jakedouglas

Bump. I never ended up getting rid of this. I'm moving now and need to get rid of it this week. I would prefer it went to someone who needs it.

I'm a new skier and went through this research process last winter. All of the recommendations I got are consistent with what has been said here. Around 100mm is a good all-arounder to start with and you can eventually get different or additional skis for varying conditions or as you discover your preferences. I ended up getting a 98mm for myself and 100mm for my girlfriend. When spring came around I picked up a cheap but light 80mm pair for skiing consolidated snow. If you are deal hunting, I just saw a pair of Black Diamond Aspect (90mm waist) in 176 length at Pro Ski in Seattle for $275. Not quite as wide as the general recommendation, but I know people that have fun on them as their only ski and it's a good price IMO.

I've been eyeballing the new G3 ZenOxide C3 105 for winter stuff. Weighs about the same as the skinny Dynafit skis but has a 105 waist. Ultimately you have to decide what your priorities are. At one point I had hoped that someone could point me at a magical "Cascades ski", but it turns out that there are just a million skis and a million different personal preferences that vary wildly.

Ran across this video of the helicopter hoist

Hope your partner recovers well. Was there anything in particular that caused the fall, or just an accident?

Heading out of the Alpental lot this afternoon Sunday Sept. 8 I was looking at my phone but looked up to catch a glimpse of what looked like SAR vehicles on the side of the road, like maybe a response was going on. It looked like they might have been looking up at Guye. Anyone know what this is about?

Anyone have a good suggestion where to practice steep snow climbing safely as well as self arrest practice? I don't know about steep climbing in particular, but the Paradise area is good for practicing snow skills in general, including self arrest. Slopes with safe runouts and close to the car.

Fellow noob here. I'd recommend elaborating about your current skills and what kind of activities/objectives you hope to do. This will make it more clear to people whether you might be a good match. It sounds like you probably know how to belay and rappel and you say you have led 5.2. What grade can you reasonably follow? Do you know how to build gear anchors? Do you have any group equipment such as a rope or rack? Do you want to go cragging? Alpine rock climbs? Volcano glacier slogs? Ski mountaineering? Swinging 2 ice tools? All of the above? Depending on the activity and your skill level, you can research some appropriate objectives and state a specific goal that you would like to complete. You don't have to do this but it can help narrow down a partner, and having a concrete goal is always good so you don't waste your time noodling around. Stating your safety preferences can also be a good idea. People have wildly varying ideas about what acceptable safety standards are and you have to decide for yourself what you are comfortable with. If you aren't clear about it, this can become an awkward problem during a trip. There are always clubs and classes, but I believe that I come to a better understanding through researching and figuring things out with my partner, than I would being shown. There are more ways than one to do a lot of things in climbing and you have to pick the best way for you. Do a lot of reading and practicing of the technical aspects at home. Real trips will always be more complicated than you anticipate, so the basics need to be second nature.

Not specifically related to taking new climbers out, but I have noticed that many people are obsessed with removing equipment whenever it is not completely necessary for a given section. The time of taking things on and off not only adds up throughout the day, but also complicates things when you find yourself in terrain where you would like to have them and it's tricky to get them out of the pack and put them on. For me, the harness and helmet usually go on at the car or camp, and stay on until I get back. If it is too warm for the helmet on the hiking approach, I leave it clipped to the outside of my pack so that I can put it on in a few seconds without removing my pack. Wearing these items also frees up space in the pack and potentially allows me to carry a smaller pack. When I have brought crampons, I generally leave them on for the entire duration that I am traveling on snow where they might be necessary, unless it is plainly obvious that they will not be. Even on a long slog it is unlikely that the efficiency I would gain from moving them from my feet to my pack would outweigh the time spent stopping to change them 1 or more times. I also won't find myself on hard snow wishing I had them on.

