Alpine_Tom

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/59409_mtbaker22ww.shtmlThe highway is closed at Maple Falls due to a mud slide. This is before the road up to Mt. Baker. So if you're planning on going to, oh, Goat Mountain, as well as Church Mountain, Shuksan, etc, you should check with the highway department, since the article doesn't say when it'll be open again. [ 02-22-2002: Message edited by: Alpine Tom ]

I’m planning a Gib Ledges climb for some time in the next few weeks, and I’m trying to decide whether to haul up a tent or stay in the hut. I’ve been at Muir in December and January in years past, and the hut felt to me like a walk-in freezer. It’s my guess that you’d be substantially warmer in a tent than in the hut, since there’s so much less space to warm. Am I full of shit, or does this make sense?I like the idea of saving the five pounds or so of a tent, but I don’t want to be miserable either, especially in the event of bad weather forcing an extra day up there.The tent in question is a Sierra Designs "Tiros"

Or, you could go to your neighborhood grocery store, and use the scales in the produce department. I expect they're pretty accurate, and they probably wouldn't mind.

I've got the MSR Denali classic, and have rented other, more "standard" snowshoes (Atlas?) from REI in years past. The only thing about the MSR I don't like is they make a loud plastic sound in the snow; they sound kind of cheap. But so what: they're compact and strap easily to the outside of a pack, they are easy to put on, and since they're narrow, they are easier to walk in for a slight klutz like me. And the price is certainly right. I've got the long tails (I weigh about 190 lbs) but haven't needed to use them yet.

The trailhead for Fischer Chimneys on Shuksan is basically the ski area parking lot, so access isn't much of a problem.The road to the Sulphide glacier trailhead will probably be blocked with snow and fallen trees.Nelson (vol 1) recommends Ruby Mtn in winter, but I've never done it.Hood and Rainier aren't close to you, but they've got about the easiest trailhead access in winter.Snow Gulch on Whitehorse is good in winter, I've done it. And, of course, plenty of routes in Snoqualmie - Granite Mtn, Snoqualmie, Red, Guy, Silver, [ 02-22-2002: Message edited by: Alpine Tom ]

Cool! I'm curious why the other two elected not to go up. Wind, or iffy conditions at Muir?

quote: Originally posted by AlpineK: how about your bathroom scale. Weigh yourself, weigh yourself with your pack, do some math. I think it's called subtractionMost bathroom scales are not particularly accurate. Or repeatable. I can gain or loose five pounds on mine, depending on how I stand. So, if you're trying to find out how much your weekend pack weighs, for bragging rights, it's probably okay, but if you're trying to compare the weight of, say, two different tents, or sleeping bags, it probably won't work. But the downtown post office is a great place to hang out after hours!

quote: Originally posted by AlpineK: rather talk about what a morron George W is and what a bunch of loadies his daughters are. "Loadies" Is that a good thing or a bad thing?

Maybe we need to become mineral prospectors rather than climbers. Then we won't have to pay for the parking passes, since it'll be work and not play. And of course, where are you gonna prospect besides in the mountains. The Cascades are covered with mining claims; I bet half the mountains are named for claims or miners (Johannesburg, Ruby, Eldorado, Monte Cristo come to mind.) The beauty of this is that almost no prospectors make money prospecting, so they wouldn't expect you to actually have an income from the "job." Plus, you'd be able to write off your climbing gear from your taxes! For a few years, anyhow. This wouldn't work in the North Cascades or Rainer National Parks, probably, but it'd work in NF land. I've e-mailed my brother, who's a geologist for a gold mining company in Nevada, to find out whether this scam would work.

In my experience it’s the bosses who take lots of time off who expect their employees to work extra to pick up the slack.

quote: Originally posted by Mike Gauthier: (btw, many rangers agree that climbers are about the smartest of all park visitors. They can also be the most cussedly independent and cynical, but that's ok too) Mike -- climbers are cynical? You must mean OTHER climbers, not the ones that frequent this site.

