RJRiha

I have absolutely no problem with these new anchors. If there were no anchors on top of Jello Tower, or only ONE set of anchors, then the hordes going up Midway would jam up the other routes, which can currently be climbed and rapped off. Last time I climbed the Fault, I noticed the large collection of tat on the bush (that can be easily seen from the ground) was GONE. I thought someone had done a good deed. What I didn't realize until my partner pointed out, that there was a nice set of bolts near that bush. Also, now with new anchors, a bunch of those nice looking climbs at lower castle are now cleaned up and look like they could provide a nice day of climbing. Before recently, the only clean routes there were Brass Balls, Mr. Clean, and the Fault. Now I can't even name all of the clean routes. I personally like that. Some don't. The crowds aren't going away in Leavenworth any time soon. But the crowds aren't going to Lower Castle....

It felt 5.9 to me. No harder than Ski tracks, The Bone, Deception Crack, etc...Actually, I think it's easier than P1 of Canary or S. Face Jello Tower. The feet are excellent on that pitch. If you thought that was a sandbag, have you been to J-tree or the Gunks?

Has anyone seen this yet? http://county5.blogspot.com/2012/06/liberty-ridge.html

How about the two belay bolts at the top of the first pitch of Outer Space?

Found some Smith sunglasses at the farside. Tell me where you were climbing and describe them and I'll get them back to you.

Here's some happy new year Index stoke....

Ummm....wow!

Sounds like a strange sequence. I do this, but there are other sequences: -Move up current aider as high as possible (using fifi, biner, or draw as necessary to maintain balance) -Place new piece -Clip other daisy/aider to new piece -Bounce test new piece if questionable by stomping on aider, then fully weighting and bouncing up and down (keep other foot in previous aider and hand in grab loop to prevent daisy fall if bounce test fails) -Move onto new aider -Remove other aider/daisy from previous piece -Clip draw/rope to previous piece Repeat until you are bored. If I'm doing really easy aid (City Park), I'll have daisy on the aider biner to avoid cluster, but if I even THINK I'm going to disconnect the daisy, I'll have a separate biner for the daisy to aider connection and aider to piece connection.

I climb with 2 daisies. One for each aider or pair of aiders (if using 2 etriers per piece). No switching daisies. As I said, I would consider unhooking the daisy from aider if I thought my top piece was crap and I risked a daisy fall (but would clip the rope to the lower piece first to eliminate the risk of losing the lower aider/piece).

If you're on the top piece, that means it's either: 1) Bomber, no need to test, 2) Tested, or 3) Downright scary and moving on to it is necessary. If it pulls, yes, you would daisy fall on the lower piece if using two daisy chains. But it's unlikely that a piece would pull between the time you move onto the upper piece, and retrieve the aider from the lower piece (you bounce tested the piece that you're on, right?). I would consider clipping the rope to the lower piece and unhooking the daisy prior to moving onto a piece in option #3, but one daisy is too risky for my personal preference (dropped aider) and it just adds another step to keep clipping and unclipping the daisy. If you think it's a bad technique though, you might want to inform Chris McNamara that he has it wrong in his "How to Big Wall" website and video series.

For basic gear (in addition to the aiders, daisies, and jugs), get a fifi hook (it's cheap). Then for pieces in addition to your free rack: DMM offsets (brass and aluminum) will be used ALL THE TIME, get a cam-hook or two, and some tiny nuts (sometimes you can get a great deal on these from someone who tried and didn't like aid). After you start making some money, start filling in the rack with small and offset cams and ball nuts.

Wishing death upon a fellow climber is seriously wrong.

One major bit of advice: Don't clip the rope above you before you move on to a piece. If it blows (which is what you are protecting against in the first place), you just made your fall longer. Clip your pieces after you move to the next one.

Well, that's one opinion; who's to say that opinion should rule the day versus this one: Since I haven't changed my opinion on what *I* believe adequate bolting is, you can chalk that one up to me being more specific on one post (death or serious bodily harm). Bodily harm is too broad, and I realize that (since it could mean a little road rash, bruises, etc). That's my opinion and I'm doing nothing but voicing it. I'm not against the existence of death routes. Nor am I necessarily against over-bolted comfort routes. What I am against is a mentality that one or the other is correct.

Who decides? You're immediately back to the lowest common denominator problem. Your perception of 'adequate' may not be shared by the next person who still considers your notion inadequate. What about the person who wants a clip every body length? Adequate should be defined as that which will not be expected to result in death or serious bodily harm should a fall occur. Should every climb be bolted like that? No. Variety is good. If you want skull and crossbones routes, well, lucky you (they exist all over the place). If you want moderately bolted routes, climb moderately bolted routes. If you want every body length, go climb Endless Bliss.

