aikidjoe

Wondering if there is any news on Banks Lake? Thank you!

Hi all - Reaching out to the community for comments on experience. I'm building my top rope solo setup. I currently have a Petzl Minitraxion, and am thinking of getting the Wild Country Ropeman2 as the back up, since it's less than half the cost and functions similarly. Does anyone with experience using the Ropeman have any feedback? Allow rope to glide through well? Catches without slipping? Etc. Thank you very much! Joseph

Maybe the logic is that if you are with a team, at least someone will know exactly where you are and can call for a rescue?

Awesome Joe!

Thank you for sharing this!

I recommend American Alpine Institute if you're looking for a 5+ day course to cover the basics of climbing.

If you can afford it (both time off work and cost), I think it's totally worth taking an Intro course that covers both general mountaineering and rock climbing. It's the fastest way to get exposed to the basics and form a solid foundation, but it also depends a lot on the organization. I had a great experience with American Alpine Institute, which did a great job of teaching and not guiding when I did courses with them 10+ years ago, and I assume they are still great. Cost and being able to take the time off work are definitely factors, and I was very fortunate to take several of their courses (Intro to Mountaineering, Intro to Ice Climbing, Alpine and Tech Leadership 2). I've been able to grow from there.

I'm planning on heading to Mt Stuart West Ridge this weekend. I've climbed it once by what I suppose is the standard route, where you traverse on ledges on the south side to reach the last 2 pitches below the summit after the north side traverse. I have heard that, instead, you can just head straight up the ridge after the north side traverse, and it never gets above 5.6, which sounds much more fun. Can anyone confirm if that's true? Is there anything I should watch out for if we were to head that way? I'm taking my cousin, who is somewhat new to climbing, so I don't want to get into terrain that is tougher than that... Thanks in advance!

From Curtis Ridge stay low - around 7000 feet, and there's any easy snow ramp down to the carbon. It cliffs out above there. From there it was straight forward until you get pretty close to the ridge, then veering right there is some route finding through crevasses that could be tricky in a whiteout. The first image looks across the Carbon from near where you get on it, so you can get a sense of the path from there.

Trip: Mt Rainier - Liberty Ridge Date: 5/9/2015 Trip Report: My buddy Joe and I climbed Liberty Ridge last weekend. I'm posting mostly to relay conditions as they were for those interested in climbing that side of the mountain. But I will say that, for me, it was a really inspiring climb. I've wanted to climb it for years but never felt ready until recently. Fear has always stopped me from upping my game in climbing, and I've spent the last couple of years building my fitness and working on controlling the fear. There's something liberating in feeling like you've taken a big step forward in your climbing. Oh the possibilities! Anyways, we were surprised to have the route to ourselves, and noone had been on it since the previous snowfall, so it felt like a remote, alpine adventure. It made it that much more special. The glacier crossing was straightforward; no real postholing or punch throughs on the Winthrop or Carbon (but a lot on the Emmons during the descent). Snow conditions on the ridge were generally straight forward, with some sustained sections of loose powdery wallowing. We soloed most of the route and did running belays at the icy portions. The upper route on the face is mostly blue ice, but there were some paths with snow to minimize the calf burning. Since we were racing the weather window, we did most of the climb in the dark, and ended up too far left somehow and almost on the Willis Wall. Fortunately, when we noticed we were getting mighty close to the ice cliff, we found a steep passage to the ridge crest near the top of the blue ice. We pitched this portion out, and Joe reached the bergschrund. It turned out to be a very good thing we went way left, because a serac collapsed above the top of the route and swept the face of blue ice, and could very easily have killed us had we been on route. Joe was almost underneath it when it collapsed, but fortunately had just enough time to move slightly out of the way and brace himself. The car sized chunk missed him, but a large chunk hit him square in the helmet, and he amazingly came away unscathed. (Always wear your helmet!) I mention this as a word of caution: just because you're not on Willis or Liberty Wall proper, doesn't mean there are no serac falls. In any case I didn't see anymore seracs looking too unstable, but you never know. It looked like there are a number of options at the bergschrund. We found a neat little ramp that that led us into the serac mess, with some tenuous bridges and a short WI2 section. Here's how it looked last weekend: Route overlay of where we went. In the dark, I guess we missed the Black Pyramid. Gear Notes: 6 screws, 2 pickets. We used pretty much all of it, plus a shovel/ice tool combo for a deadman anchor! I used two tools; Joe used one tool and one technical axe (curved shaft). The 1 tool 1 axe is better. Approach Notes: No snow for first half to Glacier Basin. Full coverage by Glacier Basin.

