Blake

Trip: WA Pass - SUPERCAVE Date: 8/1/2012 Trip Report: The Supercave route must be one of the very best routes at Washington Pass and I am already eager for another go at it. Inspired by meeting the FAists on a hitch-hike several summers ago, and then reading their report after their multi-year project was completed, a friend and I started up one afternoon a few weeks ago, not sure what to expect. But despite only climbing 5 of the 8 pitches, we were both amazed by the route. We reached the cave and rapped, but the final 3 pitches look great. Here's the corner crack halfway up p2 - flawless white granite The approach is less than an hour and the rock is as good as the E. Face of Liberty Bell. There was snow and running water at the base on Aug1, but that is all likely gone now. It's still less than an hour of walking from the car. If the gully is wet, just stay skier's right. Following the flakes under roof on p3: Starting double cracks on p2: Walk to the far R. end of a lege below the wall and begin in an LFC. Grades and pitch lengths are foggy guesses. P1 - 40m 5.10- left-face corner, left of the bail 'biner. Ends at 2 rap bolts by tree. P2 - 50m? 5.10+ Leftish up double crack, then amazing fingers in corner, mantle up and face climb up easier-than-it-looks terrain, end at 2 rap bolts. P3 - 30m? 5.9ish - Walk left and go up white and tan flakes that lead up and left to small stance belay underneath roof. p4 - 40m? 5.10+ Amazing steep corners left under roof and then farther left and up through roof to semi-hanging stance in LFC. I forget if this belay is bolted, I think there's a fixed wire and/or pin. p5 - 30m? 5.11+ Up the leaning LFC, clip bolt out right, pull over on huecos, finesse your way up, clip 2nd protction bolt, and then slightly right and up to rap-bolts on left edge of cave. From here the route goes up from the left side of the cave for 3 pitches. We slung a tree at the bottom of the cave and did a 55m rap to the top of p2, then 2 bolted raps to the ground. It's hard to get a view of the whole wall, but Hwy20 just above the hairpin gives an ok perspective. Thanks a ton to the guys who established it. Gear Notes: Doubles to #2, with a 3 camalot. 2x 60m ropes to rappel Approach Notes: Park at mile post 166 and walk up the hill in or left of the creekbed.

A few friends and I climbed Der today, and it is really fun. Definitely not a route that should scare off solid 5.10 climbers as all the 5.11 climbing is well-protected and the runout knobs on p2 are stancy and never too far from a good bolt. We rapped in 3 rappels down the south face, starting with a slung pillar just west of the summit and going down the big corner just left of the route. The first rap ~55m to a nut anchor, the 2nd ~68m to bolts w/rings, then ~40m to the ground.

Yes, you can bring sneakers only.

He drew you a topo and there's 2 pitches harder than 5.8, go get your untrammeled adventure on dad!

I'm always 1 or 2 sizes smaller in Sportiva than in Scarpa (IE Mythos or Miuras in a 39 = Vapors or Boostics in a 41)

Are you talking about being roped together without any protection in (probably on snow) or just soloing vs belayed climbing?

Trip: Aasgard Pass - The Valkyrie Date: 6/26/2012 Trip Report: I was joined by a couple buddies in an attempt to climb Acid Baby the other day. But when I realized I had forgotten a lot about the route and I'd rather be lost on something new than a climb I'd done, we made the last-minute decision to try a new route just to the left, on the same tower. This tower is probably called Aasgard Sentinal or Spineless Prow (although it sure has a "spine" up top) but either way it is a rampart of Enchantment Peak, on the east side of the trail up Aasgard Pass. P1 P2 (The orange rock where we belayed is a good landmark) P2 higher up Scott Bennett lead the first 2 pitches, I took the middle block, and Graham Zimmerman got us to the summit, joining Acid Baby on the last pitch. Every pitch was 5.10 and the rock was generally stellar. Along with the stemming corners and splitters, the route featured a an amazing face of knobs and blobs, overhanging just a touch and with enough gear to make it exciting but not really dangerous. P3 starts with a hidden traverse on jugs, straight right for 25' P5 knobs before joining Acid Baby's hand traverse to the summit Best topout around: Despite trying to find a solstice-themed name, we settled on "The Valkyrie" in deference to the area's Norse naming convention. (Aasgard Pass, Lake Brunhilde, Dragontail, Lady Godiva) It should be nice to have another mid-grade climb in the area, as there are very few alpine rock routes between 5.9 and 5.11+. It felt like a similar difficulty and quality as Acid Baby, a route one friend of mine has climb SIX! times, including 4x in one summer. Gear Notes: Double set to 3" - 60m rope - no need for boots or snow gear Approach Notes: 60 Left of Acid Baby, 2/3 of the way up Aasgard Pass

Your guess is good, it's the face on the right aspect of the left of those two aretes. The schwacking isn't unusually fierce.