I wouldn't take the case of Southern Belle as ruining a cliff face. The route in question seems to be an expression of what can be done on rock in ground up style, considering there were sections where the climbing was reported as too hard to stop and drill. Read about Hall of Mirrors on Supertopo if you want to see what happens when slab just gets too hard to do ground up (they reported to stand on bolt hangers to drill the next bolt). That being said, I'd bet most slab routes aren't put up to make a point, or even craft a climb for others. The FA probably just wants to climb on unclimbed stone because he likes adventure and pushing into the unknown. Putting in more bolts takes time, and if you're comfortable at the grade, why not just run it out? I'd bet on most of these run-out climbs, the FA doesn't even care, or would support addition of bolts if a bunch of people wanted to climb his route. I'm not advocating rebolting every climb for every climber. Having a variety is ideal. I personally don't want to be strung out in the death zone when I go climbing, but that doesn't mean I want an uber-G rated bolt ladder either.

This is such a hard question, and I don't think the community will ever come to a consensus. Nobody wants every route bolted every 5 feet feet, but then again, MOST don't want routes with 1 bolt per pitch. But, there is the gray area in between, and most (slab) routes out there are in this gray area. If every route put up had no runouts at all, the next generation wouldn't be mentally trained to climb all these great routes. For every great test piece out there (Southern Belle, Bachar-Yerian) that gets a load of press, I wonder how many run-out death routes immediately fall to obscurity after the FA. I've always wondered why it shouldn't be ok for a later climber to add bolts to ground-up climbs if done in the same style (hand drill on lead). I would say if it's popular, no way, or if it is 'special' (SB/BY/etc), leave it as is.

I'm surprised you got down from the second set of anchors with a 60. I did the same rap with a 70 after climbing the 10c (awesome climb if you link the first two pitches), and didn't think there was enough rope on the ground to indicate that a 60 would make it...

What's wrong with DC? Many people do it for their first Rainier climb and thoroughly enjoy it. I know some don't like it because there are guided groups up the wazoo on that route, but the route itself isn't bad.

Got a late start and took a wrong turn on the upper wall trail (took a left and ended up above the upper wall). By the time we found the right trail, it was too late to entertain notions of shooting up the whole wall. The first pitch was tons of fun and very easy. It was my 3rd aid lead ever, and took me way too long (almost 2 hours). After shaking the cobwebs out, I started to cruise (could probably do it again in about an hour). Since there is such good pro on it, I'd be more comfortable with more moves on camhooks (they feel so solid when weighted). A little bonus though, at the top of the first pitch, I reached into the grass to stabilize myself to get out of the aiders, and I felt metal. I found booty! A damn near new condition Hybrid Alien!!! That's worth the trip by itself. The second pitch is definitely an eye opener for an aid newbie, but nothing a few hooks and trust in small brassies won't solve. It never seemed like there were more than 2 moves between bomber placements. The guide calls this pitch C2/3; I'm definitely not one to accurately critique aid ratings, but with a fair abundance of good gear, I can't see this meeting the definition of anything more than C2. Time was running short, so we bagged out. Next time I think I'll fix the first two pitches and attempt the rest the following day. If the first two pitches weren't too bad, should I expect to find the rest of the route to be fairly straightforward? The guide shows the remainder of the route to be mostly C1. I'm excited to see this "easy 5th class" last pitch.

Just read the report. What's so bad about the 6th pitch 4th class gully?

Great that I don't have to lug bigger cams up. From the pictures I've seen, it looked like a fairly wide portion of crack above the big roof, and the topo I have says 4". Thin should be fine; in that department we have a full set of ballnuts, two sets of brass nuts down the smallest, the three smallest WC zero cams, small offset TCUs, assorted nuts to #1 BD, camhooks, and a thin beak for hand-placing. I was more concerned with the possibility of having to hook old mank, inverted cam hooking, etc.

I am planning on attempting to aid Green Dragon this weekend, and have a couple of questions about the climb. I've heard that it takes more wide gear than a typical aid climb. How wide should I go with the gear? I would prefer not to lug the #5 in addition to the aid rack. This climb looks appealing because of the bolted belays and the ability to bail if necessary. We have limited aid experience...are the C2/C2+ sections particularly tricky?

From reading this thread, it is not entirely clear what area of x38 this new 11x route is in. Could someone please clarify?

Really??? So, you dangle out that topo, encourage people to climb it....but for someone who not only has a good chance of freeing the entire thing, but possibly getting the onsite, then it's not cool? I've heard of red-tagging something, but never heard of red-tagging a specific section of a pitch, or a specific move on a pitch. Is that common in Squamish??? Good work on the climb...looks spectacular, but you might want to work on the public presentation next time.