Alpine_Tom

I certainly never go off on a climb without making sure my helicopter pilot is back from vaction, and my mechanic has the bird all fueled up and ready to go, just in case. Owning a personal rescue helocopter is one of the ten essentials, isn't it?

Just one more reason to be glad I was born in America. Note to self: burn passport tonight!

Value-mines, wasn't it? As proof that I'm a genuine geezer, I have a picture of my wife sitting in my old car right next to the old mine building. You could still drive to them in the early 1980s. Valumines was the name of the company; I always just referred to it as the Boston Mine. They were in limited operation in the mid 70's. Finding the Boston Basin trail in those days involved finding and following the black plastic water pipe above the mine. The Cascade Pass trail started at the mine as well and was much shorter than the existing one. Regarding the obliteration and "rehabilitation" of the mine site I hope there's room for another point of view: that the obliterators and rehabbers have either no sense of history or a very finely focused one, and that removal of all traces pretty much amounts to an act of vandalism. The bunkhouse had been pretty much destroyed by a snowslide but I submit that the concentrator should have been left intact. Mining, like it or not, is an important part of Cascades history. This isn't meant as a troll, BTW, though I admit it's probably pretty non-PC. I feel the same way. It's cool to see the old concentrator remains up by Monte Cristo, even if it's just a big jumble of broken boards now. I'm guessing this is part of the National Park "no permanent structure" ethos. otoh, I bet more people would be complaining about it sitting there decaying than complain about it being gone.

I've got aluminum crampons that I really like for general mountaineering (Rainier-type) climbing, and for with hiking shoes (Black Peak.) But the one time I tried them on real ice (the N. Face of Baker) they didn't work well at all. Seems like Nelson told me they'd work fine on water ice, but maybe I'm remembering wrong. I've not done Denali, but seems like on an expedition climb like that you'd be better off bringing more dependable gear, even if it is a few ounces heavier. I'd hate to go to all that trouble and expense, and then have to say "I couldn't summit because it was too icy for the crampons I brought along. But man, they were light!"

The one time I tried it, after reading Beyond Backpacking I was astonished how well it worked -- it keeps the rain off you, and there's no ventillation problem. The only issue, of course, is that it's tough to hold an umbrella if you're using an ice axe or trecking poles.

My wife got me a new, rather expensive, North Face "Summit Series" Gore-tex parka for Christmas this year. So, I took this new gore-tex parka, which was perfectly clean, never washed, not even worn very often, and wore it while I was out working in the yard in the rain a couple weeks ago. I didn't break a sweat, I was just planting a couple of rose bushes and that sort of thing. And, in half an hour or so, my shirt under the Gore-Tex was noticably damp. Not from sweat, but from rain percolating through. One of the arguments I've heard for buying Gore-tex stuff is that Gore requires manufacturers to adhere to a high standard of manufacture. So far two of the velcro patches have come unstitched, and one of the loops that hold the shell to the liner has broken. And, this from occasional use, maybe once a week -- no hikes, no hard use, nothing more strenuous than walking the dog. Personally, I think that gore-tex is a myth, in the same category as Sasquatch, and using red markers around the edges of your CDs to improve the sound. If you want to Believe, be my guest.

I think I've failed on Whitehorse six times (not including once when I got to the trailhead and discovered I'd left my boots at home!) The combination of the low trailhead to suck you in, really heinous schwacking, and a much higher climb than you expect. Still haven't been to the summit.

Yeah, it peaked early, and kind of lost momentum.

hey -- for some of us, <5.7 IS hard!!

And people say climbing is scary? I'd go ice climbing, naked, with framing hammers for ice tools, before I'd put myself in this position. Reading this story was a fabulous experience, about the best matching of content to the web experience I've come across. It reminded me a lot of Jeff Long's novel, The Descent

I looked at that before I got the Golite. The idea of using your pad to replace the stays is great (that's what you do with the Golite too) but if you're out for a day, do you really want to drag your sleeping pad along? I want a pack that I can use for a day hike with room for rope, clothes, helmet, etc, as well as light overnights. That's what I got the Golite for, but if it's not really full, it carrys really lousy. This pack has straps at the bottom which, I understand, can be used to strap on your sleeping pad or tent. I didn't pick up on it being conical-shaped. That might be a big problem.

I'm finally ready to replace my Golite Trek, and it looks like the Mountainsmith Phantom has about the right mix of size & features I want (3500 cubic inch, 2 ice axe loops, internal frame, hydration sleeve, 3.2 lbs, $110 at Campmor) I did a search in this forum and didn't come up with any Mountainsmith hits. Anyone have any feeback about this pack, or Mountainsmith in general?

