keenwesh

Don't find a partner, no one deserves the boredom that comes along with belaying someone on an aid pitch. Aid climbing is all problem solving, looking at what's in front of you and making it work. Here's a problem you have to solve before you can get off the ground. There have to be some blocks below that you could lasso, and/or a tree. Look harder. Alternatively, you can place several pieces that would hold in an upward fall and clove the rope into them as you go, making that the anchor. Using the haulbag as a "partner" is a handy trick when you want to have a softer catch, but don't rely on just the bag. Usually that technique involves the rope running off the anchor, down to the bag, and then back up to you. When you fall the bag gets yanked up, but stops once the rope comes tight on the anchor. In my experience it's kind of a pain to rig, and probably doesn't make enough of a difference to merit the work unless you're on some new wave A4 pitch.

I brought a buddies dog to the crag with me once and leashed him to a tree. Being the destructive little demon that he is with massive chompers he proceeded to chew through and fell the poor tree that I had tied him to. (Badger, NO!). I no longer bring dogs climbing with me.

Maybe it's just the bay area folks that are so militant about the discrepancy. The difference matters not. As far as the OP is concerned that batholith is chock full of excellent climbing. Many routes to dial in your skills and spend your time on.

Just a heads up, it's Sierra. Good to know before you unnecessarily pluralize it and betray the fact that you're not a "local" from the bay area.

I learned a ton from 3 weeks in the AK range. Would highly recommend it.

Sounds like you weren't using it correctly and/or you were using it with a really fat rope. The gri gri 2 can be a crappy device when using cords that are 10 mil or larger. Hold the gri with your right hand, with your pointer finger hooked under the metal flange. To feed slack hold down the cam with your thumb and throw rope out with your left hand. Once you figure it out it's easier to feed slack with than a ATC. If you're using a rope thicker than 9.5-9.8 the gri gri 1 is the better device to have. If you're belaying someone who's dogging it's way better than a tube style device. If you're ever going to start aid climbing a gri is essential, it is actually impossible to stay awake while supine on a portaledge in the afternoon sun on el cap. You can snooze and belay at the same time, not so with an ATC. It's the best aid soloing device out there if you're dumb enough to get into that miserable pursuit.

What telemarker is talking about is the same as a far end hauling system for solo wall climbing. Replace the swivel/haulbag in the bottom of this picture with yourself. Normally this would give you a 2:1, however since you're hauling yourself you get an extra mechanical advantage (3:1) as any weight you pull down with takes away from your weight (thanks to Newtons wonderful 3rd law!) And as far as escaping onto rappel, what telemarker said will work, but if you want to nerd out and practice something that makes passing knots while rapping with a haulbag a breeze tie yourself off to the ascender with a munter mule on a separate strand, like a 5 ft length of 7 mil cord, with a knot in one end (to clip to the ascender) take off the minitrax, put on your grigri, pop the munter mule to unweight the ascender, take the ascender off, and you're happily on rappel!

I used a hurricane and D5 to replace the anchors on Sunkist a year and a half ago. Probably the best drilling setup out there. $250 is too rich for my blood, but if you want the best that's a fair price.

Welcome to CC! If you fall wearing a pack the weight can flip you upside down, this is best remedied by clipping your pack into your belay loop and letting it dangle below you. I've never used a chest harness and I've spent a lot of time hanging on and ascending ropes. Learn your crevasse rescue skills so that you can set them up once you've fallen in. I always cringe when I see rope teams with pre rigged prussiks and other assorted crap hanging off each member. Seems like all that stuff would just trip you up.

They're too radically curved in my expierence. I've just used them on a buddies woody a few times though, so I haven't used them very much. The nomic geometry is pretty good and climbs everything well. Only benefit I see to the ergos is they're slightly easier to hang onto for multiple fig 4's and 9's in a row. Fig 4's on nomics are just as easy to do, and the nomic doesn't feel awkward and unwieldy like the ergo. Unless you're going to climb exclusively at the hall of justice I'd say avoid the ergos (and every time I've climbed there everyone is using either fusions or nomics)

This will be my last update for the season, unless we get a good freeze/thaw cycle going in April and I bike up the road. Basically everything is out or on the way out. I made a naked solo lap through several different routes in the Gallatin Canyon and my nipples never became even slightly firm. It's been in the 60's in town for over a week. I heard a crash coming from the twin falls area this morning and when I looked I realized the source was Cleo's. The entire pillar is now in small pieces at the base. It has been a short season, with the warm fall and early spring, but so many great routes came in this year I can't really complain. Until next year!

Nope

I've been leading quite a bit this year on a single half rope with a mild core shot 5 meters from one end, so I say as long as the sheath is intact you should be fine. I vaguely remember reading something long ago about testing a rope that had a crampon point hammered completely through, resulting in the most horrifying core shot imaginable. The aforementioned rope pull tested to something like 70% of it's undamaged strength. Basically the gist was that ropes are incredibly strong. I would have zero concerns climbing on a rope that had spent a decade sitting in a closet if it was otherwise in good shape.

I totally misread what you wrote me earlier. My bad. That makes (a lot) more sense.

