Alex

Is the 44 hours include the 3 hour nap? Great effort, endurance fest.

Freney XT, if they fit you.

Its the route described in pms' Volume 2.

Climb: Black Peak-North Ridge Date of Climb: 9/8/2005 Trip Report: Smelling the end of days, I decided to stop being a model employee and (*shock* ) took a good weather day off work to solo Black. What spurred me on was, while perusing trip reports on this site about the route, my own freakin' post from 2002(!) saying that I would go do it soon. Well, 3 years later seems soon enough, so with Rafael_H along who wanted to solo it too, off we went. I had never been to Lake Ann, or Wing Lake, and if anyone had told me the area was so scenic I wouldnt have put it off for so long! Started at 6:30 and took the perfectly graded trail to Heather Pass, fantastic morning light, perfect temps, autumn smells in the crisp air. The trail is easy to follow all the way to Heather Pass, Lewis Lake (why so green??), Wing Lake (why so Rockies limestone blue??), and onto the heather meadows beyond. The trail and approach is so easy, the area so scenic, its a crime. From the heather meadows beyond Wing Lake you have to make a slightly inobvious route finding decision: a low spot in the large moraine half way along that guards the E face of Black. But the access ledges to the N Ridge are obvious, and after a short icy slope (crampons, no axe), the notch is gained. From here the climb travels first on the E side of the ridge, over loose 3rd and 4th, before scrambling to the crest at an obvious place before a vert wall bars any further progress on the East side. Whenever making routefinding choices, just look for the obvious lichen-free trail of cleaned holds and bootprints...the route is well travelled enough and the options plenty that you should never get into trouble and have to climb harder than 4th. Here the crest is very sharp with dramatic exposure, certianly much more exposed than most ridge routes in the Cascades. The climbing is never harder than 4th, and can be climbed in approach shoes or good mountain boots. All the while you are surrounded by the remarkable green of Lewis Lake, the remarkable blue of Wing Lake, cool gusts from the N side of the mountain, warm gusts from the E side of the mountain, all the WA Pass peaks close at hand, really stellar location! The technical and exposed section is fairly short, perhaps 100m or so. Here there are still traces of recent snowfall on the higher elevations of Black, which gave things an appropriately alpine feel. After that the ridge broadens a little, and soon after, you pull a steep wall above a slab and the ridge abruptly kicks back to low angle, 3rd class again, with the summit in view. From the summit you get your first views of Goode, challenging you from across the valley. Yet another reason to climb Black. The decent is not nearly the horror show its made out to be, in fact its much better than many established decent routes. I thought it was fun and easy. For the not-so-adventurous, it offers a fine route to the summit in its own right, with the only suffering the scree section between the moraine and the saddle. 45 min back down to Wing Lake, and on out to the car, with blueberries, cool winds blowing, spectacular scenery, and just a few idle souls about. Perfect fall day! The route is short, but the climbing is not the reason to do this route, the position and the environment is. The hike to Wing Lake alone is worth the trip. Even with the shorter days, this is an easy objective, it took us 8.5 hours round trip, moving at a very leisure pace. Gear Notes: helmet, crampons rope and light rack if exposure makes you jittery no need for rock shoes Approach Notes: one of the most obvious and straightforward approaches you will ever do

The upper level low is coming in from th Gulf of Alaska, so I don't see how Squish will be out of the path?

what forecast are you looking at? I am looking at http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/sew/forecast03.php . 40% PoP doesnt look good to me.

Thats like saying "since Sea of Vapors doesnt form as WI7 and only comes in at WI5 anymore, it doesnt get done anymore". Every mountain route changes with conditions. That the ice bulge is no longer whatever rating doesnt mean it isnt the same route. Some routes get easier with time (due to conditions or gear advances), some routes get harder with time, and some routes like the Bonatti Pillar or that tower you posted a pic of earlier this year, just fall down the mountain with time.

Well that just speaks volumes, doesnt it

I thought scarface was initially rated 14c?

Extreme Alpinism by Mark Twight, and "go climbing". However there is also other good cross training. For a better cardio workout, mountain biking. Your body is pushing an extra 35 pounds up hill, thats good. For endurance training, nothing is better than doing long 12-hour hikes with a 20 pound pack. Things like Tomyhoi via Yellow Aster Buttes in the North Cascades, or linking Broken Top and S Sister in Oregon in a day car-to-car come to mind as perfect 12-hour training workouts. Also living in PDX you can make hiking up all or a portion of Mt Hood S Side a habit. In the winter it becomes really good training as you get to deal with weather all the time. You can hike up under the lift towers on the Palmer in the driving snow and wind and get a real feel for "when the shit hits the fan" without actually getting killed.

Sorry I was not trying to suggest that you dont take care of business, I think everyone would agree that if you have doubts about your rope, you shouldnt even think twice about replacing it. My comment was aimed specifically at claiming 1500$ worth of loss for ~400$ worth of equipment (nothing personal Collin). This past Christmas we wrecked our car and the back window went out all over the interior of the car, stacked with our road trip ice climbing gear. But the gear was inside a TNF duffel, so it wasnt affected. We swept the car out and continued the trip. After the trip I vacuumed the car out. Now, 9 months later I am STILL finding glass shards in the back of the car, despite numerous vacuumings. The safety glass is for the most part not sharp and the shards not small enough to work themselves into the sheath of a rope, but thats "for the most part". There were def small slivers that could have gotten in and done some serious damage to hand or rope.

good job Tom!