Close. I e-mailed DCXP.com, and this is the answer I got: The images was taken in December 1998, so I am a little hazy on the exact details, but; Image taken on Fuji Velvia ASA 50, with a Canon Eos5. It was a double exposure image with different lenses used, both on tripod. The initial image was a long time exposure some 30 minutes - 1 hr?? with a 28mm lens, then as the moon rise occurred during it then moon is actually the abberation you are thinking of. The second exposure on the same frame of film, (ie did not wind on the film), was with a 300m lens trying to locate the moon in the top RHS of the frame. Thus the moon has been photographed twice! Hope this helps, Cheers Duncan Chessell

That was the climbers of the Eiger nordwand, and they were awarded by A. H. himself. It's important to keep in mind that, though Herrer had a Nazi flag in his pack during the Eiger climb, in 1938 the Nazi party was a patriotic party, and Hitler was a leader who'd restored Germany's self-respect, not the man who started WW2 and instigated the death camps. There's nothing uniquely German about Antisemitism, after all. I had a professor at Annapolis who was a German Naval Officer, and was old enough to have been in the Hitler Youth. At the time, he said, it was about what the boy scouts to kids today, there was nothing sinister about it to them.

Does anyone have any experience with these? Backpacker magazine gave good reviews to them, fairly roomy (I need) and light weight for their 20-degree down bag.

Are you doing "eenie weensie spider" there?

That sounds sort of bogus. Is a mountaineer someone who goes out on weekend climbs a half dozen times a year, or someone in the Lowe / Viesturs level of professionals? There must be tens of thousands of people in this country who consider themselves "mountaineers," and ANAM lists maybe 20 deaths a year. I expect you're far more likely to quit climbing for any of the dozens of reasons people do, than to die doing it.

Well sure... if you add the weight of the tails - but you don't need them up here in WA unless you're a gorilla with a full pack. I don't know the weight of the tails offhand, but I'm sure leaving those behinds shaves off at least 1 lb. I agree that less weight = good thing, but trading weight for less traction (therefore less time on feet - either the snowshoes or yourself!) doesn't seem like a good trade in my book. I think MSRs have a great following here because they do great with our local snow conditions - you can just about wear them anywhere, doing nearly anything (within reason.) Your mileage may vary. -kurt I've got the MSRs, and at 200lbs, I've never needed to use the tails. At Alpental a couple of weeks back, they might have been useful, but in general the snow around here is pretty wet. They are awfully noisy, though. That's the one real drawback as far as I'm concerned.

Smoot's book has an accurate map of the approach roads. If you can drive all the way to the trailhead, the summit by the easy route is just a couple of hours.

Makes me want to stop doing solo outings.

Dan Larson sucks!

Hey, didn't you read the description? It's a "rare find!"

Mad cow disease?

There was a guy up there in the parking lot, directing traffic. He didn't hassle us at all, even though we obviously didn't have skis or snowboards, and asked him where the bathrooms were. One interesting event -- I put in a screw, which cracked the ice a bit, you could see the crack deep in the ice. Alex assured me it was probably okay, so I went ahead and climbed up, my tool popped off, and I fell in the screw -- and it held! I really enjoyed myself. Thanks, Alex!

Climb: Alpental ice-practice cliffs Date of Climb: 1/15/2005 Trip Report: Alex Mineev and I went out on Saturday to try out the ice at Alepental. We got to the pass by about 9:00, and the sign over the freeway displayed a balmy 11 degrees. We planned to start off on the area "Washington Ice" calls the practice cliffs (I think, I don't have the book in front of me) the gully between Guye and Snoqualmie peak. The ice was in pretty good shape, but the snow was hellacious! The least consolidated snow I've ever slogged through -- not even powder, a sugar snow that seemed to drain from beneath our feet. The gully is about six moderately steep (wi3?) steps, 15-30 feet high, with longish flat spots in between. The flat sections were pretty deep in snow. The top step was only about 15 feet high but the best ice of the day. The ice was really variable: sometimes really hard, sometimes really rotten where it was exposed, but where it had a few inches of snow over it, it was almost slushy. So, getting onto the ice was the hardest part -- finding someplace that would take crampons. Still it was a fun day -- thanks to the authors of the guidebook! We were able to rappel down what we couldn't downclimb from trees and branches. Here are a couple of Alex's digital photos. Gear Notes: I had my old Stubai steel ice tool and a little Grivel 3rd tool; Alex had twin Grivel wings. Approach Notes: Great -- ten minutes from the car. Couldn't make it without snowshoes.