Ade

Almost everyone I climb with is older than me... I always look at the bright side... when I get my butt kicked by someone old enough to be my dad I always figure at least I'm not past it. There's still scope for getting better not older. I guess being utterly crushed on a hike upto a hut in South America by someone with nearly twenty years on me and no lower legs (prosthetics and crutches) was a bit disasterous though.

Don't get me started on Maggie Thatcher... "There's no such thing as an innocent bystander" - Refering to people caught in riots, probably some small child who took a plastic bullet in the head. "General Pinochette was a good friend to this country" - Reminding us we shouldn't prosecute him for killing thousands when he helped Britain out over the Falklands War (because it suited him).

Not entirely true... As of 9/Sept there's a 10-15' square snow patch near the bivi ledge at half height and another larger one right on the summit. If you had a stove you could definitely use it. The Bypass/Pocket glacier occupies two sections of the cirque, both are easily bypassable, no need for crampons etc. We missed the turnout from the main road to the Slesse Creek parking spot in failing light. It's on the RHS right before you reach the turn before the orange gate.

And don't park down at the fork in the road near the old buildings. The sign there says Slesse Creek Trailhead 5km (yeah we should have tried harder to find the turnout). The Canadian Govt will tow your car leaving you a rather long hike.

You could try reading "No Logo" by Naomi Klein.

Neutrogena Hand Cream and or Bag Balm (as used by Shuana Twain) seem to do the trick for me.

I just replaced my old Mountain Technology Vertege tools with a set of BD Shrikes with the Alaska picks. I'm reasonably impressed with them so far. True the adze kind of sucks and the point on the top of the picks makes carrying them in the cane position uncomfortable (time to get a grinder to them to solve that one). The reason I went for these over the Axars is because they have an alpine pick and I really like the BD Alaska picks. The other thing worth noting about the Flies is that the pick/adze/hammer is a one piece unit making a spare pick somewhat bulky.

The Marmot Store in Bellevue stocks them but they're fairly hard to come by CCW is a small outfit so don't make huge volumes.

I just bought a CCW Chaos, the bigger brother of the Chernoble. Pretty light and carries well despite having a foam pad, rather than stays, for the back.

Jannu with Cesen is the obvious choice. Popular rumour has it that it wouldn't involve any real climbing. A few "borrowed" photos and you're done.

Megamid - Not really a mountain tent though is it? On balance I think a hanging XGK is a bit much. You'd be better off with a hanging stove, modified for cold weather with a copper heat conductor and insulated fuel can. And as Alex pointed out you wouldn't really need that for most Cascade climbing.

Marko... How does this work with an XGK? The real problem is that it's fuel bottle makes the whole thing lopsided. I thought you might be able to bend the bottle to hang under the stove but suspect that this would be hard to do and effect the fuel flow. Are you doing this with an XGK? Definitely agree on the plywood idea. I take a couple of cork coffee coasters (glued together) to stop my XGK sinking into the snow.

OK. I fess up. I have used an XGK in a Bibler. We didn't hang it we placed in on a large flat rock we placed on the tent floor on a sleeping mat. The tent didn't overheat, we had the door partially open to stop CO buildup. It was pretty damn windy outside (hence cooking in the tent) so ventilation wasn't a problem. In most circumstances I cook in the vestibule of tents with an XGK. Never had any problems with this. Obviously (great) care is advised in both th scenarios. Ade

The only problem with flying in is it's hard for everyone to hear you whining about what "assholes" snowmobilers are over the noise of your helicopter. What ever happened to doing ascents in good style?

Yeah. I'm staying at home too. I need to hone my predicting the future skills so I can help others plan their climbing weekends. When I'm done with my forecast of what routes will be free at Leavenworth at 3pm Saturday I'm going to work on the condition of the bergshrund on the Liberty Ridge fpr 7am Sunday.

I have to say I came across this particular bolt on Saturday... If it wasn't quite so pathetic it would be almost funny. Presumably nobody has admitted to putting it there? I'm sure they'd be easy to spot, probably busy bolting some trailhead parking lot somewhere to make that "safer" too. Nasty things parking lots...

Tuesday morning it was knee deep wet mush by 11am. The trail up to Glacier Basin has seen traffic and is OK though. Ade

"She Go!" means we did it on the 19th to 22nd. Pretty much perfect weather and nobody on the route. The lower glaciers were OK but soft, lots of postholeing, no real problems with crevasses. The lower part of the ridge is OK but melting out. I imagine with the continued hot weather things have only gotten worse. On the descent we were wading knee deep on some lower sections. Above Thumb Rock the route is pretty icy. I can't really say how icy as I've not done it before but comparing it to other descriptions it seemed so. The majority of the route was front pointing with some sections of windslab/neve. We made it up and over the top and part way down the Emmons on the third day before bivving in sight to Camp Sherman. This was slower than expected but from most of the accounts I've read doing the whole thing in three days car to car requires good conditions. For the most part we were postholeing or front pointing. Ade Thanks to whomever it was who decided to not use a blue bag at Thumb Rock, and the guy who "forgot" his full bag there. May you forever melt yellow snow.

Wilderness sports is another good bet if you want to help the little guys. 425 746 0500. They rent stuff but I've not had boots from them. REI in Redmond rents stuff, I've had boots from them before. The number is: 425 882 1158 Alas, this weekend is already taken, but thanks for the offer. Ade

REI rent them. I think it's about $10 a day. Ade

Emmons is fine I think. We met a team of two on it so there should be boot tracks all the way to above 12,500. It looked pretty straightforward above that. Very soft snow below 11,000' so start early.

I was up looking at the Ptarmigan in mid-August last year. It was in pretty bad shape the lower section of the route was covered with fallen rocks and a bergshrund ran right across the face. I'd guess this year would be worse as there's less snow to start with. Liberty "She Go!" but the warm weather is going to make the approach much more like hard work but most of the glaciers are still in reasonable shape - no huge holes to fall in yet.

Even mid-week this is going to be pretty busy. I was leaving the park on Tuesday afternoon and there were three parties setting off to do the Liberty. I would also avoid the flamethrower. Everything below 11,000' was mush yesterday and probably getting worse if the hot weather continues.

Probably... When I saw him he was wearing the (obligatory) Mumu and talking utter gibberish.

Isn't Guy supposed to be traversing the whole of the Coast Range or something?