Wastral

What? You mean I haven't been wasting my time at the ranger stations getting my red tape trimmed? Damn what will I do with myself. Beauracracy at its finest. Give em the middle finger is what I say.

Walking on Bear crap is a very common occurrance anywhere on the West Coast of BC North through alaska. In Knight inlet we camped on the only beach the entire distance of knight inlet. This was also where bears came to dig clams etc. We literally had to scoop the bear crap out of the way to lay down our ground mats in between the ferns. The only real trails in Western BC are bear trails. Walk anyone of them and you will be walking over fresh bear crap every 100 feet or so. Any logging road will have tons of bear crap on them as well. Bears don't like getting their B-hinds wet in the brush when they squat any more than humans do. Likewise burying your crap just means extra work for the bears. If you hike in and out on the same "trail" look at every place you crapped on the way in and its a near 100% guarantee that it will have been eaten by the local bears. T-P and all. I don't bother to even think of burying my crap in the woods in W. BC anymore unless its close to a road/human trail/water.

If you have the money, McHale packs win hands down. Keep the hips/Shoulders from hurting. I got old Alpiner modeals used and they are wonderful for larger loads. I do not own one of his smaller packs though they should be the same. The reason is that McHale packs down pull DOWN on your shoulders, this allows you to actually move your arms over your head without your shoulders having to lift your pack as well as your arms up. This is a BIG deal if you are doing anything even close to technical. Like anything off trail for instance. As far as I am concerned, any of those packs made by GoLite etc, with lightweight fabric will be shredded anywhere off trail in the cascades or northwest and not worth buying unless you like buying multiple packs. Been out with several different parties and without fail their lightweight packs/clothing gets shredded. Yippee skippy if you have tons of money and like buying equipment all the time. Likewise I find a 50L pack is good for a week as long as you are willing to strap rack/tat/slings/pons/rope to the outside. All 50L packs are not equal. I find "most" "50L" packs are in actuality far smaller than advertised.

The reason I posted the equation is to see if anyone who disagreed with me could actually think, or just blather. All you guys did was insult and blather. Let the idiotic ignorant blather continue. Let those who actually want to use their brain do some very very very simple math.

What I can't stand is folks like you name calling and shouting your ignorance to the whole world giving the rest of us environmentalists(me and others) a bum rap by lumping us in with your baffoonery ignorance. Do try 7th grade math occasionally. Apply said math skills to how much Steel(tons) AKA Iron is needed just for the towers of said windmills to come even close to meeting 50% of our(USA's energy) needs assuming 0 transmission loss and an absurd 30% run time on said windmills at full nameplate installed power conversion. Both of the last two never happen in conjunction with eachother. That doesn't even count the amount of steel for the bases to hold said towers to the ground. Now do a very simple look up of how much iron ore is mined every year. 7th grade math maybe Tvas et al can use a calculator. Somehow I doubt it as calculators don't have enough profanity buttons on them. Yes, if you count Hydro, then the NW is basically already self sustaining except at the end of the summer/fall when the reservoirs are running low. We aren't talking small pockets of the world like the gifted NW is for natural resources. Addressing 5 Million in a world of 6 Billion is not exactly germaine to the discussion at hand. Hell, BC could easily be self sustaining as well if they damned up their rivers which they have not done so far. They are planning several very large run of the river installations especially at the head of Bute/Knight inlet for Vancouver Island. Does making getting into that region much easier if they do so.

