rbw1966

Depends. Are you planning on doing it direct, i.e. climbing all three gendarmes and the headwall, or circumventing these obstacles? As a ballpark I would say it would take anywhere from 12 hours to two days doing the entire ridge direct. Traversing around the gendarmes would dramatically reduce this estimate. This doesn't help much I know but there are so many variables: aerobic fitness, route conditions--whether its rimed up or not, weather, approach conditions, etc. I think it took my partner and I about 4-6 hours from T-line to our retreat point near the top of the first gendarme. We were moving very slowly in near-perfect conditions on the approach but the ridge itself was in terrible shape.

The Zbojnicka Chata (hut) in the Slovak Tatras is powered by wind turbine. It makes some pretty disturbing noises in heavy winds. Very eerie.

Mt. Hood Meadows has seen two deaths this season. Both out of control snowboarders.

I'm bored.

rec.climbing: Just when you thought this saga had ended: Biting off more than you can chew! ---------------------------------- Ricardo's Solo of Zodiac, Sept 2003. The plan was to solo the West Face of Leaning Tower, a short aid route that overhangs the whole time, making for an easy haul. The aid on WFLT is C2 and is thought to be a perfect first wall. I was stoked. But in my mind, it seemed like it was still practice, since the real goal was El Capitan. I considered the routes that might be within my reach on El Cap, only two stood out Lurking Fear, and Zodiac. Lurking fear did not seem like a good choice due to its slabby finish, Zodiac seemed perfect, except I had no portaledge. The defining moment came a week before my vacation, when I bought a single portaledge on Ebay for $200 (w/fly!). I contacted Pete Zabrok (passthepitonspete), whom I had arranged to pick up at the airport in Fresno in exchange for him giving me technical support getting ready to climb my first big wall, and asked him if I was nuts for considering Zodiac. Pete responded: "How badly do you want the summit, vs. How badly do you want to learn (aid). You will learn MUCH MORE STUFF on Zodiac because its longer, harder, and you have me to teach you... Just how bad ass are you? How badly do you want it??" I did not understand how right he was, and I did not know how badly I wanted that summit. I would find out though. I must admit that the idea of soloing El Capitan for my first big wall was partially inspired by Ammon McNeely's resume, my rationalization was that you only get one shot to go big for your first big wall, and I might as well take it, worst thing that could happen would be that I would bail. Later I would realize that the worst thing that could happen would be that I would get myself killed. Picked up Pete at the airport, and spent a whole day getting his gear and groceries. While we were doing this, someone stole $1000 worth of gear from my stash at manure pile buttress, dark clouds began to circle in my mind, and I began to get demoralized. Finally being in the valley and looking up at zodiac had also struck fear into my heart, and I had not gotten a good night of sleep since I arrived. We spent Tuesday hauling bags up for Pete, his plan was to solo Gulf Stream. Finally under the weight of a loaded haulbag and walking around the base of El Cap, my mind raced about what I was getting myself into. I changed my mind about what to climb several times on the first hike up the base. On Wednesday me and Pete carried all my climbing gear up to Zodiac, it was about 1 pm when we got there, there was fixed ropes from P2 to the ground, and a team of two from Mexico was gearing up to ascend the lines. Pete told me to not do any more carries, and just begin climbing and fix as high as I could. It took a long time to get racked up, and I have no idea when I began climbing. The first move was easy, a hook up to a bolt, I fixed my lead line to the first bolt with a figure eight, and then clove hitched the next two bolts, they would serve as my anchor if I took a fall up higher, nothing that I had climbed previously had prepared me for zodiac, it was steeper and more strenuous that what I had practiced before, I was already scared. After the inital bolts you make a move left onto a slot and then climb a crack that ascends 100 feet before it meets a roof. Getting a piece onto the slot was proving problematic, the route was steep, and I was not comfortable. Finally I managed to get a hybrid alien to stay, the next move was a cam hook in a pin scar, as I weighed the cam hook the hybrid popped out and I was then fully on the cam hook. Only 20 feet off the deck and I was already soiling my pants. The rest of the crack went without much trouble, though I was climbing slowly, it was hard to get regular aliens to stick in the pin scars so I would either hook, or use hybrid aliens, and back clean when possible. Finally I reached the roof, which comes after making a grappling hook move, I placed a hybrid on the roof (C3 move!), and stepped up, the alien waited until I'd removed the hook before failing. The ride lasted less than a second and I was now about 12 feet below my last piece, a .4 microcamalot behind a flake. My mind was on fire, and my hands were shaking. Only 100 feet into this climb and I had already taken a fall. I