har har

Trip: The Tooth - South Face Date: 8/24/2013 Trip Report: My partner and I climbed The Tooth for the first time this past Saturday. It was our first “alpine climb”, if you can call it that, and our second multi-pitch trad climb, the first being R&D in Leavenworth. We slept in the car at the trailhead on Friday night, knowing that we would have company on a Saturday so we needed to get started early-ish. Still, a party of 2 showed up around 5am and hit the trail just a few minutes before us at 5:30. My partner had been sick with mono so I volunteered to carry the rope and the rack to make better time. It still took us around 3 hours to reach the base by taking the Snow Lake trail and traversing around the bowl before climbing up towards The Tooth. I am accustomed to taking the cat track in winter and I am not sure if there is a faster way than this with no snow cover, but it seemed very indirect. After figuring out the best way to scramble up to the base we took a while to eat and started getting ready to climb. The party of 2 ahead of us was making quick progress with the leader cruising and not placing any gear. As we were getting ready another party of 3 scrambled up and introduced themselves. We ended up working with these nice guys a lot for the remainder of the ascent. P1 from the base My partner led up to the first puny tree on the route and belayed me from there. I thought I had seen the party ahead of us departing from here, and remarked that it wasn’t very far up, but we decided that maybe The Tooth was shorter than we expected. This early belay would cost me in rope drag on the next pitch. Messing with the first tree. Don't bother with this, keep going. At this point the party of 2 was already coming down, so we waited for them to do their business. As they arrived at our tree, their pull got stuck and the leader soloed back up and freed the rope. By the time they finished, the party behind us was climbing, so we offered to let them pass. I waited for the leader to get ahead and then it was my turn. I climbed maybe 30-40 feet to find the leader belaying at a slung block. He asked why we had belayed from the tree and it was now obvious that this should have been our first belay. He let me squeak past and I continued. Above this was a large ledge where it took me a few minutes to figure out the easiest route up the wall above. The other party suggested heading up the right-hand side where I placed a bomber nut, but after getting a feel for what the moves would be it was clear that this was not the easy route and was more than I wanted for my first time up here. I found an easy ramp on the left where things felt more exposed, and equalized a small nut and a red C3. I was skeptical that this setup would hold much, but it was probably 4th class and I didn’t see anything better. I clipped a fixed pin and took the easy blocks and ramps up past the dead tree, feeling like I was doing squats as I heaved up the rope behind me. My belay here included a slung root. Ok, this is starting to feel pretty “alpine”. I could see the party of 3, but not my partner, and they were kind enough to relay our commands. Pulling up the rope was a full-body workout and I was happy to feel it get easier as my partner ascended. Big belay ledge after terrible rope drag By now it must have already been several hours, with our slow leading and waiting for the other parties pass us. The other leader arrived and we shared the belay area while we took a break to eat and drink again. His followers unroped as they arrived so they could scramble the next section, and we sat around for a while as they departed. My partner was feeling sick and talked about bailing, but I just agreed to lead the rest. Denny, right? We aren’t really into the unroped thing yet, so although the terrain was easy and without much possibility for falling completely off of the mountain, I stayed on belay and placed a piece or two on the way up. I arrived at the base of the final short pitch where several parties were either climbing or rappelling from the summit, and after going back and forth all over the place assessing the situation, I realized that I just needed to get out of the way again and let everyone finish. The rock in this area is very loose and it took me a long time to find somewhere out of the way to plug some cams in and bring up my partner. Staying out of the way on easy terrain. Photo by cool dude aka Jason Okay, almost there. I saw the obvious exposed “catwalk” which I had no interest in taking, and also what I have seen described as a 5.6 flake, with the tree station at the top. There was another guy climbing 10 feet left of the flake that I intended to take and he accommodated me crossing over his rope. I expected this to be the crux, but I found the flake to be very easy. The guy next to me said that it is 4th class. Maybe he was climbing the 5.6 part? I had read a lot of trip reports prior to the climb and I’m still confused about this. Dude who climbed next to me and let me cross his rope. I believe the flake I took is just up and to the left of him in this picture. A lot of the flake sounded hollow and the best gear on the way up is an old fixed cam. The last 10 feet or so got “protected” by a #1 that I could rip out with my hand unless it sat just right. I brought my partner up to the tree and there was a group hanging out on the summit. We weren’t sure what the summit was like but we knew our comfort level was well below theirs, so we agreed to belay each other to the summit and back. Looking down the crumbly last pitch. Garbage #1 visible. Looking up towards the summit, which is just out of view up and to the left I belayed my partner up and the guys on top generously offered to belay me up as well so we can hang out on the summit together. I broke down the belay and one of the guys walked down to carry one of our backpacks to the top since my partner left his. At the top my partner is tied into a few cams with enough rope to walk around