Yo ignorant moron TAV. Its Iron for the towers dumb ass. Iron is not rare at all. The problem is instances where it is concentrated making it economical to actually mine it. So according to ignorant TAV he believes a goal piece by a bunch of PR politician wannabies have a energy storage source to get to their 80% goal. Did you even read the article? Guess not. What a chump. If this was true, then it would have been written on the FRONT PAGE of every engineering journal and every magazine across the world and there would be umpteen multipage articles in every renewable energy magazine across the world and the electric car folks would be doing hand stands and jumping jacks. TaV, if you knew even 1 thing about engineering, I could properly slam your ignorance, but you are so ignorant I can't even sneer properly in your direction as you wouldn't have a clue what the first word meant in reality. For instance you believe intermittent wind power can be sent thousands of miles across the country by waving a magic wand. Europe who has been pushing wind for FAR longer hasn't figured it out yet and their power source is VERY close to their populations centers. For all intensive purposes, the east coast and south east have NO wind power resources. Would have to come from the Dakotas. Just gotta buy a few trillion worth of land rights to run a few gazillion miles of new lines down. The dessert rat was an example of how stupid environmental wackos are. Won't even allow 'sustainable power' sources across desert and force folks to go through the courts when all one needs is the land rights. See above why this is a near impossibility. TAV do yourself a favor, I like how you go around calling everyone a teabagger moron without even knowing their political party. So, everyone who points out reality is a teabagger idiot? Must mean you are an idiot it seems. Then again you believe that you can keep printing money forever without any consequences. Brilliant! Devalue the dollar so we get to run around with wheelbarrows of cash to buy a loaf of bread. Brilliant strategy dude. That is a real bread winning idea there. That way we can just devalue the debt we keep accruing and pretend like everything is rosy. Brilliant! Of course everyone will suddenly STOP buying US treasury BONDS. What a dumb ass. Keep burying your head up your ass. Take a sniff, don't light a match it might blow your head out your ass and you might sniff a bit of clean air and reality.

This is what happens when wind farms aren't willing to pay for transmission lines. They expect to use "existing" transmission lines built on other utilities dime. This is a giant hidden cost making wind power "look" nearly viable. See the giant fight in California over same such issue. A perfectly good place to build a giant wind farm out in the dessert, but the local utilities cannot accomodate them and they need to build a 250 mile transmission line and the environmentalists are busy worrying about dessert rats. That and the minor fact that to produce enough renewable electricity with wind power would require the entire worlds iron mining rights for five years to make said wind turbine towers for the USA alone. This doesn't even address the rest of the world. As far as I am concerned, any wind farm that is built MUST build in equivalent power sources for when the wind is not blowing. As our daily lives are not centered around the wind, rather they are centered around planning that power will be there when we turn on a switch. They can't continue to mooch off others and expect to be accomodated. Just like if a Giant Coal or NG power plant goes in they have to pay for upgrading the transmission lines to the power drain(cities). Why are Wind Farms that can produce a GW of power not subject to the same financial burdens(responsibilities of not overbalancing the electric grid)? To read about such giant problems that have taken huge resources to use, look at Europe. They have made Gigantic phase lag/lead stations with quite often 2nd sets of transmission lines to address the issue. If we think Wind power has any future, then this issue of over/under burdening the electric grid system must be integrated into the final solution.

Yes, run of the river/creek solutions can be and should be emmplaced. If one goes to Switzerland, you will find them Everywhere. Even on small creeks. I was staying working with horses watching a creek descent 2000 feet to the skagit river on the opposite side of the valley and was calculating how many kwh said creek would produce. Near a MW. The reason its not being used? Government regulations, namely the astronomical price of hooking up a power source to the grid. Just the "permit" costs over $400,000 before you even think of touching the environmental folks. If reality was kicked into the energy commisions heads they would take that $400k number and dump it down to 20k or less so folks who own said creeks or part of said creeks can actually use them. GeoThermal, currently has issues regarding salt/mud eruptions. We have no current models to adequately find such problems before we drill all the time. Here I am thinking the very large holes needed for such energy solution. The best folks for doing this would be the oil companies that so many like to deride. Why folks do this is beyond me. Deride the folks using all the oil instead. One will note that it is the oil companies 'leading' the charge with geothermal as they are the only ones with experience and readily available holes to use. Don't know about you but, I bet if one tapped into Yellowstone Volcano, it would solve quite a few energy needs, of course to extract said energy you need a giant sump of cold water and the only close sump is the Snake?Yellowstone Rivers and all the environmentalists will cry foul. The other option to make such Temp COld possible is gigantic "nuclear" cooling towers that most folks associate with nuclear energy as they use differences in pressure to condense said water back into liquid form thus decreasing the amount of cold water they need to operate. Your hundreds of miles on an electric vehicle at beginning of 20th century was a joke comment right? "upgrading" electric grid will get us 15% at most is what I have read. Still that is 15%. Lets see USA uses 4k TWh/year. 15% is about 0.6TWh per year or enough energy for another 50Million people or so. The $60B number is hopelessly low, but I agree it still needs to be done. Just the easements to erect the new lines in conjunction with the old will require the $60B. Just turning all those power stations from AC to DC will take $60B. You know how many giant power stations there are? Thousands, multi thousands. Its a daunting task. Pretty much those living out west have it made. Those on the east coast are screwed when it comes to renewables in ANY form wind, solar, geo, hydro. Thus, my comment regarding the need for superconducting power transmission lines.