regained the hook placement and decided to use my newly acquired cheat stick to bypass the alien move, and gained the belay. A quick check of the time revealed 6:30 pm. I raced back to the car to get my headlamp and made one more carry up to the base, setup my ledge on the 2nd bolt and slept comfortably. I was on the wall! Thursday I awoke to thundering sound of BASE jumpers, what a sight! I cleaned P1 without much hassle except for having to clean the large expanse after the hook move that I cheat sticked. I restacked my ropes into the two bags I had brought, one was a nice large BD bag that fit the new 11mm Yates lead rope nicely, the other was a beat up book bag that Pete let me borrow, ugh!, what a pain, next time I'm buying a nice large bag to fit my haul line. I was afraid that the rest of the roof would prove to be as bad as the move that had spit me off the day before, but it turned out to be a pleasant roof traverse, all C1 placements, the roof then led to some hangerless bolts over the roof to a ramp that then led to the belay. I gained belay without much problems, but I could tell that I was rather slow. A team of 2 had made it to the base and had began to rack up. I lowered back down to P1, and made a mistake, by lowering too far, I had lowered myself about 50 feet too far below the roof, and now I would have to ascend the free hanging rope to get back to the belay at P1. This proved painful and slow since I don't really know how to ascend a fixed line with 2 jugs. Its not rocket science, but I'd never done it before. As I started cleaning P2 I finally decided that I had enough, I was too scared, and way over my head, and asked the party of two starting up if they wanted to team up and climb as 3. They agreed and I said I would complete fixing to 3 by myself, and we'd go from there. Now I was happy again. No longer would I face this climb alone! While leading P3 Pete and Joe (joebuzz) arrived at the base, Joe volunteered to climb zodiac with me. We agreed and the Swedes (whom I had asked to climb with earlier) agreed that they would rather climb as a party of 2. So it was set. Joe left with Pete and would return the next day with his gear. P3 is a bolt ladder that goes on for a long time, there are some hook moves in the middle of the ladder to some heads, but nothing too strenuous. I was trying to make better time, so I used the cheat stick again to get past some of the head moves. I lowered back down to ground, leaving ropes fixed up to P3. There was now a party of 2 at P4, and two sets of ropes fixed to 3. I made another trip down to the car to carry 4 gallons of water up. Friday I awoke very tired, and was glad that I did not have to start climbing right away. Went down to Gulf Stream to check out what Pete was up to. Waited and waited, it was a hot day. I was laying on the boulders at the base of Zodiac looking at the part of two from Mexico trying to retreat from P5, it took them most of the day to rap 5 pitches with their two bags, what a nightmare. I was more scared now than ever before, it was past noon and no sign of Joe, it seemed like I might have to climb alone after all. I then met Eric Sloan who gave me a few words of encouragement, and let me know that everyone is scared. That made me feel a bit better. Joe finally showed up around 4 pm, and gave me the bad news, he could not climb with me. I was demoralized, I was scared, I did not want to blast off and commit myself to this climb, it seemed too steep, too long, and I was sure that if something went wrong, that I would die. I went down to tell Pete that I was done, and would be taking my gear back down tonight. he was not surprised, he said that over 60% of the parties on zodiac bail, so I was not alone. Hanging out with Pete was Matt who was soloing Mescalito, and Dave (elcapbum), who was soloing South Seas, I felt like a traitor. I was hanging out with a bunch of soloists, every one of them putting their life on the line, and I had just quit! Dave began telling me that I had already done the hard part by getting my gear up to the base, and climbing the first 3 pitches. He then went on to tell me that since I had climbed the first pitch clean that I would have no problem with the rest of the climb. (I didn't tell him that I had used a cheat stick). Finally he said, "20 days from now, you'll be sitting in your office, and you'll wish you were here doing this climb.." That settled it for me, I had to give this climb a fair shot, I needed to do this climb, or I would be haunted by the fact that I had given up before trying. Dave suggested I get at least 9 gallons of water up to the base and food for 8 days, he figured this way I could climb 2 pitches a day. I had 13 pitches to go, so I figured he was right. I made another carry of water that night. On Saturday morning I had a large breakfast at the lodge cafeteria, picked up more water and food, and set off to meet my fate. Pete had built for me a frog ascending system the day before, and a 2:1 hauling ratchet. I packed the bag, and was set to go. There were now 2 parties above me. The owners of the other set of fixed ropes had returned and bivied at P3, the party of Swedes was above them at P4. It was slow going at first, but I finally reached P3 and discovered my first prize, the party above me had