eldiente

I'd second the mental aspect of it, all of my wall failure have been mental failures, not physical ones. The slow pace can be discouraging, but don't focus on it. Often you'll get later on in day and start thinking maybe we should stop for dinner or think about setting up the ledge as there is only a few hours of light left. Nope, don't even think about it, keep climbing until it is truly dark and you can go no further. Your belayer can work on cooking dinner and setting up the ledge while you lead one last pitch before sleeping. Don't worry about getting to that comfy bivy ledge, climb as high as you can and set your ledge wherever you end up for the night.

Index or Squamish would be good choices. The big surprise for people going to the the Valley is how slick everything is. On moderate pitches (5.10 an under) your always on your feet, I find my calves and toes get tired long before my arms do on Sierra granite. Go to Index or Squamish and practice your slab skills. Also, really work to dial in a good french free system. Even a hard pitch might be doable if you yank on a few pieces of gear to get you past a crux move, this is much faster than trying to aid up the same pitch.

Yes, true. The ownership needs to be transfered to BLM, State Park, or County to work well. I hate to mention it, but Smith is really a shinning example of how a high-traffic crag should be operated. Yes, it is expensive, and yes there are a lot of rules at Smith. However the crag is clean and a lot people pack in there ever weekend without leaving behind a huge mess. I still like free and wild places, but if you've got to share a crag with a 100 strangers, I'm favor of a small fee to keep the place clean.

Yes, charge for camping, or even charge for parking. Just give us a place to take a shit.

This is a problem that needs to be fixed. If your concerned about this, please email. vantagepoop@gmail.com We are getting together as many people as possible to address this issue. We've been talking with the Access Fund about this issue and the WDFW but so far nothing.

Well I think KKK is the one with a big boner right now. He made a point! Although take a look at who was working hard to close that loophole, our own Sen Wyden. Dirty politics aside, they (AIG) might have been legally obligated to pay those bonuses no matter the public thinks. One of the key roles of government is to enforce contracts and uphold legal arguments even if the contact is dumb. All the more reason to let them file chapter 11, all of these contracts would be nill.

Interesting question, although I'm not sure taking a minor climbing is any different than taking an adult climbing with you, both could sue you just as easy. If your adult partner is killed while climbing, his/her family could try to sue you just the same as a minor's family could. Also, I'd say taking a kid climbing is no different than driving your neighbors kid to school, both have risks. If your willing to drive someone else's kid around in your car, your already taking more of a risk than you would be going climbing with the same kid. Thoughts?

Maybe your friend should tell this guy he is being unsafe too with that single binner he is about to clip. [img:left]http://www.8a.nu/images/10/10_633718424605415100_demenciasenil9a_fa.jpg[/img]

High-end sport routes at Ozone? Where are these routes?

Good old American family values.

Have your friends post here on CC.com. I'm sure there is some skilled individual on here that would love to make a few bucks to help some people walk-up Rainier.

1) WWII is *not* part of the New Deal. 2) War is not socialism. 3) If you agree that massive military spending is the way out of recessions/depressions in general, then Obama needs to invade a few countries. Of course our recent massive military spending hasn't seemed to do us much good. Your arguments are weak and simpleminded. "War is not socialism." Huh? My simple mind is not following. Is that a complete thought or just a starting point? Now that I think about it, maybe war is the ultimate form of socialism? If we think of socialism as a compulsory way of forcing others to share their wealth to satisfy some "collective good" than this would be exactly what a war is. The government takes your money (taxes) forces you into government employment (draft) so that the group as a whole can prosper by killing some brown people (the collective good) in a country that most of us can't even spell. As an added socialist kick, after you lose a limb you'll now get to be in a lifetime socialist program called the VA. Yes, war is the ultimate pooling of our resources,very socialist yes? The point I was making earlier was that debunk this thought that the New Deal (government spending) was a failure yet WWIII (government spending) was a success. Both were the same damn thing. Building a tank and a fancy ski lodge in Oregon is the same thing. The tank has a shorter lifespan than a ski lodge, and the "good" a tank creates is debatable but aside from that they are the same. The government pays a bunch of people cut down tress (Timberline lodge) or dig up raw metals (tanks) at a much faster pace than they might have in the private sector. The New Deal and WWII were very similar, the Fed spending tons of cash for people to consume raw materials at an increased pace.

Wrong. The economy only recovered after the War Machine revitalized it. Nice try though. Why didi WWII bring us out of the depression? Oh yeah, massive government spending,huge deficits, large government project (ships, tanks etc) and a huge increase in the the number of people hired by the government (army) People always like to us WWII as proof that the New Deal didn't work and that only the war turned things around. The New Deal wasn't big enough, it took a real crisis (war) and really massive government spending (war) to end the depression. So KKK, if you think WWII ended the Great Depression, your really arguing that what we need right now is more government spending?

Maybe there should be a list for everyone that has gone up Outer Space?

Freddie Mac was actually a very conservative lender. Most of their loans required 20% down for a house and required good credit scores.

