selkirk

Why would you put frosting on candles? Seems like a waste Happy b-day Mel!

linky linky

Today started out as one of those days where you contemplate throwing yourself out the window. Then you remember your only 1 story up. That's just far enough to break a leg or an ankle and ruin your climbing season, but only far enough to get you out of a day or two's worth work. Dammnit, they gave me a laptop and I could work from hospital. bugger all. However after 10 yr old Single Malt Irish Whiskey My day is vastly improved :tup: warm, sweet, smooth. Just doesn't get much better

exactly Moron, Thanks for clarifying my point. If the Mounties taught improvisation that would be great....but they often teach outdated attitudes which rely on dogma as opposed to sound judgement and self reliance/knowledge. You seem to get the idea that the Mountains are a dynamic environment and approaching them with a flexible attitude and a broad range of skills often serves one best. You should go teach for the Mounties, you could stir things up a bit. First off you might want to seperate the "Mountaineers" from the basic course students, there are lots and lots and lots of mountaineers floating around doing lots and lots of climbs that aren't under the mountie formal umbrella. Usually you would just call the climbers. As for the Basic course..."We" teach "a" set of skills that won't get you killed. It may not be the most modern. It may not help you climb 5.12 this year, or help you free El Cap. It may not help you climb a Himalayan or Patagonian peak. They will keep you from killing yourself in the near future and give you enough grounding to teach yourself and continue to learn and of course not kill yourself. For a lot of the students getting their first exposure to technical climbing of any sort a single safe way of doing it is about the maximum amount of information that they can absorb. Every time I teach I get lot of "what if" questions, and like teaching in any field I try and provide more detail, understanding, and choices to the students who are capable of absorbing it. And no, they don't teach the dulfersitz anymore (though I've used it on occasion, and shown it to a few people), they don't teach wrapping the rope around your foot or leg to lock the rope off when tying off a fallen climber. They also aren't doing 50 person field trips anymore. Teaching is a balancing act of giving the student enough information without overloading them. The instructors I've worked with always do there best to be flexible with what information is passed on to students, and tuning things to individuals. With the shift from large classes to small instructional groups (6 to 10 people I think) things are becoming progressively more flexible, and the students are also being allowed to leverage previous experience and knowledge to bypass some of the courses. I know mounties who have been up plenty of respectable climbs (Washington Column, Liberty Crack, 20k+ first ascents in China, yada, yada, yada, yada) in good (safe, not hindering other climbers, not scarring the rock) but not groundbreaking style. On the other hand during his first two climbs as a "climb leader" one of my climbing mentors, ended up having his entire basic climbing glacier groups participate in rescues of other parties that were both guided by "professionals". Go figure... So basically STFU noob. If your going to be talking like a "expert" you might want to be aware of current practice. Besides it's been my experience that the most vocal detractors of anything are the most likely to be angry arm-chair enthusiasts.

Some of the info on the Mounties is recently outdated. The Seattle Branch (which takes most of the head), has recently shifted from large single course (200+ students) to smaller groups, and are breaking apart alpine skills, rock, and glaciers a little more so that you don't necessarily have to go through all of them, or all of them at once. There are also some much more brief courses, like intro to rock climbing sort of things, with the goal of getting you ready to lead 5.7ish sport safely. The Mounties are a bit rigid, but the basic courses mostly start with the assumption that the students have never done anything technical. It's also rather common to start there with a climbing course, develop a few basic skills, and more importantly develope a network of climbing partners to get out with.

Let them carry their own gear, but make sure they get some "group gear" you know, chocolate, marshmallows and graham cracker On my first backpacking trip, our stove turned into a fireball and melted into a little puddle of aluminum It was cool!

Friction is Stranger than Truth

Tieton: Bolted Belay's Good Pro Soft Grades You are very mean individual. Tieton is the only place I have ever heard comments like: "That's the only 5.4 I've ever climbed with a crux!" "That 5.5 has a 5.7 crux" "Fist crack" used to describe a crack that I can comfortable knee bar Grades seem to normalize around 5.9+ and up, but the stuff below 5.9 there is consistently stiff for the grade (compared to other local climbs) The cracks have a lot of undulations and can also be a bit funky on cam's, but take truly bomber hexe's Not a good place for tenative new leader IMHO

I still like having a cubicle with a window that looks across the Boeing Field runway The A-10 kicked but too!

someone from Oregon?

Sudafed at the first sign of any sort of crap building up anywhere near your sinus. Dry the fucker out and don't let anything get a foothold. Same thing my mom does, same thing my step mom does, and between the three of us I've never actually met someone who lives with more long term severe allergies. Now go take your drugs!

someone sounds a bit jealous. He's just bummed that he can't make tele turns with a fixed heel but I can make parallel turns just fine on tele gear

Tele's cool AT is cool Downhill is cool . . . . . knuckle draggers on the other hand....

Good thread choice Most satisfying Multi-pitch was Zebra-Zion I launched up it having successfully led maybe three 5.10a pitches. What a stellar top out as well ! Most Satisfying single pitch is probably Kunza Korner down at Smith. Sacked up and led it on sight having never been on a 5.10c outside Though Paul Maul, and Stems and Seeds are close on it's heels as far as satisfying pitchs go! How about scariest single pitch? For me it was definitely Crackmaster Lambada out at Vantage. The climbing was right at my upper limit at the time, and varied between awkward bulges with little cracks that took tiny nuts, and flaring broken pods that wouldn't take any gear. I don't remember having any gear that I actually trusted to catch a fall. I hit the top and just giggling that I hadn't pitched off and pulled all my gear!

Lightweight. Sack up and get after it!

I'm interested in getting a tag line to use for rappelling. Any suggestions on diameter???? 7mm or 8mm?? TIA

Can I bring my dog? How does one repel with a dog anyhow?

Years ago I ran into a group of older climbers (60's and 70's) as they were on their way out from climbing Olympus. They were all plodding down the trail in double plastic boots saying they love the foot and ankle support. You could always try renting a pair for a weekend at one of the local climbing shop's and see how they do. Sorrry to hear the pigs hurt though!!

Mrs. Selkirk and I got married about 1 month before we started taking the Mounties Basic Climbing course My climbing tapered a bit when we got a house (f-in yard I do like the fresh raspberries though ) and has lately tapered more due to climbing partner drift. In general, if she's cool, she's cool though. Congrats!

rat bastard!!!

Anybody interested in Index on Saturday? I live in North Seattle, have a trad rack, and lead up to 10+. Half day or a late start would be fine. I'll be checking here in the morning. Cheers Josh

Took four five footers onto a blue TCU right at the crux on Calamity Jam down at Smith, before I figured out the crux sequence

That's takes some serious dedication Minx. Just make sure you don't start to grow into the couch It makes it more difficult to obtain alcohol.

Time to go aid climbing

There was some good picket work previously done by Kiwi's. follow the linky linky. http://www.alpineclub.org.nz/documents/activities/instruction/snow%20anchor%20report.pdf As memory serves the conclusion was that all snow anchors are very suspect.