left behind several carabiners and a locking biner. I began to haul. First I tried to body haul, no go. I hooked up the 2:1 and it moved. It was a long process, but I could see that I was making progress, I pretended that I was at the gym, and I would count repetitions as I brought the bags up. Finally the bag reached the station, and I let out a victory howl! it felt great. I was able to lead up to P4 and setup my first bivy on the wall. While I was choosing my dinner I learned another lesson "Everything that is not clipped in, is gone." -- I managed to drop my a box of soup from trader Joe's. On Sunday morning I began to figure out what the sequence of tasks was to get going, gather gear, get water from bottom of bag, stuff gear in bag, place day's water and food on top of bag. Arrange ropes, rack up, and then start climbing. Climbing alone is a weird place, there is nobody else to tell you to "Hurry up", or to tell you how to do something more efficiently, so you sometimes move very slowly. The bolt ladder on P5 was easy and fun, though I also realized that I had not brought enough loose carabiners, on every pitch with alot of fixed gear, I would always run out. Linked pitch 5 with 6, which proved to be a great idea. I had managed to catch the team above me by doing this, they were very nice and made room for me to setup an anchor at P6. On this pitch I made the mistake of leaving my hammer at the top, when I was cleaning I was unable to remove 2 pieces from the rock because of that. I donated a 2.5 tricam, and a red ball nut. It was 4:30 by the time I had everything hauled up to P6, and I stared up at the black tower pitch. The black tower pitch is one of the crux pitches, and some guy had broken his pelvis on this pitch in may. I was ready to nail on this pitch, so I brought out all the pins. It took alot of motivation to get going, but I began to lead the pitch at 5:30 pm. Reached the top of the tower by 7:30 pm, when it got dark. Out came the headlamp. The seam above the tower is tiny, so small that at times all there is for gear is some fixed heads. I nailed right off the tower, placing a small knifeblade on a separate flake. The flake expanded. My stomach sank. All around on El Cap I could see headlamps of parties now at their bivies, thankful that they had survived one more day on the captain. I felt alone, as if I was lost in a dark forest, and there was hungry wolves all around me. I made slow progress, through all the fixed mank, placing screamers on every small piece. My rack began to get thin on the small pieces, both black aliens, all my knifeblades, some micro nuts. I would test vigorously all my placements, because I knew that I could not risk a fall onto the fixed gear, in the darkness, everything looked like s---. Finally I reached a point where I had no more small gear that I felt comfortable with, and tried to place a RURP, I failed, the RURP just bent under the blows of the hammer. I then finally made a blind #1 micronut placement, I was terrified to step onto it, but I was also too tired to stay out climbing, it was now close to 9:00 pm. I stepped up onto the #1 micronut, and it held. I spied the chains of the next belay maybe 2 moves above me. The next move was also small, I fished a blue ballnut into the seam, it pulled when tested, I tried again, and it pulled again. I then tiptoed onto my aiders as I tried one more time, the ballnut held this time. I was then able to step up onto it, next came a cam hook, and finally I reached the belay. When I made it back down to my portaledge at P6, it was 9:30 pm. I was exhausted, and ravenous, my dinner consisted of a can of corn, and a can of pork and beans, never had food tasted so sweet, so good, it tasted as good as having dinner at the Ahwahnee. Monday I awoke with pain on my hands, every morning I would take two advils to start the day, (and two advils to end the day also). I was high in spirits since I felt like today I would cross the halfway point, and that I would survive this adventure. I had a short conversation with Pete in the morning through our radios, he was impressed that I had made it past P7, and thought that I would send the route. A few people had taken notice of my ascent, Eric Sloan whom I had met at the base had been keeping an eye on me during the first 2 days, and was glad that I was making progress, though he told Pete that I looked a bit "light", which means a bit inexperienced. I said "well I should think so!.. I've never done this before!". Cleaning p7 was eye opening, every nut that I had placed was removed without using a nut tool, and in most cases they just popped out of their placements before I reached them due to the pull the rope had on them. On pitch 8 I reached a point where a lead bolt had been chopped, out came the cheat stick. I was now thankful to have brought it, since I did not see a way to get around the chopped bolt. I reached the top of P8, and hauled. It was 4:30 pm. And I did not feel like climbing through the night again. I decided to take an early day, and just stop. Above me on p10 I could see the Huber brothers working out the moves on the Nipple pitch, (they would later free this pitch at 5.14a I believe!) I watched them take whipper after whipper from the comfort of my portaledge, popping jelly bellies