waterboy

Hello, Can you please help by writing an e-mail to the US Forest Service and ask them to reconsider not opening the Glacier Creek Road (#37)until the fall? This road provides access to the Coleman Glacier Climbing route, the North Ridge route, and ice cragging on the lower Coleman glacier. Given the facts that: 1) The Federal Governement is almost literally begging to give away tax dollars as part of the stimulus package, and... 2) The Road accesses the #1 glacier climbing destination in North America. I don't know how this got missed, but clearly climbers are not being represented as a user group. The e-mail should be addressed to Jim Mitchell: jbmitchell@fs.fed.us and Jon Vanderheyden: jvanderheyden@fs.fed.us Phone number for the Sedro-Wooley ranger station is: (360) 856-5700, ext 0. I apologize but I don't know who the appropriate congressional representative would be. So if I'm going about this wrong, I'm open to other suggestions. If there is a coordinated interest group already going, I'm happy to get on board. I would think that guide companies have some revenue at stake, as well. Thank you.

Thanks for the TR - I did that climb a couple of weeks ago while in Chamonix. The Cosmiques is definitely a classic that lived up to everything I hoped it would be. On the tram ride up I ran into Colin Haley - got to talk with him for a bit. While in Cham we also got the chance to ski the Vallee Blanche a few times, and to climb the Goulotte Chere (twice!) Chere was defintely in, but at a "D" rating I thought the ratings were very easy compared to the North Cascades. Glad you had a good trip!

Hello, We are heading to Chamonix for a climbing trip April 10-18. Does anyone have any recommendations for hotels that are good for climbing trips?

Hi Paul, Thank you for the reference. Jim did a fine job on sharpening 3 of my screws - and I got them back 4 days after I sent them.

Hi There DH! To answer your question: yes, I think what you're missing is that this photo is one of the upper pitches, which Shannon called AI2. Having been up there myself, I would concur. Although you can see footprints in that photo, there were definitely sections even on the upper pitches that only took frontpoints and picks - thus, AI2. Hope that helps and thanks for the question!

Tim, I'm going to be in Chamonix April 12-18. I will have my skis and climbing gear, although probably won't have enough time for the Haute route. I would be up for climbing something in the Mont Blanc range. I already have a partner lined up for the Goullette Chere, but I might also be interested in planning something on the Cosmiques ridge or something like that. Does anyone have any good hotel recommendations for climbers in Chamonix?

Best wishes for a speed recovery, Anon. And thank you for posting your experience. With much respect-

Hi Shannon, As always, great to climb with you. That was a superb lead on the first pitch. Here are a few more photos: Shannon at the start of the climb Shannon at the top of the first pitch: Shannon on the traverse - nevermind that suspect tree that I slung: Shannon on the summit:

Hi Bob, Can you forward me Jim's e-mail address? Thanks!

Hi Layback, Good to see you up there last weekend. Thanks for the picture of Leigh. As mentioned by Alex, here is a photo of the top tier of Rambles Center, which we were climbing when you took those photos down below. We spent all day Sunday and Monday at Oregon Jack - it was spectacular.

Thanks Brad! I actually broke it yesterday in Canada (up in Marble Canyon), so that is fitting. I can arrange it with MEC. I love Canada.

Hello, Does anyone have any recommendation on where to find replacement picks for the Grivel Alp wing? I know Grivel North America packed up shop back in September, but wondering if there are any replacement picks still in North America?

Yes it was a fun climb. Winnie's slide was not so bad once you're on it and then it looked really easy as that older Swedish gentleman did a standing glissade the entire way down!

Yes I was up there last Sunday - Skiied the Easton with my wife and my dog. Very straigtforward - you should be able to drive to the TH now. There is the standard bootpath all the way up - firm snow - no bridges - doesn't get any easier. Have fun!

Hi Matt, Kudos to you for leading this effort. Very much appreciated. Honest question though - Where is the forest service in all of this? I mean, I can understand work parties for trails. But for forest service roads, isn't that the forest service' responsibility? The good thing is we have taxation WITH representation, so a lot of times the "squeaky wheel" principle works well. I remember when we put pressure on them in '05 when that road was closed. After many letters (I wrote one of them), they eventually opened up the road. In fact, do work parties on forest service roads set an undesireable precedent? Interested in your perspective. Thanks Matt.

Hi Kaskadsky, Glad you were able to get out there. FWIW, the Temple is the peak on the left in this photo. Leigh and I did it last June. As for High Priest, this is the view from the base of the North Face. Having been up there, I agree that the route descriptions in Beckey and other readily available sources are confusing for High Priest.