I'd go to hear Tom Hornbein, but it's hard to know what he could say about the movie besides “it’s all ludicrous – every scene.” It’s like those “The Science of Star Trek” specials they used to do.

quote: Originally posted by payaso: I've seen some people with a kind of funky "chest harness" for their SLR and am interested in trying something like this. When strapped on, it is a real camera bag (PROTECTION!) more or less right under your chin. If I have to take off the pack to get the shot, the shot too often doesn't get taken. I personally use a Canon A2. Anyone out there use a harness-like camera bag, and if so what kind? I got a "wedge-shaped" camera bag last summer based on the recommendation of someone on this site. He said to clip it directly to the straps of my pack with mini-biners. I tried that but it bounced annoyingly every step. So now I just wear it with the strap diagonally, underneath the pack, and it's right there. It's pretty secure, dry, and readily accessible.Mine is from Lowe, and they have an optional strap that goes around your chest to hold the bag in place, but the pack does just fine for that.

I usually bring an old Olympus OM-PC with two lenses: a 50mm and a 28-200 zoom. Typically I start the day (in the dark or near dark) with the 50mm because of the better F-stop, and then switch to the zoom at the summit and for the descent. For years I've left it set at -1 exposure, based what Galan Rowell says, for getting richer colors.I also have an Olympus stylus P&S, and it's more compact, but sort of frustrating to shoot with. My compliments to anyone who can get reliable results out of a disposable camera -- I buy one each year for RAMROD, and out of 18 or so shots, I get about three worth keeping. (Got an okay one of Dwayner as his CAMROD avatar last summer!) [ 02-04-2002: Message edited by: Alpine Tom ]

I've heard the same thing, that nylon looses its stretchiness over time, even when the rope isn't used. Duane Raleigh says something about that in his knot book. (Subsequently, a guy at the downtown REI gear counter told me that wasn't true, so you choose which experts you trust.) On the other hand, I asked a few months ago on this website if anyone had ever heard of a rope breaking, and no one responded that they had. 'course, nylon is different than perlon, spectra or the other miracle fabrics that PB mentioned.

There's a place called Devil's Rock Garden, it's a hike in one of the Footsore books. There's a few acres of rock lying around, from house-sized on down. Probably a dedicated boulderer could start a career there.

quote: Originally posted by JayB: I’m with you on the whole property rights thing, Erik, but I thought that I’d go ahead and add some more information about the property in question. I'm certainly not advocating trespassing or otherwise violating property rights, but established precedents can and should be taken into account in situations like these. Sometimes there’s a longstanding agreement between landowners and climbers, and when it changes abruptly and without notice climbers can be caught off-guard. Well, there's a legal principle called an easement, which can NOT be changed by a simple change of understanding. <practicing law without a license> If the use of property, e.g., driving across your property to get to mine, is allowed to continue for seven years (in Washington) and it's open, notorious, and hostile (i.e., everyone is aware it's happening) then an easement is created. In that case, the gun club would loose the right to prevent crossing over their land. They couldn't, for instance, put up fences to prevent access. The easement stays with the land, so if the gun club sold the land, the easement would continue.Of course, if they had "no trespassing" signs up, and people from the gun club yelled at climbers whenever they saw them, the easement would not be established.This happens most frequently with driveways, and with fences built "on" property lines.(And, BTW, this doesn't apply to publicly owned land.)</practicing law without a license>So, a lot rides on how long this has been going on. And, of course, finding an attorney to represent you who doesn't mind getting shot at.

If you get good weather and site your high camp correctly, you can do the whole thing in one push from base camp. You need to spend some time acclimatizing first.