and listening to the radio. I felt like I was on top of the world and nothing could touch me here. On Tuesday I climbed into one of the great landmarks on el cap, The Grey Circle, at this point the route begins to overhang, and it does not let up until you top out. P9 was hard, I nailed one pin right at the start, and then did the rest clean, which required several cam hooks in a row, and several head moves in a row. At one point I decided to place my own head rather than top step a fixed head. Failed at this too, the head popped when tested. I topstepped the fixed head and prayed. The climbing was steep, scary, and incredible. A huge sea of granite lay all around me. I could see the new bolts that had been placed on the free route that the Huber's were doing, (where it deviates from the aid route), and I could see the holds they had tick marked with chalk, it is amazing that they can climb this. The nipple pitch was amazing, the route up to the nipple was fully fixed, with pins and nuts, after watching the Huber's take whippers on these pieces, I didn't even bother to test one of them. Above the nipple you can clip a bolt, then top step the bolt and get a good orange alien. After than its small gear and hooks. One of the cam hooks blew out on me here, and I took a short 8 or 10 foot fall onto a black alien. I was excited that the piece had held, since I thought it was bomber when I placed it. I bivied on top of p10 underneath the Zorro roofs. The Zorro Roofs are wild, steep, and just incredible. My spirits were high, although my body was in alot of pain, it would take about 30 minutes each morning to get enough mobility in my hands (past the pain). The weather had been hot, and the cool breeze that I was expecting up high on the route, never came. I began to worry about the water I was carrying, but figured I would have enough water if I could save a bit today. I led up past the Zorro roofs, and the past the devils brow. Lots of fixed gear, and scary climbing. By now though I had grown used to it. I reached the top of P12, and did not like the anchor setup, I backed up the belay on a crack, and decided to bivy at 11 instead. (Under the devil's brow) By Thursday I was no longer feeling scared, since I knew that I would survive. I had passed most of the hard climbing, and would reach the only ledge on the climb (peanut ledge), I could see the tree tops on the summit of the nose, and it felt great to be this high up. Nothing stands out about the pitches up to peanut ledge. I reached peanut ledge that afternoon, and quickly racked up for the 14th pitch, which is a flake of about 4" to 4.5" for 80 feet, an incredible cam walk, all you need is two #4 camalots, 1 set of nuts, some quickdraws, and a few other cams. I used a 3, 2, 1 camalot, and a few aliens, (green, yellow, orange). It was the lightest rack I'd used yet, and I was happy. The pitch went fast, and I had finished it off in about 1 1/2 hrs. I rapped back down to peanut ledge in the setting sun. What a setting, I felt full of joy to be in such a spectacular place, having the time of my life. Friday was the day I had been waiting for, my topout day. I decided I would link p15 and 16 to just be done with this climb. But El Cap does not give anything away, and this linkup proved to be the hardest climbing of the route. First came an unprotected traverse from the belay, to a thin seam (black aliens). Below me was a slab. Then came another traverse, hooks moves forever, with a few pins for pro. Finally a ramp up to a ledge where you had to free traverse to the anchor. Free moves are terrifying on a solo climb. From this anchor you have to do more free moves to reach a flake about 20 feet above the anchor, no pro until you reach the flake. My stomach was doing flips when I looked down and saw the possible 40'+ fall onto the slabs below me. I finally got some fixed pins, and placed a sawed off angle. I duct-taped a large captain hook to the wall for pro. Then I noticed that my 65m rope might not reach the summit. I tried to keep the rope running in a straight line to get the most out its length. I went directly for the exit boulders, which in some maps are shown as A4, I don't know but the climbing seemed hard, and I knew I could not blow it. Finally I placed an orange alien underneath the exit boulder, and stepped sideways onto the final anchor! I looked up and saw the most incredible view. Half-Dome lay square in front of me. There was two guys humping loads from Zodiac (the party ahead of me had left their bags at the top two days before). They congratulated me, gave me some food. I was happy, I was peaceful, few words can describe the feeling you get when you complete a solo, so I wont try. My bivy at the top of el cap was magical, I stayed up late watching the sky. The descent sucked, it took the whole next day, and beat me up. When I reached the bottom though, I laid my bag down and finally let it out, tears came out of my eyes. Something that I did not believe I could do, I had completed. It had been impossible for me to envision completing this route, and I had done it. And now that it was done, I just felt peaceful, Zen like, nothing bothered me, nothing was wrong, and there was nothing to worry about. I went to the meadow and looked up at the route, no longer scared.

