Ade

No.

12" out and still full of it. Amazing.

Crappy tree bounce tested to about 200lbs and new orange cord added. Nope... Not if I have anything to do with it

You can get insurance to do this shit?!

Noooooooooooo! I only got off a route 36 hours ago and already the rat is back. It's got fatter but it's still going to eat me alive. Then it'll find out that I sold my soul for a first ascent that actually wasn't. If Canada is "CRAP" all is lost! Maybe we could BBQ the rat? It'll be pretty darn big by then.

Doh! If the weather is that good I'll likely be in Canada. Otherwise count me in for the burnt dead flesh party.

Better approach would be to head West on the road for about a mile to the turnout on the N side of the road and head straight up into the basin E of the peak as per Beckey III. Rather than traversing from the trailhead directly. Certainly on snowshoes traversing is no fun, maybe on skis this is better. The sun and hopefully cold nights will cause the upper snowslopes to consolidate but may bake the crux smears further. We rapped off the summit to gain the gully but I think you're supposed to traverse slightly S down the ridge to get into the top of the W gully proper. Bounce test those rap anchors. My snowshoes nearly ended up on David's campfire.

Al and I snuck in on this - I own a pair of skis and he knows what skis look like. Great times were had by all! Amazing weather considering the time of year and the somewhat vague forecast. Many thanks to those who organised it. I'm concerned though... I've never seen anyone tele skiing first hand but this weekend there were a lot of people with tele gear who looked like they'd used it that day and now there are pictures of those same people. My belief that free heel skiing was an elaborate hoax made up to fool non-skiing Brits has been shaken!

Yep... In the words of Shaun Rider (Happy Mondays, Black Grape) "I don't have a heroin problem, I've been on heroin for fifteen years, no problem."

Done! "Backcountry Travel" section is online and in da house. Argue about skis until you bleed from the ears.

And as if by magic... A "Backcountry Travel" category appeared. Please try and include a link to a picture or the manufacturer or distributor's web site when adding a review. Thx!

I was up there last night. It rained most of the way during the drive up and rained in the pass until around 2am when it turned to snow. It was snowing reasonably hard above 5000' but very warm. None of the snow by the roadside hardened up significantly over night. Drove back this morning, it was raining pretty heavily all the way out of the hills. I figure it must have put down several inches on elevations above 6000' over night and it going to put down more today. Ade

"Armada" great name. Like Spanish Armada I guess they were going to use "Titanic" but Hollywood got that first.

Mad Cow Disease is New Variant CJD which is slightly different. But neither one of them is something you want to end up with, effects your balance so climbing will be harder . The other side-effects don't seem so great either. Here's the CDC's Q&A on BSE and CJD: Questions and Answers Regarding Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) and Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD)

Have anybody been upto Price Lake below Shuksan lately? What is the trail and river crossing like and where does the snow start? Thx. Ade

Nice! It's supposed to be very warm today but getting colder this week but with crappier, but probably not too crappy, weather. If anyone is interested in getting on this mid-week, or something similar (I have a few other similar things I want to do), then PM me. Ade

How very true... Still it a great excuse to take extended climbing holidays while writing a book nobody ever reads.

I have the Acuevue IIs. I got them specifically for Denali on the recommendation of my eye Dr. She did some research and dug out some stuff on some guy who'd done Everest with them. I left mine in for a week while climbing to 18k (we didn't summit) and they were fine.

nobel/hippie peace prize...don' mean shit Good point... It's a real pisser that there's no Nobel War Prize. Maybe they should add it? The Nobel thing is really lame anyway, it needs more categories, like the Oscars and the Grammys. You know "Best use of Smart Weopons", "Best Counter Insurgency" all that good stuff.

Nothing, it's still alive and well. This is not a democracy or a freedom of speech issue. CC.com is owned and run by Tim and Jon, in that respect it's just like your local shopping Maul, it's not a public space. Try going in there and spouting some of the stuff that gets posted here, you'd get kicked out. They let you post here because they for the most part like what's posted, the moderators just help them moderate content. You have the right to own a big SUV, guns and a house and do what you want with/in them. Tim and Jon have the right to do the same with CC.com. It's their property. Trask doesn't routinely threaten people because he doesn't like their views. Trask hasn't posted shit to very forum because he disagrees with something. But I'm sure that can change. Have a fun weekend... Go climbing. Ade

As of Thursday 10th... The trail to Colchuck is fine, started at 3.30 and was at the lake by 7.10. All hard packed snow and an easy trail to follow. The approach to the route is fine too, lake frozen solid and hard snow to the base of the first couloir, on the route by 8. The route has a lot of new snow on it, 4-12". This seemed pretty stable, it wasn't slabbing off but didn't investigate further, just tried to keep to the sides of the couloirs. The snow made for hard going; step kicking the whole way. The ice on the crux sections is steep, but pretty short with bomber styrofoam placements. Summited at noon. It snowed most of the time, with a lot of spindrift pouring down the route which made the steeper sections entertaining. There was this sort of river of snow running down the middle of the couloirs and off the side walls, so not a place to be if it really was dumping but very cool to watch. The descent is tricky in a whiteout, the cloudbase was at 7000' all day so you couldn't see anything up high. Lost too much height before turning East and took a while to get back on track. Make sure you have a good map and compass, you'd be completely screwed without them in bad visibility, it was bad enough with them. There's only one place cross the SE ridge line to Asgard pass from the summit. The S side of the mountain and the top of Asgard pass also had at least a foot of new snow on them. On the descent it was still snowing at Asgard pass but raining at the base of the route and off and on for the rest of the afternoon. The weather in general was a lot better East of the crest on the drive back. BTW: The last 3.5 miles down the road on the way out really suck... and they just go on forever. This TR was brought to you by; Orbital, Bjork, New Order, Perry Farrell and Skinny Puppy.

I sooo did not need to know that. And I definitely don't want ANY more information. Getting back to drinks... Cytomax is usually available on discount at http://www.nashbar.com/. I've tried that and the Gu drink and prefer Cytomax, mainly because I like the taste. If you find them hard to digest then lowering the amount of powder you use will lower the % carb and help gastric emptying. I've not read anything that says this as any negative effects. If you're going to be taking the power on trips to use as a drink while climbing then Gu isn't very good; the powder is pretty hard to dissolve in cold water without a lot of stirring.

A friend of mine got his Marmot GTX one piece modified by Marmot (I think). He's very tall and they sewed an additional 2-3" into the middle of it. You could ask at Marmot Mtn if they have such a service. I don't have any more details but I'll ask him who did the work although I suspect it was pretty pricy.

Where did you here that... a Pentagon source? I'd wait a few days and see if it's true before you use it to beat Liberals with. It might turn out to be like the 51st Iraqi infantry, 8000 of whom didn't surrender as reported. Or the capture of Nassiriya and Umm Qasr, which were both announced at least three times. Or even the chemical weapons factory that never was. War Watch Either way I'm confused. Which "Plan" are you refering to; this week's, last week's, George's or Tony's?

Good idea, we don't need their oil, but I think they beat you to it: http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=24611