Economic prosperity is driven by cheep resources either materially or energy. It allows the common person to dream big. When basic necessity cost of living(food/shelter/transportation) is lowered for all, that means it raises the average person up to be able to use their available resources in the best manner. Industrial revolution happened due to revolution in farming techniques lowering food cost for everyone. The industrial revolution was further fueled by cheep energy in the form of coal. Cheep energy in the form of fuel allows people to move and do what needs doing instead of being constricted to a very small portion of the world limiting their possibility of success. Until solar power costs lower(the panels themselves, not even efficiency wise), I don't see any possibility that anyone will ever get even close to even half. Momentary spurts of 40% don't count when the wind decides to blow as the common person doesn't get to choose when they have to go to work. If the computers and lights in the office are not on, its rather pointless. Intermitent power sources DO NOT match Coal/NG energy sources as those mainstay energy sources DO NOT turn on off quickly. Wind turns on off in a matte of minutes. Coal/NG turns on off in a matter of DAYS. Boiler heating/cooling. If one said add Nuclear to the equation as it can be turned on/off very quickly and doesn't have a Gigantic heat build up in its boilers like especially Coal does. NG not so much. Yes, today, we could install the solar panels needed by covering the world with them. Of course that still only helps for 3-12 hours a day and since we have NO VIABLE ENERGY STORAGE SOLUTION TECHNICALLY FEASIBLE, it means at best we can obtain 40%-50% of our energy needs in this manner at a HORRENDOUS cost. Then add in gigantic population centers in northern lattitudes where for 6 months out of the year, even solar is not feasible it becomes a mediocre solution regardless of cost considerations! 3 watts of power collected in Florida becomes 1 watt in New York by the time it is run through the transmission lines! What are you going to do, march everyone out of New York/Chicago/Boston/London/Seattle at gunpoint and force them to live in Mexico/Spain/Morocco/Jordan/India? Until we find a practical energy storage solution or superconducting transmission lines, obtaining 50% renewable is out of the question let alone 80% regardless of how much money is spent. That is the bottom line. Please do try to be somewhat informed about reality. Most see renewables as a wonderful goal(one can argue up front sunk cost verses imports in another thread etc) but right now there is no technical solution let alone a practical solution.

Now, if the money grubbers here in Washington would do the same. What you mean they aren't public lands after all, they require fees to use.