Yeah, he did it faster with 'pons and tools than in approach shoes. I think all that time in patagonia might have something to do with it Bailing meant getting to spend the night in a warm bed with a girl, whereas continuing meant topping out at 2 am, and shivering in between 2 hairy dudes until the sun came up and we figured out where we were. I do feel soft though so I'm thinking about going back next week.

The best tool is the one you've used the most. I've been climbing on Nomics for 4 seasons now and therefore use them for everything. If I could afford it though I'd get a set of quantum techs for alpine terrain. Still, I wouldn't say nomics are overkill, sure you can get by with a straighter shafted tool, but unless you've been climbing on that tool for 3 months it's going to perform much worse. And Kurt, I'd rather climb for 30 hours straight than endure an unplanned bivi. If you can stay fueled and keep moving upwards you're going to be warmer/more comfortable than shivering sleeplessly on a frozen ledge!

Somehow Airborne Ranger fell down. It was 20 feet in diameter at the base, so that's pretty scary. Didn't know stuff that big could come off. It's been in the mid fifties to upper sixties in town for the last week or more, sort of cooled off for the last day and a half, but super warm temps will return soon. Personally I would say unless you're going to get on The Nutcracker Hyalite isn't worth coming out for, but all the moderates are still climbable.

I liked reading a ton of old TR's, and figure his comments were just a long winded version of "bump". for fourteenfour

I did Birdbrain Boulevard down in Ouray a few months back and it took us like 3 hours up swinging leads. I've heard it referred to as like the Eiger, but a sixth the size, I doubt the accuracy of that statement. Most of it isn't very sustained, so for a 70 meter pitch there's maybe 20 meters of actual M4 climbing, the rest is just snow. Upper pitches are more sustained, but they're chimneys, so really secure and the lack of pro isn't really a factor. In the alpine I generally throw in a couple pieces and find a stance that I can wedge myself into if the anchor does blow, because generally the anchors aren't very bomber and it's a lot faster. I think carrying a small hammer to wail in pins would speed things up and increase security, as pounding pins with nomics sucks and you can't drive them home in the same way.

Probably trolling, but I'll bite. Every alpine route that I've ever climbed has been done far faster and in better style by many other folks. Hell, Alex soloed the North Face of the Grand in 20 hours C2C back in December 1992 when I was just a couple months old and shitting in diapers. I am not rad, I just aspire to be.

The nature of the climbing itself is insecure, crampons skating on slabs, tools slotted into thin cracks (on lead I'm swinging/hammering my tools into those). Even when following you can't really rage up that kind of terrain. Timing my buddies (we were climbing as a team of 3) my buddy with actual mixed climbing experience took around 15-20 minutes to follow a 200 ft pitch, whereas my other friend (who was climbing his first mixed pitches ever, found that out at the top of pitch 3) was more in the 20-30 minute range. We were leading in blocks and have our changeovers really dialed (I've climbed with Colin a ton, and that's something we really focus on) No issues pulling/placing gear, but when you're 30 feet above your last gear swinging into 2 inches of frozen moss you just can't move that quickly. I climb quite a bit of this terrain as well, both with and without a rope. I've definitely become faster, but have reached a sort of plateau. Meh, it sure is more rewarding and engaging than the actual difficulty would suggest. It's just disheartening when you can solo something like TC in 1/5th the time.

Another example, last winter I climbed Big Mac Couloir on McHenrey's Peak in RMNP (not living in Washington leads to being part of climbing circles in Colorado) and that route took us something like 8 hours for 1200 feet. The most time consuming parts were all sustained but moderate mixed terrain. 2 months later I climbed several 3k-4k routes in AK in a similar amount of time. I REALLY want to get faster on routes like that because it would open up so much stuff closer to home here in the Rockies!

Hey folks, I thought this might provide some interesting and useful discussion. I've found that when climbing grovely winter alpine terrain (think stuff that would be dirty 5.5 or 5.6 in summer) each pitch takes around 45 minutes to lead, and following is also time consuming, leading to the total time per pitch to take in the 1-2 hour range. I find that when I'm climbing this kind of terrain I'm not dawdling much, I get my turf sticks and commit to them, I'm not overprotecting anything. Yesterday I spent 5 hours climbing 4 pitches (each 200+ feet long) on the North Face of the Grand Teton and bailed from the base of the Guano Chimney, I would grade those pitches scrappy ~M4ish R/X, not hard at all, but sustained at the grade and falling is totally out of the question. In summer I would have soloed to that point in under half an hour. I guess my question is can anyone climb that kind of terrain in the half hour per pitch range? If so, what are they doing that I'm not? I'm thinking now that it's pretty much impossible to climb stuff like that much faster, and in order to climb routes like that in winter conditions you just have to commit to spending 15 hours on route (or however long it takes). If someone has evidence to suggest otherwise I'm all ears! This kind of terrain, if you happen to be a visual learner (that's Colin Simon's ass)

Here's a shot a buddy took of Bingo World today. Photo by Bud Martin, Climber: Nick Frazee

Bingo World is in, probably won't last very long but it's really good and solid! It's come in twice this year!