I remember being at that stage. I owned a chalk bag, a rope, some webbing, some biners, and climbed in my Vasque Sundowners. My friends and I were self-taught, and only learned slowly because none of the other more experienced climbers we ran into ever actually took any time to make any helpful suggestions. They avoided us like the plague, hmmmm, wonder why? We still had fun, and realized that we didnt know much. I gained alot of my initial knowledge from RR's Advanced Rockcraft books. In hindsight I likely would have advanced and become safer MUCH MORE rapidly had some real climber, such as yourself, ever offered to take me out just one weekend!! These days when I see novices at the crags I try to restrain myself from saying too much, unless they are being obviously unsafe...usually this manifests itself in someone belaying for the first time, and being coached by the climber who is actually climbing...when that happens I will drop what I am doing and come over and help belay, and try to get the brake hand concept across, it usually doesnt take long for the belayer to understand the whole deal, especially when the full weight of the climber comes on the rope while lowering... The scariest things I still see probably occur at Mt Marrymoor, most of the folks at the crags at least seem to have some time in the gym and understand the concept of belay and toproping, if not efficient and safe leading on bolts. Of course very rarely do you see real novices at Index or LWorth outside the GNS area or obvious beginner toprope crags.

thinking lworth or vantage 2 days

good points, i can understand the rap anchor setup to prevent hordes from trampling the surrounding area getting down. in those cases i would much rather have 2 inconspicuous chains than a big donkey trail down from the top.

Even in LW, this has hardly been the case the last 5 years. The new route development that I have seen in Leavenworth in recent times has sometimes been either squeeze job, contrived, unethical, or all 3. I have climbed alot of quality routes in Der Worth, but I would say a vast majority of them are in the old guidebook. But I am not complaining 'bout that. At the Gunks or Index it would have been 5.5. It was technically no harder than Saber. So no, not at my limit (but one day soon, it might be, wheres my walker??). If it were an out of the way crag that no one ever frequented I might not care (but it isnt). My feeling is that none of the bolts are necessary. For those who are really curious and would like more information, please PM me and I will tell you the name of the route, and you can go climb it and make up your own mind. Oh, except Rudy, who seems to already have made up his mind about this particular issue.

I am not Ken Nichols, Rudy. I understand the role bolts play very well and frankly if you had any idea you'd know me as a very docile accepting climber. I sure happily clip enough bolts without complaint and have drilled a few. But to permit such an intense disregard for rock where anything, and I mean anything goes, is just plain irresponsible. The gym is the gym. There are limits to what should be bolted even in places where bolted climbs are accepted as the norm. Also, since you might not have noticed, I have not been a mod for quite some time, so now I'm just a lemming like you.

I'm not going to play 20 questions, but no, it was not PG.

duh Here's a question: Say the "FA" has bolted a line into submission, placing many bolts next to perfectly protectable features. Not only that, but placing sporto chain anchor 5 feet from the top of a walkoff decent. I come along one day (yesterday, lets say) and easily lead this bolt protected travesty on natural pro. Does that give me the right to chop the route? how about with the FAs approval? How would my action be viewed any differently than a noble RR chopping that evil bolt-spawn Dawn Wall creation of yesteryear? 'Cause if you say yes, you can sure as shit bet that by the end of the week there are going to be a few less bolted moderates at a local crag. But maybe I wont wait for your collective decision. Maybe I will realize that my ethics are not the conglomerate of a dozen disparate internet voices? Maybe I will make a decision on my own, just like that "FA", that might affect the future climbing experience (positive or negative) of others. Soliciting input might be noble, but in the end climbing is selfish, no one "owns" the rock (unless its on private property, eh?), and we all have to live with the consequences of our actions much much longer than we initially suspect.

In a real snow year those things would be pretty much buried, no?

I am not so sure that Erikn's intitial posting about a bolt on SPM was really the best thing to do, but in any event the thread has wandered, so I split this off in an attempt to keep Erikn's thread more on topic. PP my GOD, all this discussion about one bolt, when just across the way at a crag I visited for the first time this weekend but shall remain nameless, I saw more bolts next to perfectly protectable cracks (all in the name of "route development for the gumby sporto masses") than I ever hope to see anywhere else! If it were the Gunks that shit would have been chopped in seconds (and ratings would be significally more in tune with reality), and some really fantastic trad routes on "damn, this is granite" could have been allowed to flourish. But no, subdue the shit for the masses.

Tired and old cliche but still oh so true: the best boot is the one that fits best. Here are some models you might try: LaSportiva Trango EVO Scarpa Freney Pro (I have a pair of 42.5s I am selling) LaSportiva K3s if you can find them Scarpa Eiger / Eiger Assault The WaffleStompers looks cool, who/where is the local dealer? I am back to my Eigers after I wore out my first pair of Freneys and the Freney Pro (unfortunately) fits a bit differently.

I'd like to echo Dru here: The Anarchist especially looks like an exact Quark Ergo rip off. Oh, except for that useful ice axe leash attachment point, which I will need for my leashless ergo tools.

You've gotta be kidding, how are these fundamentally any different from the X-15 design circa 1989? Wait 16 years for what,a little bend in the top of the shaft? Look a little snazzier?

insurance fraud is lame.