northvanclimber

my friend and i drove into the ghost last year in a 2wd volvo. not such a good idea. after getting the car stuck in a snow drift a couple minutes after going down the "big hill", we turned around the car (after much difficulty in getting the car moving again!) and headed back up the "big hill". as the name suggests, it was a very big hill.. and covered in several inches of bulletproof ice. the car barely made it a third the way back up the hill. we ended up spending about 45 minutes chipping away at the ice using our ice tools in order to clear a 30 foot patch of road for the car to get going again and get some speed to clear the rest of the hill. since the car was borrowed from a friend, i'm glad we got it out of there! in contrast, an all wheel drive car drove by us no problem... looks like an awesome place, and would love to go back, but will take a 4x4 on our next trip.

dang. the link got moved. here's the text: Canada shreds plan to scrap paper maps Last Updated: Thursday, October 12, 2006 | 10:37 AM ET CBC News The Canada Map Office has found its way out of the scrap heap. The previous Liberal government decided to close the map office, which provides regional dealers with large-scale topographical maps that show details about terrain and elevation. The plan had been to move to digital maps only. But Natural Resources Minister Gary Lunn announced Wednesday that the Conservative government has yanked that plan off its course, and the map office will remain open. Kathleen Olson, a spokeswoman for Lunn, said Natural Resources Canada received a flood of letters protesting the planned closure. "We did start seeing a lot of commotion around the idea of this office closing," Olson said. "The minister wanted to find out more about it and once he did, he quickly realized that this is not something he wanted to see happen." Paper maps vital Map librarian Heather McAdam was among the many who cried out against the plan to provide the maps only over the internet for Canadians to download and print themselves. McAdam, who works at Carleton University, said that won't help the third of Canadian households that don't have internet access. And she said many Canadians prefer paper maps to digital ones because they can be spread out to show a much wider area at once. "When you want to plan something or you want to look at something, you have to see the beginning and the end," she said. "How do you look at that on a screen?"

gov't "shreds" plans looks like all the complaining worked!

my g/f bought a new pair of la sportiva katanas, but they're too small for her . asking $95 (canadian), worn only a couple times and never outside. if you're interested, email her at lavina@antiflux.org or PM me.

might have more luck here: http://www.skaha.org/

I just recently got a front loader, but it's a new "high efficiency" washer. as a result it doesn't really immerse the contents of the washer in a ton of water... any idea if it'll still work okay?

no thanks. just finished my thesis this summer!

whoops... should've mentioned the route (although only one is depicted in alpine select.. but yeah, the north face of weart...

you probably won't need much pro as many people routinely solo the route, but it kinda depends on your experience level. expect some ice at this time of year. regardless, you might only be able to get onto the ridge via the weart-wedge col, as the alternate route that short cuts part of the ridge by accessing the ridge via the slope above the icefall probably has a huge bergshrund across it right now. fun ridge, have fun on it! i did nearby mt. weart a month or so ago. probably harder to get onto the face right now due to the huge bergshrund, but i'd definately recommend the route to people. just bring a little bit of rock pro for getting onto the face.

oh, maybe. wasn't sure if that was the same "descending" incident jeffski was referring to. only four deaths, while very tragic for those affected, is a pretty small number considering the number of climbers that visit the area and the number of stupid things you see people do sometimes!

add one more, here's the obituary: "DAVID CHRISTOPHER GUNSTONE, 41, a popular rock climbing enthusiast and guide book writer, died May 31 (2003) in a fall from a cliff in British Columbia. The laid-off Boeing Co. electrical engineer fell about 100 feet while descending Exasperator on the Grand Wall, part of a formation north of Vancouver known as the Squamish Chief."

the petzl manuals always show that you can add friction to your rappel by using two carabiners to attach the belay device to your harness.. anyone tried this???? any good belay devices for ropes in the 8.2-9 mm range? the reversino is the only belay device i know of that's specifically for smaller ropes and the biggest it takes is 8.2 mm... the BD ATC-guide is supposed to be good down to 7.7 mm

http://clubtread.com/sforum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=18007

the autoblock is really just there to take the place of your braking hand should you let go of the rope. the benefit is that when you want to continue rapping, you can easily release the knot and be on your way. in contrast, if you actually want to re-ascend the rope, you'll want a prussik ABOVE the belay device... but, if you then change your mind and want to go back down, prepare to battle with that locked up prussik! and yes, you'd want the prussik to go around both ropes... unless ahead of time you figured you might run into a situation where you'd have to re-ascend the rope, in which case you could've put a big figure 8 knot at the top of rope at the station. in this case both lines of the rope act independently and has the added bonus that if there are any sharp edges and one strand of rope gets shredded, you won't die. obviously the last person to rap takes out the knot and comes down normally... um, assuming the whole rope shredding thing didn't occur!

was there just last week. the schrund was stil passable, but the real issue for many people was the sheet of ice that you had to climb above the bergschrund. make sure your front points are sharp, otherwise try the sketchy scree on the right (bugaboo side of the col). it's also a little bit of a fiasco to descend the col, but most people could make do by rapping on the bugaboo side of the col. some of the rap stations are just a little high up on the rock and hard to get too since they were likely intended for use with a higher snow level. you'll figure it out though...

once, i tried to speed things up and simul-rappeled on a single strand of a 8.7 mm half rope with a reverso.. good thing i was wearing gloves!!!!!! wouldn't recommend doing that again

lots of people use a single half rope for glacier travel. personally, i've also used a half rope for alpine ice too... maybe not the safest, but nice and light. just be aware that it's a thin rope that won't take a ton of sharp-edge abuse and because it stretches so much, complex cravasse rescue systems are a bit of a pain in the ass. i'd never use a single half rope on any technical rock as it could get cut .

went up last august only to find the glacier approach almost impossible (well, at least extremely difficult when navigating by headlamp in the early hours). came back and did it this june. was much better... just depends on the conditions of the glacier.

If you want to do any sport, you're best off heading just a little further north from squamish to the chek area, since the bolted climbs are limited near squamish. the squamish select guidebook describes the chek area (and the other popular areas, including those in squamish) well. for gear, there's tonnes in squam. just depends on what you want to climb. the mclane guide book lists the popular areas. you might try the apron on the chief if you want some fun slab multipitch, otherwise the smoke bluffs have lots to offer. the malamute is also worth checking out and the chief itself is the showcase if you're up for it...

i picked up the petzl myolite 3 last year after deciding that having just led's on my tikka was just no good for routefinding. so far, find it really good to be able to easily switch to the halogen when you need the extra juice... especially when negotiating ice falls at 2am...

Wow. good job, you guys are fast. these warmer temps will definately start melting down those snow bridges.. too bad, was hoping to do the ingram direct soon.

saw the coquitlam SAR practicing in the smoke bluffs about a month ago... hope they never have to rescue anyone on rock cause they were as green as can be .

was up on the north ridge on june 25/26. VERY warm up there. there's still enough snow on the glaciers that routefinding up towards the headwall isn't too bad (but personally i'd scout the approach the day before to make things easier). unfortunately, with the warm temps the snow isn't freezing up at night, despite "radiative cooling". personally, i wouldn't go anywhere near the headwall area until things start to cool off again. saw lots of stuff coming down all over the place as we descended.

Thanks for the steps, it made our ascent on the 26th a lot easier Was a great route, but dang, the soft snow made it a real slog at times, especially on the descent.. post-holing all the way back to camp. it was so warm at night that the snow didn't freeze up at all. saw lots of people (and i mean LOTS) on the colman/deming route, but with the warm temps, it's really a nasty slog...