Nice work! Joe and I climbed it car-to-car on Sunday, and your bootpack helped speed things along! We found the conditions to be great, but after talking it through ended up simul-soloing most of it as the conditions made for solid climbing, but we had no confidence in the picket placements. We regretted skipping the AI2 step at the beginning though.

PM sent

PM sent

My normal climbing partner is out of town this weekend, so I'm hoping to find someone to climb with during the weather window on Saturday. Conditions are pretty tricky right now, so I'm open to options. I'd like to do something alpine if possible. I've had a few climbing courses with AAI in the past, have a good amount of glacier experience, a fair amount of rock experience (lead up to 5.7 trad, follow up to 5.9), some ice (lead WI2, follow WI3, maybe 4), a little mixed experience, and am an intermediate skiier. Unfortunately I don't have much of a rock or ice rack... I'd be able to leave Seattle Friday night if needed to have an early start at the trail head. PM if you're interested in meeting up. I have a few thoughts of objectives, but am open to other options too.

Has anyone been up NF 39 in the last week? How close can a car get to the TH, given the lack of snowfall and warm temps? Thanks!

Has anyone been to Banks Lake? Any news there? Thanks!

Trip: Guye Peak - Improbable Traverse Variation Date: 7/8/2014 Trip Report: climbwa picked me up from work early on Tuesday to head up to Guye Peak to climb the Improbable Traverse. After sweating our way up the boulder field (it was HOT), we roped up and simuled the first 3 pitches. I led this block, and of course, steered us to the wrong direction. What followed was something of an adventure, where climbwa pulled through with a couple great leads into the relative unknown. We ended the simul block at the base of a corner a bit right of the standard route. climbwa took over the leading here, and we pitched out the rest of the climb to the 3rd class bit at the top. This first pitch was a short one to what we thought was the Lunch Ledge, but in fact was just some ledge to the right of it, situated below the middle of the smaller roof. After poking around, we decided to head up the corner to the right of the roof, and meet the standard route at the top. climbwa did an excellent job on the lead, which involved a few slightly overhanging moves. From the Selected Climbs book, this was neither the standard route nor the Direct Variation (which is to the left of the small roof). I've sketched in approximately where we went in the photo below. The blue line is where I think we went off the standard route and in the variation. I'm wondering if anyone else has done this variation and if they know the grade? It was clear from the moss and dirt and loose blocks it hasn't been climbed often, but I really doubt we're the first ones to climb it. We think it was at least 5.9, but neither of us feels experienced enough to judge for certain; it could have just felt harder to us than it actually is. top It took us about 5 hours to get to the top, and by then it was getting dark and we were rather dehydrated (did not bring enough water for how hot it was...). We had a little confusion finding the descent trail, but happily found it before complete darkness and were able to follow the trail by headlamp back to the road. 7.5 hours car to car. Overall a fun after-work adventure. Some photos (sorry for the rotation of some of them): Me starting up the simul climbing pitches. climbwa leading the variation. I didn't get any photos of him in the crux unfortunately. Approaching the summit at sunset. climbwa at the top. Me at the top. Great view of Rainier from the top. Gear Notes: Full set of cams 0.1-3, with doubles from 0.5-2 I think, and a set of nuts. I think we ended up using all the cams. Approach Notes: Parked below the residential road.

Truly awesome and very inspirational.

I took the course a number of years ago and it gives a good grounding in the basic of steep to vertical ice climbing that you can build from. Well worth it I think. The trick is finding people to climb with after so you don't lose what you spent so much to learn.