My bad, you do need a permit to switch out 2 receptecles though according to the NEC which most states/counties/cities adopt. So, its $4 for 2 receptacles that now cost $400. Corporation of 1 = self employed = not a corporation. You are using a corp for self protection, and in the same breath you go around bashing corporations on these threads as big bad evil entities. According to you, you are a BIG BAD EVIL ENTITY. Get a grip dude. All the "fraud" you posted JB, is nothing but products without the moronic "UL" sticker which means nothing, as the "UL" sticker doesn't mean much at all anymore as they create their own specs and regs as they wish. Some types of products by law are required to meet some specs and some are not, while those Safety hacks go around trying to claim all products should. For instance if an alarm clock doesn't have a UL sticker on its E-cord to the wall, it is considered "fraud". No one in their right mind is going to pay UL, 10k to test their E-cord when in reality the test or inspection if you will should cost no more than $10 because they have a monopoly they charge astronomical prices. As it stands, most alarm clocks DO have said stupidity sticker. Same reason all of our electronic gear has a converter box that is NOT UL approved, but the cord going to the box is "UL" approved. Now which part is more important... The cord or the transformer? All UL looks for is safety shields, prongs, etc. Something the common joe can easily see for themselves. "UL" doesn't actually test the parts that fail all the time, thus they are a joke. For instance an Electrical Box, nothing but steel from Cutler Hammer will have a UL sticker on it because it is required. UL doesn't actually check anything as there is nothing TO check. All those old electrical panels before the moronic "UL" weren't burning down houses. Its always loose wires that have nothing to do with said Steel electrical box. You guys really look like ignorant douche bags when you type the crap you do. Yet, you go beating the drum for more regulations which have 0 effect on reality but to make it harder on the common joe to make a living while letting the big problem children run free. People lived for thousands of years without permits on their houses, people won't willingly live in a house that is going to fall down. That is why when you buy a house you have it inspected first. You can see everything you need to see from the crawl space and the attic to know if its built right. Chinese bad drywall? That is why we have a legal system. Use it idiot, has nothing to do with regulations. When someone is willing to purposefully poison somoene to get rid of waste regulations won't work. You will note I have no problem as stated in my previous post about the Clean Air/Water and toxicity regulations. We can argue the validity of some of said regulations, but no one is going to argue that there are many substances that are poisonous. This still has no bearings on permits. You don't even have to test for said products, because anyone who already knows said poison is bad, will give you test samples that won't have said waste product in it! Are you really so ignorant as to believe they would throw it in their first batch run? ya, I know a lot of criminals are stupid, but Big time criminals making products are not. Seems you haven't tried building anything recently TAV, as if you had, you would know that permits for building and your utilities will and can run you $50k. My current project is running at $45k right now in Seattle. The total amount of "inspector" time at my current project is no more than 10 hours. Lets see, 10 hours of work, $45,000 in fees. Runs out to be a tidy $4500 an hour. Gee wish I could work at that rate! Do try to get your heads out of your asses before asphyixiating on your own farts that you keep blowing around the threads that you claim are "informed." Try a bit of reality instead of an internet search and copy paste.

Many corps don't pay taxes because they moved their operations off shore outside the USA due to immense regulations creating an impossible atmosphere to actually develope and manufacture a product. Thank all the permits required and jack ass inspectors to placate just to change out a single outlet, creating outlets that you buy for $2, but require a $200 permit and the requirement for a "licensed" and bonded electrician instead of some High School Graduate which is all the talent required to do said job in the first place. So, it turns a $2 outlet into a $300-$400 bill. THAT is why businesses are SPRINTING out of the USA. Add in the time delay to get said jack ass moronic permit and inspection done delaying the final product by additional days turning into weeks when you have multiple permits etc... Also, since profits from outside the USA are heavily taxed it makes no sense for said corps to bring the money home. Thus, said profits stay oversees where they build more plants requiring less manufacturing at home in the USA. Most corporations aren't actual businesses either. IE employee total of 1. Do, I believe that we should increase payroll taxes a small margin across the board? Yes, but only if one slashes spending at least 30% across the board from ALL programs, no matter what PROMISES were made. Its time to get real. Regulations need to be addressed as well. I am not talking the overall reaching regulations like the Clean Air Act or Clean Water Act. When one goes to build a home and you have to budget 6 months to deal with the damned regulators and $50,000 in permit fees before digging the first shovel full of dirt for the foundation, it makes owning your own house next to impossible as the common joe Can't afford said house. Thus, another reason we have so many defaulted loans, because all the MORONIC permit fees jack up the cost of living for the common joe, thus keeping the poor, POOR. THIS MUST BE ADDRESSED! It never will I bet, just more beaucratic crap added on till no one can do anything and the ONLY way to do anything is its better to ask for forgiveness instead of permission.

Heres wishing they had made Ruby into a Ski resort eh? Better than Whistler for scenery IMO. No bias here...

Apparently you have to be so stupid as to pay $100 bucks to have someone tell you how to pick your nose. Thanks to the mountaineers, all idiots need not fear, they have a class for you!

Apparently all such idiots are in the mountaineers... Never had any positive things happen from any mountaineer. Either neutral or bad. Not exactly a good track record.

Me 3!

Get in shape, after that everything else is easy. Not in shape = slips = injuries = death possibly. Everything else is secondary especially if you have no experience. That is the bottom line. In shape, class 3/4 for the inexperienced is perfectly safe. In shape, snowfields are perfectly safe as you won't be slipping and sliding due to fatigue. That is the bottom line. If you are a newbie and not in shape, I won't take a newb anywhere dangerous. If experienced and out of shape, sure, no problem. Being fit is the #1 priority for mountain climbing. Not to mention mtn. climbing SUCKS the BIG ONE if you are not in shape.