Certainly I don’t like having hordes of Mounties out there any more than anyone else does – I’m entirely comfortable with the idea of locking the door to the outdoors, now that I’m here. Okay, no one who has an REI number over six digits can use any route that appears in Beckey or the first volume of Nelson and Potterfield. Sounds fair to me. But it's not like they go recruiting people to take their classes; in fact, a few years back I got the idea of joining the Mounties and taking the Basic climbing course, but gave it up because next year's class was already full. They're a big organization with big classes because there's a huge demand -- there are lots of folks looking for the freedom of the hills . I'm guessing that part of their rigidity (you can only tie in with a bowline on a bight, not a butterfly knot) is due to a desire for consistency in training, as well as a fear of liability. After all, if someone climbing with me gets injured, their attorney probably won't come after me (after all, I'm basically judgement-proof!), but if I'm representing the Mountaineers, it's probably a different story. I wonder how often they've gotten sued because some moron wasn't paying attention, fell and got hurt, and went crying to mama. I agree it's kind of irresponsible to make a new Basic grad a Basic teacher, but that's what they do in college. How many freshman or sophomore level classes at UW aren't taught by grad students? The best way to learn is to teach, y'know. (Of course, a bad Econ TA isn't going to get you killed... ) There's no excuse, of course, for mounties to act so self-righteous and critical of others; I guess that's an unfortunate consequence of making novices into leaders, making them think they know more than they do. But the basic issue is that the crowded routes are crowded because there's lots of people who want to get out and climb. (Does anyone REALLY expect solitude on The Tooth?) The mouties are just the easiest target because they're big and clumped together. Even if they restricted their basic class to a dozen people a year, and required years of experience to be an instructor, that wouldn't reduce the number of people you'd run into in the hills. [ 01-16-2002: Message edited by: Alpine Tom ]

It seems like, the last few weeks bicycling in to work, I've noticed the Cascades socked in by couds in the morning, and the Olympics in view. Anyone know whether the Olympics close to the sound (Constance, Warrier Peak, da bruddas, etc) tend to be clearer? Someone told me years ago that Mt. Olympus was the 3rd most glaciated peak in the state because of the huge amount of snow it gets. I like the theory that Olympus and the other mountains in the interior of the peninsula cause a sort of rain shadow.

Guess you told him.

How many stupid mistakes can you find in this picture? One September weekend a few years ago, partnerless but not wanting to waste what might be one of the last nice weekends of the year, I headed up to a route Beckey calls the north face of Mt. Dickerman. He calls it class 3 with one short class 4 section and I figured, it’d be challenging but well within my abilities. If not, I could always down-climb it, and hike up Mt. Forgotten instead (it’s on the same trail.)I hiked up the trail, found the proper gully (eventually, after spending half an hour on the wrong one) headed up. I was clearly the only one up there in quite a while – there was so much loose rock I swear I set off rockfalls just looking at rocks too hard!Proceeded to get off-route. Badly. Before long I knew there's no way I could down-climb it, I had no idea where I was but I kept looking up and seeing what looked like easier ground about ten feet up. No? Okay, ten more feet. Okay, then, ten more feet. It was typical crappy cascade dirt-rock, where if you grab a handhold too firmly it comes off in your hand; even if I had a partner and a rope and pro, it’s hard to see what good it would have done, besides slinging the occasional tree who’s branches I had to burrow under.I had a cell phone in my pack, so I comforted myself thinking “well, if it gets too dire, I could always call 911” although how a helicopter would get me off that face is hard to envision. If I could get cell service. The whole way I was assuming I’d pop my head up at the summit, and see a bunch of berry-pickers (it was September) but when I got to the top, it turned out (as Beckey actually said, if I’d actually read the route description closely enough) that I was about a mile or more north of the actual summit, so I got to wander along up and down the rocks of the ridge to the summit which was in fact teeming with berry pickers. Did I mention I ran out of water at the start of the gully?Took the Mt. Dickerman trail down off the mountain. And of course, my car was still at the Mt. Forgotten trailhead, a couple of miles away. I tried to hitch a ride on the highway, but no luck, then a mile up the road to my car.No real damage except for a few scratches and scrapes. Talk about an excess of luck outweighing an excess of stupidity!Later that winter, I hiked up Mt. Forgotten, and tried to spot my route. I couldn't, really, it all looked too irresponsible to think about. [ 01-10-2002: Message edited by: Alpine Tom ]

for the last couple of weeks, when you try to go there: http://www.nps.gov/mora/home.htm the site doesn't respond. Now there's a message that says "Due to conditions outside our department, the National Park Service has suspended operation of www.nps.gov until further notice. We apologize for this inconvenience and are working to restore service as soon as possible." Anyone know what's up? Budget cuts? IIS virus?

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This is so cool. Ropegun just justified all the time I've spent here during work hours! I'm doing software support research!