gary_hehn

Thank you for the post ... I did as you suggested and raised a glass high.

Thanks for the great TR and pix, good work the two of you ... wow!

Yes mattp, I agree, a piece of gear would be one thing. I haven't heard from anyone so, I'm going to call the ranger stations to see if any inquiries have been left there. And, that should keep this thread going for a while longer

eldiente, my guess would be that the bowline knot became lose and simply fell apart, which it can do readily if lose. To make it more secure tie it as a double bowline (or round turn bowline) with yosemite finish. Tie off the end with a double overhand knot, making that more secure as well. I have been using this exclusively for more than forty years, except around beginners that only know the figure 8, and have never had any issues with it.

Fish on! Thanks anyway Matt, but no, this I need to attempt to return to the owner.

If you lost something on South Early Winters Spire this past week give me a description of it. You might want to do so via a message. If your description matches what I/we found I can work on getting it returned to you. I hope that, aside from misplacing what we found, you had a good outing.

Joseph! SWEET! It looks great; what a nice job you've done. Thanks.

Yes mattp, Your wording, "When using the Munter Hitch, have ropes in and out of the "knot" feed from the same direction if possible.", should help. Words and knots (or hitches) don't mix easily. I'll try to come up with some pictures. Did you see the link, provided above by Hokus, to the auto block technique? It is sweet! Thanks for the help.

Hokus, thanks for the link to another great Munter trick! The hitch that keeps on giving.

Hey Hokus, That was quite the thread you initiated. Although, the title subject seemed to get lost pretty quickly in there. And who would have predicted that it would end with a discussion of stability control systems in cars! Anyway, back to the subject: "Munter Hitch for Trad Climbing" and your wondering if anyone else likes the Munter for multipitch climbing. Well, I'm at least one of those. You say, "the more that I use it, the more that I find that I like it." It sounds like you have rediscovered the Munter in a way similar to me rediscovering Pink Floyd a few years back. But, let's do stay on subject. I ditched all my belay paraphernalia for the Munter hitch in 1992. And I have essentially been using it exclusively since. You mention not seeing it as viable for rappelling, but I use it for that as well. There is a trick to employ for minimizing, if not actually eliminating, the rope coiling issue. The trick is to hold both strands of rope, the strand going in and the strand coming out of the hitch parallel. I can't stress this enough! I'm not exactly sure why this works so well, but I believe it has something to do with the out going strand undoing the twist from the in coming strand. The instant one strays from holding them parallel the rope will tend to coil. This is not in itself a safety issue, of course, just the hassle of twisted rope. The good thing is that it is not difficult to hold the strands parallel and doing this actually becomes very natural and convenient. Do this when belaying and rappelling. When rappelling I generally hold the strand from below (the loose end) in one hand parallel to the strand from above while I feed the loose end with the other hand. Another thing that I like about the Munter hitch is that it has so many names. So, at one belay stance I can use the Munter hitch, at another the friction hitch, the Italian hitch, the half ring bend, the carabiner hitch, the running R, the half-mast belay (or as one climbing friend dubbed the half-assed belay), the UIAA method, or the halbmastwurf sicherung("half clove-hitch belay")-HMS. Hew, that makes for a long sentence!

Spire Rock south tower wall in Spanaway (Spamaway). This from "A Guide to Spire Rock" by Jim Phillips and Mark Webster: Elbow Delight Right arm in - 5.7 Right side in using crack only -- no face holds - 5.8 Left arm in - 5.8 Left side in using crack only -- no face holds - 5.9+ Try a lieback for a change of pace Short but sweet and easy to get to, depending where one is coming from. Phil, I see that you are likely in Bellingham; I wouldn't recommend the drive just to get to Spamaway. And yes, top rope. And can, of course, do laps. This could be a good partial day starter exercise. There is another good crack, "Lieback Crack", on the main south wall to right of "Elbow Delight" rated 5.9 when jamming hands and feet in crack only (no face holds). Hopefully nobody has pissed on it or worse. The place needs a fence like Marymoor and lights.

I guess what I meant by, “Fortunately, we are generally insulated from the most of it.”, is that we in the western world, don't generally fall victim to these sorts of atrocities. Of course, there is no saying it couldn't happen. Anything can happen once you get in the way of those in power. I agree with your assessment Hugh - it's all pissing in the wind, and it sucks! Only it doesn't suck for us nearly as it sucks for those ethnic minorities that get in the way of the “machine”. I just finally purged myself from Yahoo as a piss ant statement against them helping the Chinese gov't put journalists and activists in prison. Like they give a shit! At least it makes me feel better about myself. But, what do I do when I discover that the next service I use is run by ass holes?

I read an account of this as well. Yes, very disturbing and sad to say the least. What does one do? I hate that there is the element of evil in this world. Fortunately, we are generally insulated from the most of it. And yes fenderbender, slacktivism runs rampant ... what a great word! But, what else is there for most of us? Getting the word out has to be worth something. Maybe it will eventually get to someone who can actually DO something … I don't know – I'm frustrated.

Cool video, no pun intended, thanks for sharing.

I experienced ITBS early summer of 2002, at least that was the diagnosis I got. I maybe didn't have a real bad case of it although, I experienced one of my most painful hikes out from a climb. It was off trail and dark which didn't help any either. It felt like at any point my knee could simply seize up. I was given a list of stretches to do during PT. I ended up using a stretch that wasn't in the list, but was easy to do any where and felt at least as effective. I've seen runners performing this stretch. My left knee was affected so, while standing I would cross my right foot in front of my left foot and stand with my legs crossed. I would then bend down reaching towards my left foot with my left hand. One can make small adjustments to get a really good stretch of the band. I was a bit nervous about my condition, but I continued climbing the rest of the summer. When I felt the tightness I would perform the stretch for about 30 seconds. Again, apparently my case wasn't particularly advanced or severe. I do believe this stretch was particularly beneficial for me. I haven't had a recurrence.