"brake"? You stopping eh? Couldn't resist. Our brilliant college students these days eh? Smooth

Most beginers think that 35 degrees is 45 or 50 degrees and 45 degrees is 90...

If I wasn't sick all the time or wanting to go elsewhere when I am not sick, I would go to hood with you or say, the Adams Glacier route. Otherwise their "normal" routes are bland and boring IMO. I figure I can do said boring routes when I am 75 and decrepit. North Cascades/BC baby is what I find far more rewarding than any volcano. You can learn crevasse rescue without ever going on a glacier, just find a steep slope and practice. Practice Holding a slip as well and find out how hard(erm impossible) it is and how rediculous holding a slip on 45 degree stuff is. Best practice before ever getting on a glacier is actually going up mountains in spring/early summer that have very steep snow to learn balance, and avalanche danger before ever stepping foot on a glacier that now adds snow bridges that fail and holes you can fall into.

This topic always reminds me of when someone from Georgia decided he wanted to start mountaineering and some folks at work who were part of the mountaineers took him out up mt. si. The idiots loaded him up with 45lbs of gear and RAN up mt. SI and down. Needless to say the new guy said, to hell with this, and quit, selling off his backpack and boots the next day. Moral to the story, don't run the new guys into the ground, trying to impress them with how badass you are. Its supposed to be fun and enjoyable. Likewise, I remember two guys I took out simple mountaineering from Ohio. One was in shape, the other was sorta, but carried a 60lb ill fitted pack and no matter what we said he wouldn't believe us and wouldn't get the crap out of his pack. We took him up Buck, Maude, 7 fingered jack etc in the area, all off trail. Very moderate stuff, but lots of elevation gain. He also slipped and fell crossing a meadow ripping his brand new pants 4 miles into the trip. He was also expecting to go hiking, and not mountaineering. Not sure why he thought this as he bought an ice axe... The other guy was beaming his smile for all to see from ear to ear. No, we weren't moving fast at all. Longest day was 10-11 miles hiking back to the car off of liberty cap where both promptly dumped most of their crap out of their packs we told them at the start they would not want, dropping their packs about 10lbs each at which point we then headed back into the mountains after a little R&R around the campfire. Even the guy with the ill fitted heavy pack weighing 1/3 or more less now was a happy camper and beaming from ear to ear with a giant smile. New mountaineers will never believe what you say. Take them on a short climb to prove them otherwise. They will quickly get rid of their crap out of their pack. Good weather helps as well =).

Its on the west side of the crest in the ALpine Lakes Wilderness. You are looking at Summit Chief, Chimney, Bears Breast, Lemah etc. Its easy rambling with a huge number of lakes to choose to go to. When my bro and I did it I think we went past about 20 lakes. It is also shown in the Becky Bible. We exited out over Big Snow mountain. Started at the Middle fork went up valley to chain lakes. From there go wherever you wish. Enjoy. Bring a fishing pole. Mosquitoes at Gold Lake were the worst I have ever beheld. Swatting 3 at a time was not exactly an olympic feat. Going for 5 was a bit more problematic... Was peak mosquito season when we went so we generally slept on the ridge tops. Fall would be an AWESOME time for this ramble as well. We didn't actually follow the low route as shown on Becky's map we wandered all over the place. One can ridge run between Iron cap and Old Goat mountain as well.

Yup, for climbing perspective looking at the pickets from Luna and the ridge to Fury is purely amazing. Next Best would have to be Sahale arm for perspective anyways and then white rock lakes followed by high pass off of Buck Creek Pass. For different region perspective anyways. Otherwise top of Mt. Triumph is pretty darned good as well. High Lakes route in Alpine Lakes Wilderness is top notch as well.

Watching multi house blocks ripping off peaks in BC coast range is even cooler yet, unless you are in their path. In rare spots can you see this in the cascades. Couple spots on Ranier etc.

This is their trip. http://www.mountainwerks.org/cma/2004/pickets/index.html I would still get the 7.5min quad if you could before going unless of course you have the ability to print off your own maps. These maps will help verses going in blind. Otherwise print off the web is decent as well though not legible generally. You have to know the intervals on the topo along with max heights generally to figure out the interceeding points etc.