and I tied in too. This is obviously not necessary as the summit ledges are flat and large, but this was our first rock climb in the mountains and we were clearly a bit on edge being on the top. Him Me Cool dude We hung out for a long time on the summit talking to the other guys and eating until they left. We had left the car with 2L of water each and finished the last of it at this point. I checked out the slung block, which most parties had used to descend, but ultimately we decided that we wanted to go back the same way we came up. There was some loose gravel to get back to the tree, which is basically on the edge of the face, so we belayed each other back to it to begin the descent. The first few rappels went fine, albeit slow. I was going first using a prusik backup and then providing a fireman’s to my partner. This was the first time I had used the prusik on a descent of any considerable length and found that I wasted a lot of time messing with it as it would catch frequently, even though I was tending it. Next time I will try fewer wraps or a klemheist. I passed the next slung block and neared the tree that had been our first belay on the way up. It looked like a stretch but doable, and I recalled that the party of 2 descending earlier that morning had completed what I believed was a rappel between the same stations as I was currently doing. I walked off of the last ledge and soon realized that I had made a mistake. I was about 10 feet above the tree and at the end of the rope. I know that the party earlier in the day had not ended up so high above the tree, so they must have had a rope with a little more stretch. I was getting tired now and wasn’t keen on climbing back up or downclimbing to the tree if I didn’t have to, and I knew that my partner wouldn’t want to either. He had some of the rack and I had already put a bunch of gear in my backpack on the summit, but I poked around until I could build an anchor with the handful of pieces on my harness and shouted to explain the situation. He came down and did another rap off of the slung block above me. It looked like this one might have reached the base of the route, but to avoid more shenanigans we pulled and rethreaded the rope at the tree. From here we arrived at the base and had another quick bite to eat. We had some minor hesitation about rappelling down Pineapple Pass since we didn’t know what we would find. I could see the second station and the talus field not far below it though, so we went for it in the interest of time and not dealing with scrambling back around. I went first and had to stop several times to sort the strands as they were conveniently turning into spaghetti every time I tossed them further down. I arrived at the second station and found it to be the most “interesting” one of the day. The block was fairly solid but there seemed to be some potential for the slings to pop off if the rope were to whip around a lot while rappelling. There didn’t seem to be any solid rock in the area to leave nuts in even if we wanted to, so for now I gardened out a placement for a cam that would hold the slings more securely in place. I don’t imagine that this anchor would phase many experienced climbers, but it raised my eyebrow as a noob. My partner came down to meet me and I kept my head low as a fair amount of loose rock was falling. I went first being heavier and carrying the heavier pack, and he went second, removing the cam. Touching down on the talus field felt good and we high-fived in congratulations of not fucking anything up too badly. It started to get dark as we hiked down and head lamps came on after not too long. We had no trouble navigating back out into the bowl, but had to check GPS once before we got back on the Snow Lake trail as it was completely dark by now. We finally got back to the car at 10pm, completing what is likely the longest ever ascent of The Tooth at 16.5 hours C2C. We had been very thirsty on the way down and exercised great restraint to keep from drinking potentially poopy stream water. We both downed 2 root beers and a large gatorade each, with a few croissants, and promptly passed out in the car for the second night in a row. I realize that The Tooth is something of a joke to most people here, but I figured I could provide a view into the experience of us 2 dudes who are afraid of heights and figuring out climbing for ourselves. It seems like the majority of experienced climbers either had more of a knack for this to start than we do, or get started by having a teacher drag them up a handful of climbs. From each of our trips come a lot of lessons and I like it that way. Baby steps. I imagine the next time we go will be a lot faster, with knowledge of the route and more experience finding placements. The rappels took a long time but we got our system fairly dialed towards the end, so this should be better next time too. We also spent a lot of time waiting for people to pass, but we were so slow that it would have been impolite not to insist. Comparison with R&D: Easier climbing with big holds and no requirement to climb cracks Fewer solid protection opportunities. Probably bomber by Cascades alpine standards, but substantially less than a granite crag. Many rappels instead of walking off to the car Belay areas are smaller, making it more difficult to negotiate with other parties More loose rock. Required testing of holds and care not to knock it down. Funny enough though, it was R&D where I got nailed in the helmet with a rock. Easier to communicate, at least with low wind I am not sure which one is a better beginner climb. I got more frazzled leading R&D but I don't necessarily think it is harder overall, given the infinite amount of bomber protection. Probably just because it was my first. They are both good and provide unique experiences to a new leader. Big thanks to everyone who was patient and helpful on the route. Someday... Gear Notes: The biggest rack The Tooth has ever seen Approach Notes: Snow Lake trail