Don't discount riding the bike either: it's an excellent way to build your aerobic base in the process of getting wherever you need to go. When I was a teen, I used to ride ~1 hour each way to rowing practice after school. Exhausting work at first, but totally worth it.

Very memorable time on Rainier! Looking forward to more climbs with you!

Climbwa and I decided to take advantage of what turned out to be a stellar weather window. We left on Friday late morning, and started up from Paradise around 3 pm, enjoying a beautiful sunset and the clearest night sky I have experienced. I left my headlamp off through most of the walk, and let my eyes dark-adapt, which revealed a mist of stars I'd never seen in all my wanderings. We arrived at Camp Muir around 7, and after a couple of hours boiling water and resting, slept in the hut. We awoke and left Muir around 4:45, and followed the boot path to the ledges. Along the way we past two other teams already descending, one saying the Ledges were completely dry. We decided to continue anyways, and continued following the establish boot path to what we thought were the ledges, which we found to be dry and very sketchy. Dismayed, we sat to watch the sun rise for an hour or so (which was beautiful and well worth the pause), then realized that we were not in the right spot. We checked around the corner, and there they were. Definitely a lesson in keeping your eyes open, and don't let beta or a boot pack blind you. We found the ledges to be in excellent shape, and while there were dry sections, they were not problematic. The chute was in good shape, and I found it easy enough with a single axe by traversing left then heading up. We met up with a team of skiers at the top of the chute. Here we rested for a half hour, soaking in the view and the spectacle of a January day on Rainier without wind, and warm enough to feel like July. As we continued up, we ended up stripping down to t-shirts, and genuinely wished for a breeze. As one of the skiers said (paraphrasing), it may be a winter ascent, but it sure feels like cheating. The upper slopes were firm and made for great cramponing. Despite the 1.5 hours of lolly-gagging, we made it to the summit crater less than 7 hours from leaving Muir. We enjoyed the view, chatted with the skiers, took some photos, and again wondered at the lack of wind. I can't stress enough how amazing it was to be on Rainier in January with no wind, warm temperatures, and firm snow. Felt like cheating. We spent a little more than an hour in the summit crater, and I finally got to see one of the steam caves. We descended the Ingraham Direct, which wasn't terribly direct but was in fine shape. A boot path guides the way through, and after all the folks on the mountain we saw today, will remain at least until the next snow arrives. We stayed at Muir that night, and this morning skied to Paradise. The conditions were not terrible on the Muir Snowfield, though crappy for a mediocre skier like me, but we found some good corn snow in the bowls to the east of Panorama Point (which would be even better by afternoon I’m sure). A great way to end what is probably the best trip I've had to Rainier to date. Big thanks to Climbwa for a hell of a trip. I can't seem to get the photos to work, so here they are on Picasa: https://picasaweb.google.com/josephmontange/GibLedgesMtRainierJan2014#

Hi all, I'm looking for suggestions of some good options for the beginner ice climber, preferably top ropeable at first. Are there any good options at Banks Lake? Other areas? (Conditions pending of course...) Thanks, Joseph

That sounds great. Sent you a PM.

I'm looking for a climbing partner in the Seattle area interested in climbing this Sunday (10/20) and potentially beyond. Most of my experience has been on glaciers/icy slopes (Mt. Rainier via DC, Emmons, Gib Ledges, Fuhrer Finger and Thumb; Baker via Coleman-Deming, up the steeper section of the Roman wall, Park Glacier Headwall), but I'm trying to broaden my horizons into vertical rock, ice, and mixed, so I'm hoping to increase my experience in these arenas. I can follow up to 5.9 right now, and would feel ok about leading up to 5.6 trad. I have access to a trad rack. I'm hoping for someone with similar experience, or more who is willing to teach! Have car, will drive. I'd be happy with a long alpine day (Shuksan? Something in Snoqualmie Pass?), or just rock climbing. I'd also be interested in heading to one of the local mixed climbing crags to practice mixed climbing, which I have very little practice in.