope to make the block for a belay. I lead the last bit to the ledge from the block - my only leading on the climb, but then I am 60 years old. Also fat and unfit but that's nothing new. Last time I lead it was 15 years ago with my nephews. BP was the first climb of any kind I ever lead on my first trip to Squamish in 1975. This year I had to totally hangdog the vertical bit, but managed to pad my way up the rest. We made decent time on the ascent but at the top my ancient unfit body was feeling pretty weak and it took me 2 hours to get back to the road through the trees. Great weekend though, not even a hint of rain until this morning.

I discovered this about a month or two ago myself. You can also email maps to yourself as attachments and save them locally. I used that for my "Wapiti Valley Guide" site at http://members.shaw.ca/eseedhouse/wapiti/.

Oh no - if I have to be honest I'm gonna quit climbing. Come to think of it I already pretty much have. That's not climbing, really, is it? Ed

Well, one of these days I plan to chain Dave Lepard to a desk and get him to list the routes and grades and then put it up on the site on a page of it's own. However, grades actually are there if you look, just not a separate graded list.

I have a mini-guide to this specatcular rock climbing area on Northern Vancouver Island on line at my personal website at http://members.shaw.ca/eseedhouse/wapiti/

Er, I suppose I really should have mentioned the url, eh? http://members.shaw.ca/eseedhouse/wapiti should get you there.

Just thought I'd mention that I've updated my web pages and it's now a bit of a mini-guide to this climbing area in Northern Vancouver Island. Ed

I've been using it for a couple of weeks so I guess I am an expert, eh? First you have to zoom in a couple of steps until the red star dissappears from next to the "elevation" check box. Then check the box and refresh. At large scales the result will be odd - just a whole bunch of little tiny brownish "+" characters all over the map. It takes another couple of zooms to get actual topological lines to appear and from then on they are there.

What? That's outrageous. They never asked me about this!! :

I discovered this a few days ago on my own. for some reason tonight the page is coming up but no maps are displayed.

Well, you really can't see the harness. By the way it's a red Troll made Whillans sit harness. Can you tell I don't climb much these days

OK, this is my attempt to put a picture of the dome in this forum. Heere goes..... That's me approaching the top of pitch 7 on Wapiti Mainline. And here's the dome.... And here's a view from high on Mount Rugged:

Not that I know of, but there a lot of climbers in Victoria and the Island in general. There is a huge potential for climbing in the whole area around Rugged. On the W side of the Nomash river there is a lot of granite and, besides the dome, there are whole valleys with big granite cliffs that haven't even been visited yet. Also there is huge potential in the Haihte range in general if you like mountaineering. There's a big face just north of Rugged that hasn't yet, so far as I know, even been approached. Ed Seedhouse