SeanO

Great effort, thanks for posting!

Thanks for posting the report, Joe. Crazy story and a great read. Any pictures? Also a good story as well ScaredSilly -- I think you made the right choice on bailing. For pedestrian climbers like myself, it boggles the mind that people have even attempted, let alone successfully climbed the Willis Wall.

Great TR and pictures! Ditto on mountainsloth's question. I'm also wondering how much skiing there is later in the season when things melt out a bit.

Incredible trip, and amazing pictures. Thanks for posting!

Hey there, welcome to CC. It sounds like you're pretty well prepared given your background in rock/ice climbing and the glacier travel/crevasse course. The DC in July+ is usually a well-trodden path, but then you can have odd years like last year where there was a steep section of ice that made things more complicated. You may want to try a less aggressive objective for your first glacier climb, but with your background you'd probably be fine. The only thing I'd say you should consider is to be on a rope team of 3. If you're going to attempt it with just your wife, make sure you've practiced crevasse rescue with a 2 man team. It's a lot more difficult. A third person adds a significant safety margin if the route is heavily crevassed. If you're coming out here just to climb Rainier, give yourself as much time as possible (a week or more). The weather isn't always good even in July/August. Have fun!

Agree with DPS and Feck. My first attempt on Rainier was only after doing one climbing trip, and not on a glacier. Looking back, I was woefully unprepared and when we woke up that morning at Muir, I knew I had made a mistake, even if my partner was experienced. I had no business up there and I knew it, no matter bad I wanted it, the shape I was in, and my years of backpacking, etc. The following year I had graduated from a climbing course, read books, and had more than a few climbs under my belt. Made a huge difference and I had confidence that I knew all the important stuff to be successful and not kill myself or teammates. Ended up doing two summits within a few weeks. Frank: read Freedom of the Hills, do a few non-glacier objectives where you can practice your skills (and knots like DPS suggested), and be sure to spend a good chunk of time on crevasse rescue. Mt. Adams is a great learning objective. If you can demonstrate that you know how to tie the knots, perform rescue, and arrest yourself, you'll find it much easier to find a group if you don't want to go guided.

Olyclimber, thanks for your reply. I work in software and understand your hesitancy to jump ship and migrate to a new platform. It's simply a lot of work and there are lots of choices to make. Doing a quick search, there's got to be something better than a phpBB responsive theme (the top results)... at least I'd hope that we've evolved beyond that by now. CC definitely has its place and I appreciate the conversation here, even when it deviates a bit. Thanks for your and Jon's work!

I was a lurker for years, and I've been a member for only a couple years. Was recently having a conversation with some fellow mediocre climbers, and here are some thoughts: 1) User experience: the forums need responsive design to handle mobile and tablet viewing. A mobile app isn't necessary if the site design is responsive, and most people won't use a mobile app. Need to migrate from UBB sooner rather than later to stem the death of the site. Main landing page of the site is great with new redesign, but needs the same applied to the forums. 2) Insider club. Spray overflowing into reasonable conversations, perception of getting criticized for asking questions or posting lame TRs of simple climbs. Old boys club. 3) "Competitors" have a few advantages, whether its: more general scope, better user experience, more welcoming to noobs, wider reach, etc: summitpost.org, mountainproject.com, TGR (not noob friendly though), nwhikers.net (more friendly/inviting environment), not to mention blogs, social media, etc. I might even get criticized for suggesting these places are better in some regards, which would just reaffirm #2. I like CC and will still visit here occasionally, but I think the above are valid reasons.

At Mt. Baker on the Easton route, we got a heavy dose of sulfur near the edge of Sherman Crater right before you start up the Roman Wall. Hood would certainly be easier to access.

Fixed his photo links because I needed the beta

I played around with the easy slider and my opinion is that it slides too easily and is difficult to stow at the top of the axe. Ended up buying a pair of Sum'Tec axes instead. Watch this video at the 3 minute mark (the last 30 secs of the vid) and you'll see how it slides down on the axe in the demonstration, and he has to annoyingly pull it back up and hold it.

Do you have any pictures? Thanks for the update on conditions.

Cool trip and a well-written TR!

I was at Baker last weekend and we top-roped the Pan Dome icefall. It was in good condition, I would recommend it for getting on some decent ice. You will need to either climb to the top (almost a full pitch) or rap from above. If you do top rope it, you'll need two ropes.

Thanks for the recommendations, I think I'll check out the Quadrants. Anyone know someone selling a used pair at 28.5?

Does BD make wider AT boots in general then? I'll check out both, thank you.

I want to get into AT but I'm curious to know who makes wider boots. As a point of reference, I tried on every "wide" downhill boot at Evo but none were wide enough for my feet without significant discomfort (props to the guys at Evo for their patience with that epic endeavor). Only boot that ended up fitting was a comfort model by Rossignol at 104mm. The volume is a little too much but the width is perfect. I'm aware that you can get a high quality boot that's less-wide and have it punched significantly, but I was told it'd be better to start with a wider boot because of the shape of my foot. Anyone have wide feet and can make a recommendation? Thanks.

I don't have that much gear, but I have tried multiple systems for gear storage. I think two important considerations are how frequently you will use your gear and your living situation (storage space, frequency of moving). For many people, they can't just dedicate some wall in their garage to gear storage. Such as myself, who rents a room and can't use the garage. When I didn't have a whole lot of gear, I just used a large bin without much organization inside. Just threw stuff in and called it good. But then I started acquiring more stuff, so I got the wire racks you can customize from ClosetMaid, which they sell at Home Depot. This worked, but it was expensive, kinda became a gear shrine, and it took up more space than it really needed to for me. Plus, I might be moving soon, and I don't have much storage space. Things came full circle again when I recently decided to do a plastic bin approach again, using two bigger bins (40 liters each) with smaller bins inside organizing things as necessary, in order of use frequency (more frequently used things on top or in smaller bins inside). For example, I have a smaller plastic bin on the top of one of the bins with all of my regular use small items like a first aid kit, Gu, headlamp, etc. Sleeping bags still hang, but the bins take up less space and can be moved easily. I think this works for me, though it's a tradeoff of space for accessibility. Who knows, maybe I'll circle back to racks or something else. But with ~10 outings a year, it's a tradeoff. One other thing that's really nice: adding hooks in the ceiling to hang wet stuff after returning from a trip. Then when it's dry you can just throw it in the bins and it's ready to go for the next trip.

Thanks for the heads up. I bought mine in July but thankfully they all have a different code (LAM-T2).

Incredible pictures, thanks for sharing!!

Man, that's horrible. Condolences to his family...

Nice trip and photos! Entertaining as well.

Wow, nice solo and good TR!

Great pics, especially for beta on the face. Looks like weather held up too!

Great pics once again! Cool trip, that slab looks sketch. Looks like you had good weather too, shoulda headed up there instead of trying for Hood.