Alpine rock in the Stuart Range is all basically good to go, with the few usual exceptions such as the dripping NW face. No Mosquitos yet up there either! On the first warm day in a while we didn't see anything happening on the Ice Cliff, but it was hard to tell how difficult the transition over the moat to the Girth Pillar would be. [img:center]http://cascadeclimbers.com/plab/data/500/medium/IMG_04871.JPG[/img] [img:center]http://cascadeclimbers.com/plab/data/500/medium/IMG_0485.JPG[/img] [img:center]http://cascadeclimbers.com/plab/data/500/medium/IMG_04941.JPG[/img] [img:center]http://cascadeclimbers.com/plab/data/500/medium/IMG_0459.JPG[/img] [img:center]http://cascadeclimbers.com/plab/data/500/medium/IMG_04501.JPG[/img] [img:center]http://cascadeclimbers.com/plab/data/500/medium/IMG_04621.JPG[/img] [img:center]http://cascadeclimbers.com/plab/data/500/IMG_04751.JPG[/img]

Last night in downtown Leavenworth, my friend's car was broken into. A backpack of climbing gear was taken, putting the word out in case folks catches sight of any of the gear. The list of what was taken... Canon s95 Camera with grey/red case 5.10 Anasazi Lace ups (white) - ~size 9.5 Bright green Cassin Laser Harness (newish) Chalk Bag Blue Gri Gri II Grey Tracer helmet w/ lightning bolts drawn on it. rack of DMM offset wires C3s 00-2 Green Alien, yellow/orange mastercams .5camalot 3x .75 camalots 2x 1 camalots 1 each 2.3.4 camalots 8 extendable draws with 8mm runners 6 Camp ultralight draws 2 double length slings 3 lockers All was in a black and white Lowe Alpine Pack (40-50L) Would be super amped to get some of this recovered. Cheers folks

That blows! Someone ripped off two wallets and black Lowe Alpine bag with a CanonS95 and a whole racks of cams/draws/harness/shoes/etc from a car parked in front of our house in Leavenworth last night as well.

I find that the smallest ones can really improve the nature of the protection of certain routes. The black (.25) goes in perfectly to supplement the old pin on 24 Hour Buccaneer (Index). I like not hoping that a single old pin will keep me off the ground, and funk pro likes these, offset aliens, ball nuts, etc can really "tie the room together" on otherwise dangerous leads.

Are they then going to belay you with a munter on the next pitch? Or is this assuming that this is the topout pitch? When they leave the belay they grab the reverso they'd been hanging from, and its 2 lockers.

Hey Ryan, I'll assume a scenario of building acnhors. If there are two bolts, just clip them both with carabiners and there's your anchor. If I'm leading in blocks I'll generally try to connect 2 or 3 piece with a sliding X using a 48" runner or normal runner if the gear is close together. Maybe I'll equalize 2 pieces and then put another piece in, clipped to one of the two legs. I'd belay off the "x" with a reverso-type device in auto-lock, and have the arriving follower clip in there with one locker, cloved to rope they are tied in to. While belaying I'd likely be just cloved to a couple pieces in the anchor, and when I am ready to lead again i remove the cloves but switch my clove into the anchor's top piece and just clip through that piece for factor-2-avoidance. If we are flipping leads, the follower never clips into anything, they just hang on the reverso and I'd steal their belay device and put them on lead belay with it.

Rowdy! nice going Dan and E$! You need to listen to Cole and label your rig the "Helmstadter Homesteader" - make it fancy with little skis for the "L"s and it will be perfect. You'll see your business go through the roof.

Hey Satori, You said you wanted to climb Shasta and Rainier. For climbs on peaks like those (for most of the routes), you wont really use anything in your photo. Get a basic light axe, some lighter crampons, and lighter boots oriented more more for walking comfort than warmth. You will basically be walking on slopes less than 40degrees with occasional crevasses that you will hope to avoid, probably by following the steps of everyone else on those routes. Snag a super light/basic harness and a 7.5-8.2mm rope. If you are a skier or snowboarder, you'll save your knees (and have more fun) by descending on skis rather than walking. Don't worry about stockpiling loads of gear before you get started, that stuff is often overkill and just weighs you down. Have fun!

It is across the street from the gas station/jet-ski rental place, about 10 minutes north of E. Wen. You aren't missing a lot if you never find it.

Send an email if you lost a tool. BlakeHerrington @ Gmail DOT com

You can be pretty subjective about pitch counts at index, since routes like "Full Sag" may only be 30m long, but they end at the 3rd anchor. Here are 18 (or 9) more fun pitches 5.11 and under. DHLA is 4-6 Lamplighter->Heaven's Gate is 3-5 GM->HOC is 1-4 Roger Corner->Breakfast is 1-3.

If you just want to maximize your mellow crack pitches, I'd go for the OS-Orbit linkup, followed by the backside descent off snow creek wall, which will bring you to the base of the pearly gates where you can do 6-10 more pitches in that range. That will let you end up somewhere in the 15-20 pitch range but not much more hiking than doing outer space alone.

Newhalem, Equinox, The Country (right side of Index Lower Town Wall), and Nason Ridge, on the East Side of Stevens pass are all good to excellent sport crags, and better than anything mentioned so far.

Tie EDK 1 guy raps on grigri and the (fixed) lead line, undoing tangles on the way, quickly fixing tag line to self or next anchor to prevent knot sliding 2nd unfixes lead line and raps on both strands and uses an ATC Pull the lead line so you have something stretchy to use when you have to re-lead to free your stuck Rope.

We melted the colored plastic on our new style jetboil, near the actual burner section. I thought maybe we had it too close to our wind barrier or something, but it sounds like it's just a bunk design. This one still functions fine, but since the melting plastic oozed out a bit, the burner unit no longer fits into the cookpot.

Billcoe, Are you saying there are stats or records of folks cutting through webbing with their rappel ropes because the ropes were from different brands or thicknesses? That's a frightening prospect, do you recall any of those instances? I wouldn't suggest cutting away ALL the existing webbing, but would propose leaving the best existing sling then adding one new one as a back-up.

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