Sol, Great Job. Good to see you guys up there. You guys rocked. We were the party that summitted the same day via the West Ridge (the non hardman sit-start). We had approached the day before via Aasgard - what a great day! Sorry about mucking up the rappel in front of you - one of our ropes got stuck! Here are some more photos: http://www1.snapfish.com/share/p=344151213572637561/l=394847538/g=7172166/otsc=SYE/otsi=SALB Again, Great job.

We went up there on Saturday. The road is now open to MP 19, which is 1 mile from the log crossing for eldorado. The rest of the way is blowdowns and avy debris, which I think would be cleared up soon. Not having to use the bikes that we brought, and the talus field being mostly covered in snow allowed us to tag eldorado in 1 Day. We were slowed a little by having to break trail above 6,100', but no big deal.

I thought they were worth it and I'm going to bring them again this weekend. It's 7 miles from the bridge to the TH, so it's probably 1-1.5 hrs on bikes, vs 2.5-3 hours on foot.

Piece of cake - even Bodie had no problem. Looking forward to Fisher Chimneys.

Yes I was up there on Saturday to do a recon for my Eldorado climb this weekend. First of all, as reported, the road is closed at MP 12.7 The bridge looks fine to me but I'm no engineer. We biked 7 miles (-500', then +700') to the Eldorado log-crossing. There are about 12 major blowdowns to hike-a-bike over. We hiked up Eldorado Basin quite a ways - the snow starts at about 4,000'. There is no need for any kind of flotation - I'm very glad I didn't bring skis and I can't imagine where you would need snowshoes until next January. Regarding the road, I don't understand the bickering between the forest service and skagit county, all I know is that it hasn't been fixed yet. They say June but then it will be another long while for the park service to get in and clear out the blowdowns and avy debris. Hope you have fun if you get out there.

CFire, Do you know if the officer was Michael Gardiner, Jr? If so, he drives a Sherriff's vehicle but actally works for the Forest Service and has been deputized by the county. He is usually the one patrolling up there. I've talked with him on several occasions and he is usually a pretty nice guy. He seems pretty professional and God knows he has a difficult job up there. However, this brings up my beef with him and the Forest Service: He has unilaterally made the decision to permanently (each season) lock the gate for the road to Pilchuck at the Heather Lake TH at a time he determines. This year it was well before there was any snow on the road to Pilchuck. It used to be that the gate was left unlocked, which opened up many more winter recreation opportunities on Mt. Pilchuck. Now, because of the extra 12 miles of round-trip distance, it rules out day-trip skiing and scrambling for a lot of people. I have asked the ranger in Verlot which user-group of the National Forest has advocated the locking of the gate (even before the road is covered in snow)? The Ranger said this was a unilateral decision by officer Gardiner. I asked officer Gardiner why he wanted the gate locked, and his response was it was difficult to Patrol the circus and the riff-raff that usually occurs in the winter time on that road. Seems to me like that is not right - to rule out a great winter recreation resource for thousands of people to make one person's job easier. Now, I realize that there are other (and better) winter recreation venues in western washington, but I do not see why this one should be ruled out. I have written to Officer Gardiner and I encourage you to do the same at mgardiner@fs.fed.us If this does not produce any results I encourage you to write your legislator. I believe the Forest Service's official policy is to manage public resources for the most prominent user-group, which in this case I believe is skiiers and scrambers. I'm sorry for your unpleasant experience and I don't mean to hijack your topic, but I believe that area is being totally mismanaged by our public servants. Thanks

Hi, I have the month of December off and would like to go ice climbing midweek. Probably Lillooet but also Banks Lake or Leavenworth if they are in. Been ice climbing 4 years. I've done the N Ridge of Baker, the N Face of Maude, the N Face of Chair (Winter). I would say I could only lead up to WI3 at this point, but I've climbed WI4 on TR. I have twin 60m ropes and 6 screws. I am also wanting to go BC skiing if it snows in December (I'm on AT Gear) - I am pretty fit and teach level 1 avy.

Hi Guiran, Those are mine - check PM.

Hi Thanks for the Trip report. I have a question about rapelling off the Blueberry route - you mentioned a single 60m for the first 5 and then two 60m for the rest. I noticed that you are using twin ropes in your photos - what is the length of them? I have the same ropes (edelweiss 8.5mm, I believe) in 37m length. How do you think twin 37m ropes would fare on the Blueberry route rappels? Thanks!