rhyang

Left side is about 50-ish degrees max and 5-6 pitches when in condition (blue ice). Earlier in the season it's just snow. The time to do it is late August-September. This year could be different... Haven't done the right gully - I'm told it's steeper, shorter, and often thin or melted out at the bottom.

Did you do the ice routes to the right / left of the headwall, or the loose 5.8 headwall itself ? No, I haven't done it either, just read that it's chossy. Shasta has had a poor year for snow. There's a pic on shastaavalanche.org from a few days ago taken from the northwest - looks like there are a lot of ice patches on the glaciers already. I read that someone recently made it up to 13000' on the Hotlum-Bolam before turning around due to high winds.

The womens prolite 4's weigh the same because they are 5-6" shorter (66 and 72" lengths vs. 72 and 77").

Looks good - the secondary points line up with the tip of the boot, giving you support on steeper terrain. On my grivels I just tie a knot in the excess around one of the strap ends (coming out from the metal ring in front) to get it out of the way, then maybe thread it back through the ring. If these are your largest boots then you could alternatively just trim the strap (use a match to melt the end & keep it from fraying).

I only have the older sabretooths. The 'bar with holes in it' slides under the BD anti-balling plates on those, unlike what you've got in your pic. Any thoughts on whether that's the way it should work with the new ones ?

Lowa Civetta ($40 off ebay, threw away stock liners) + intuitions, home-baked

rei-outlet.com

Here's a note from Doug Nidever's ice report (web link above) : Here's a pic posted on one of the BH route pages -

Just got back - did Louise Falls on Friday morning, laps at Haffner in the afternoon, Professor's on Saturday, and Carlsberg Column on Sunday. Friday it was snowing lightly, and colder, so the ice was quite good, though the pillar was hacked out with hooks all the way up. Haffner had quite a few lines for practicing - it really tuned up my technique (unfortunately at the end of the season ) Professor's was definitely wet ! And technically we didn't do the last pitch, which looked like a showery chandeliered slushfest. We saw avy debris just below the last pitch too, which was not comforting ... A local bud led us up Carlsberg on Sunday - very very wet and slushy but still good pumpy stuff. Sabretooths and goretex for sure Avy debris below the exposed approach from climber's right.

Sweet. That was a fun fun climb on 4-Feb. It had warmed up quite a bit even then, at least compared to the previous 2 frigid days. Was the South Fork still frozen or did you have to wade ?

I'm sure there is still some ice in the canyon, but it may not be in good condition. Good for locals to tool on in the morning hours maybe, but not worth 6-10 hours of driving one-way.

Sorry, wish I could help with the rideshare, but we're flying in the big silver bird ...

We're planning to be up there this weekend too. Someone told me that mixed climbing on the limestone up there in warm temps is a bad idea because holds can break off -> needs freezing temps to hold together. But the person I heard this from is a local ice climber up there, not a mixed climber. Any truth to this ?

The canyon is about 2000' higher than the town of Lee Vining... so it's a bit cooler up there. However, the angle of the sun this time of year is such that in the afternoon the ice can get baked if there's no cloud cover, particularly the Bard-Harrington Wall. Forecasted highs last weekend for LV were in the high 60's (!) Doug Nidever's ice report is here : http://www.sierramtnguides.com/index.cfm?navID=25 (note that the last update on March 3rd was right after a storm came through - it's been hot since then)

Thanks again all. Another dumb question - I have JoJo's ice guide, and it mentions another guide to mixed climbing by Sean Isaacs, such as for the Haffner Creek area. Is that one reasonably up-to-date ? Is there anything in the M5-6 range to TR at Haffner ?

Cool. How is the sizing ? Past experience with Asolo summits is that the US sizing is way off - my feet measure 9.5, and I usually wear size 10's; the summits in size 8 seemed right for me. Did it seem like the sizing was correct for the cholatse's ?

Thanks !

Sounds like a great time. I'm planning to head up in a couple of weeks. Any recommendations on hostels in Banff ?

Kind of tangential, but the new grivel air tech racing has a steel spike and slight curve to the shaft. The head is chromoly and looks mostly the same as the air tech evo, except that the pick is a bit thinner and has bevels in the teeth (like a technical pick).

Sweet pics. Gearhead question - what are those red tools ? DMM Rebels ? How do you like 'em ?

I managed to get out to Cody for 3 days last weekend and had a great time. Posted a trip report to Supertaco here : http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.html?topic_id=318466 Enjoy !

Vise grips are one possibility; another is using the crampon strap to pull on the toebail (thread it thru and pull both ends).

Grivel Italy's website has indicated replaceable heads for the monster tools for a few months now. I emailed GNA about it in October and they said the x-monster heads would probably be available around mid-winter. In the meantime, mountaineer.com lists them for $79 each ... I called them up to ask about this a while back and they said they don't actually stock them - special order from GNA ...

Sorry to hear that I guess I have just been lucky ...