Do a search on here. SOmeone posted a link to the TTV website which lists dates and venues.

I read something a while back noting that ski patrollers in CO use 5mm cord for just this purpose.

Hroark=GregW

Send them to the Rubber Room or Red Rock Resoles and avoid these kinds of problems. I took a pair of Enduros to Mountain Soles for a resole and was told that because the cardboard last was toasted that they can't resole. Um. . yeah, how do you resole slippers? Anyhow, I took that as gospel and tossed my shoes. I subsequently learned that this was incorrect information. I won't be using these guys ever.

10b if you miss the guano at the top of the column.

huh?

Thanks for the info!

I'm going to guess that this isnt tele tuesday at skibowl?

Toyota makes an all-wheel drive van that a buddy of mine drove the wheels off of. It got pretty decent mileage.

I've rapped a single 5mm line before while canyoneering in Zion. You'll want to add an extra biner to increase friction. If thats not enough you can throw a biner on your leg loop and redirect the brake end into it. As someone else pointed out, you'll want to make damn sure its not loaded over any edges at all. At that diameter, you don't get much room for error.

The Mountain Shop in Portland has them. Or at least did. Give them a call.

What are they drilled for?

As I understood it, it was a one-day only screening by special invitation (that was forwarded to me and about a thousand others).

Minors arent allowed in the moon after 9 (or maybe its 10). I'm not sure I'll make it since I already saw it but who knows?

I saw TTV at a screening at the Hollywood. The poor suckas who showed up 5 minutes before it started found no more seats available. Arrive early.

Since when?

Chris doesn't need the competition.

Airline pet peeves: 1. People who take more than their allotted carry-on luggage thereby taking your spot in the overhead. 2. People who spend an hour doing miltiary folds on their suit jacket whilst 50 other people behind him are waiting for him to get the hell out of the way (extra props to the morons who don't understand that they are to board their seat in 5A AFTER the folks in the back of the plane). 3. Parents who take screaming kids on flights and exercise no control over them (e.g. slapping headphones on their noggins and going to sleep as their kid is doing boulder problems on the back of my seat). 4. The joker in front of me who invariably drops his seat into the recline mode rapidly and abruptly thereby spilling the three cocktails (and banging my knees) I got lined up to ease me into the stupor needed to avoid going postal.

Let me guess: unusually rancid BO as well?