We used 1 micro traxion each as part of our 2 man glacier travel setup this year but we definitely did not have them configured to hold the fall. Seems ill advised as others have said. Note that the device can be pre-attached to the rope without having to hold the fall. In the ascending scenario we use the traxion connected to the harness and a prusik for the feet. The primary benefit is that you don't have to fuss with unbinding and pushing up the harness prusik while you hold yourself up standing in the foot prusik, which can be a pain in the ass with cold hands/gloves and a thin diameter rope that causes the prusik to kink up on the rope. Similarly we had problems getting our old prusik minding pulleys to mind the prusik properly when using an 8mm rope. The micro traxion resolved these issues and allowed us to carry the light rope. It is also lighter than the additional prusik and prusik minding pulley we used to carry. I like that genepires came up with a way of actually equalizing the two anchors instead of the second one essentially just being a backup that is unlikely to be loaded equally unless the first one gives a lot.

Thanks guys. This is about what I figured. Lots of time on I90 stuff.

Yea, sounds like Tooth NE slab is no good for us. I forgot about SEWS SW couloir, which seems pretty perfect. Added that and Colchuck NE couloir to the list.

This spring/summer my partner and I climbed Baker and Rainier by the easy routes, and R&D in Leavenworth as well as most of the low 5th single pitch in the area. During the rest of the summer we hope to tick off a few more of the intro rock routes like The Tooth and North Ingalls, etc. My question is what would be some good beginner winter routes for a pair of noobs without anyone rope-gunning for us? We are meticulous about safety so I'm not really concerned about getting in too far over our heads, but I want to make the most of our time and not waste days bailing on routes we aren't ready for. These are on my radar so far: Lane Peak couloirs Guye Peak South Gully Tooth NE Slab Chair North Face Based on pictures and reading TRs, I think we could handle Lane and maybe Guye, but I'm not sure if we would get spanked on the others. I spent a day last winter noodling around with my tools in the Source Lake area and that was useful, but we would like to have some clearer objectives that are likely attainable. Suggestions?