Your quoting Young Republicans of New York? What all three of them from Buffalo? I'l try anything once. For the last 6 years we tried lower taxes on the wealthy, that was a disaster, even the wealthy people ended up hurting. Take a look at this link. http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/02/clinton-economic-record-and-rising.html During the Clinton years, the rich were taxed heavily yet they still made more money (in relation to inflation) than they ever did during Regan/ Bush years. Also note that during this time where we were taxing the rich heavily, the poor folks actually did better for themselves too. During the Bush years, taxes went down, and the rich ended up doing very poorly as did the lower class. Draw your own conclusions but in the last 30 years, cutting taxes for rich folks hasn't helped anyone, including the rich. -Nate

I fully support them going out of business. Yes, a lot of people will lose their jobs, a lot of those people happen to work in swing states that you have to carry to win a national election (off topic) These loans can put off bankruptcy for a few months but there is no hope for recovery for these giants. It would be the same if the government started pumping billions into the VHS industry, no matter what they do nobody wants to buy VHS.

My 2cents says do it in a day and leave all the crap back at camp. How does an average climber do the route in a day? Here is the "easy" way to do it, takes a bit more time but makes for a nice outing if your like me an hate climbing with a heavy pack and don't like walking around in the dark. 1.) Go early season when there the Sherpa Glacier is still in. Day 1. Hike in via Mountaineers Creek Hike is about 6 miles with some mild bushwhacking,enjoy the walk, sniff flowers, take a few pictures. Set-up camp at the base of the N. Ridge, scope out the descent cook a good dinner. Day 2. Get up early, climb the lower Ridge. (sometimes called complete N.Ridge) OR trudge up the Stuart Glacier and go up the notch to join the Upper N. Ridge. Summit with daylight left and start moving down the Sherpa Glacier back to base camp. Hike out to car if you still have energy. Or do a third day. Day 3.) Sleep-in at base camp, pack-up, hike out to car. Yes, this makes this a full 3 day outing for one route. On the plus side you'll be climbing light and doing it with a good night's rest. Double Plus, you'll be camping in a beautiful spot. (no permit required) Base Camp Gear. Tent, beer, all the comforts of home. Bugs are bad there, they could kill you without a tent. Route Gear. Approach shoes, (boots are too heavy) light crampons for Sherpa descent and axe. Small stove and pot to melt water at the notch. No bivy gear, bring a jacket and plan on topping out before it gets dark. You'll be less tired because your not hauling heavy bivy gear. Rack. Small rope, 60M x9mm would be fine but 30M of 8mm would be great for cutting weight. Depending on much simuling you do, I'd bring double set of cams up to a #2, single #3 and #4 and a couple of nuts. For this style of climbing I like to bring a lot of extra cams so I can do long blocks without re-racking, cams weight more but are worth the weight as they are so fast to clean. Comfy rock shoes.

That's lame. I've often wondered if is safe to leave gear up there. Maybe leaving a note on the gear would have helped? (probably not) When stuff like this happens, you always wonder what the thieve was thinking. How did he/she know when you were coming back? Can you imagine the situation where you you bump into the thief as they are walking out the door with you gear? That could be ugly when the victim has ice tools in hand.

I'm not sure you could even get bolts to stick in that crap. I tried to free climb the first pitch of some route out there years ago and it was like ice climbing on mushy snow. You grab a hold and it would gradually start to compact and slide down until you quickly grabbed another hold and repeat. Too bad, as it is a nice looking wall.

It had always been a great mystery to me. I've always assumed the bolt chopper was a non-climber, maybe a local land-owner or some folks from the Bible School. It would make no sense for a climber to chop anchors from an established route, especially at a dirty crag like that. I'd give $$$ to find out who this person(s) is. PM me for your reward.

For what it is worth. I've replaced the same set of rap anchors twice out there, only to see them get chopped within a day. This anchor has been chopped a few times already, there is at lest 8 holes there now and a mess of a epoxy to boot. Who is chopping all these anchors? I replaced the bolts as I was getting tired of rigging long static lines to trees and wanted to make it a bit safer getting to the edge. Oddly enough, there is one bolt for an anchor there (old) and whoever chops the new anchors always leaves this one behind.

At least not down in Australia.

Myself and Winter climbed some very nice ice on the shoulder of the Spur on Saturday. Very good stuff there, fat maybe 5-6 different flows in good condition ready to be climbed. N.Face looked good with the gullies having obvious flows coming down. Everything is either blue ice or rock hard neve. There was a bit of small rockfall coming down the Spur, mostly from the wind. No signs of icefall, very cold which helps. We met a party going up the N.Face on Sunday (Collin?) They might be able to give you some beta. Copper Spur Ice

We (Chris and myself) ran into a pair of climbers at the Tilly Jane cabin on Saturday night. I forgot your name, but we swapped a bit of notes before heading back down to the car. I was just curious to see how your climb went on Sunday, looked like you had good conditions for it. (Thanks for the Whiskey too!) -Nate