Descending the DC route about 3 weeks ago a guide had 2 rope teams hot on our heels for a while after leaving the summit. I believe we offered or they requested to pass, either way we were happy to accommodate and stepped aside. The guide (female) was very condescending and dismissive and spoke all-importantly about how they needed to get their clients down and couldn't have anyone holding them up. Ok, whatever, be on your way. It turns out that they just rush the clients on easy terrain and then grind to a halt whenever there is anything tricky to negotiate. We caught up to them a mere 15 minutes after their passing and ended up waiting behind them numerous times, adding an extra 1-2 hours to the descent. At the top of the DC itself we waited and gave them a good head start to avoid getting stuck behind them, but shortly after we got backed up again going down a steeper section of loose rocks and wet snow. At the bottom two clients took a short fall on snow which was arrested by the guide grabbing onto a boulder. They appeared unhurt, but we gave them a few to sort themselves out, however they still weren't descending after being very patient. They were in our fall line and didn't want to knock anything down on them, so I shouted out that we were in a terrible place to stop (rocks falling here and there, people coming down behind us) and needed them to please move so we could continue. They replied that they were still busy doing work on a hand line anchor and we needed to stay put until they were done. After some more waiting we finally got down. I know this is a noob route (which is why I was on it, my first climb of Rainier) but asking to pass with the knowledge and intention of holding everyone up afterwards is a load of shit. The attitude that I should sacrifice my safety for the safety of you and your clients is also a load of shit. Mount Rainier is a national park and having someone pay you to drag them up doesn't give you any kind of priority. There's my asshole guide anecdote. No disrespect to not-asshole guides, as I am sure there are plenty.

Yes, the Marmot Plasma bags are very expensive. I got a deal on it. Feathered Friends has 900 fill bags and is usually cheaper with more fill weight than the bigger brands for their down products, but it looks like they only go as light as 30 degrees for their ultralight options.

We used Marmot Plasma 40 degree bags (http://marmot.com/products/plasma_40) on Baker and Rainier this season, in good weather of course. They weigh barely over a pound and did OK sleeping in our down jackets and with a hot water bottle thrown in the bag. That said, if I were to make the purchase again I would get a 30 degree to sleep a bit more comfortably with less waking up. At least sleeping on snow with thin z-lite mats, the 40 bordered on diminishing returns from the "light is right" philosophy. It's probably perfect if you are sleeping on dirt in the summer at lower elevation though.

I believe we spoke to you as you arrived at the flats in the late afternoon. Congrats again, this is awesome.

Loaded packs into the car at 5am on northeast Capitol Hill, went inside for some coffee and came back out 15 minutes later to find the window smashed and packs gone. Found my pack in an open garage a few blocks away with some things missing, other pack nowhere to be found. The only funny thing is that my pack was loaded with 50 pounds of water for training weight on our hike. It entertains me to think of someone trying to pull it out of the car and run down the street with it. Missing items: Canon S100 camera with CaseLogic case North Face Cipher Hybrid Hoodie softshell, blue/grey Small pack around 20 liters, grey with green trim, maybe a Camelbak brand? 3 liter platypus Grey Patagonia hybrid softshell hoodie iPhone, wallet, keys Lesson learned.

Thanks. Went up Saturday 6/22 and had to do several short carries on the initial route we took up (just below/west of Pan Point). On the way back down we stayed high to try to go through Pan Point like one would in the winter, which went except for one short carry but then we found ourselves on the wrong side of a fenced off area and we had to duck the fence to descend. Oops. Every steep slope on the way down was covered in glissade chutes which were annoying to negotiate, but the skiing on the snowfield itself was still great.

Only used a handful of times and I need to get rid of it. Good condition, size large. Just bought it too big for myself and have other packs now. You pick it up on Capitol Hill. http://www.rei.com/product/795513/rei-mars-80-pack

Haven't been up to Muir in about 6 weeks. Is it still skiable from Paradise without carrying skis very far or is that a lost cause by now? Thanks

Looking to head up the Easton this weekend. I watched the forecast all week and it looked like a fair amount of snow fell, ending this morning. Has anyone been up there in the last day or two and have any idea of traveling conditions and stability? Thanks

There is another old thread about this route here http://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/329383/Mangled_hangar_and_bad_bolt_Do I tried the route earlier this spring and just downclimbed once I got up there and saw the condition of the bolt and the difficulty of the slab climbing. It's worth noting that Connie's Crack above is accessible by the dirty narrow gully/trough on the climbers left of B.S., although there isn't much protection.