Winter

Rock Butte!!

I just wrote an article for Oregon Tilth on organic bottled beer. It should be out in a couple of weeks. I gotta say I didn't like Eel River that much. Fish Tale from Olympia ranked a lot higher, but what the hell do I know? But free beer rocks! There's also a super good beer coming out of Roseburg called Supernatural brewed by Hawk's or something like that. That stuff is the shiznit ... organic hops from New Zealand. You can get it at New Seasons.

Sphinx, get a life or go climb something. Your posts are so juvenile. How so? My sentiments haven't changed. If you want juvenile, look at your avatar image. What is this club thing, anyway? Bwahahahaha!!! Touche on that juvenile shiznit.

Best way to get started - post all the PMs you get from your original troll and you'll have tons of friends!

Is your name Daisy? Maybe Amber? Extremo?

Well! when are you coming out this way? Tempting ... very tempting .. need to find time off. Perhaps in the end of October. When's the ice form out there? Maybe better to wait until December?

I'll take the free beer and great climbing!! Two outta three ain't bad.

Today I am sitting in Multnomah County Courthouse serving my second straight day of jury duty. This little phone cord keeps me connected to the outside, albeit slowly and erratically. Consider all of yourselves fucking lucky!!! Anyone need anything downloaded from the County Court's network?

Grazing information from the commun ... errr ... conservation groups. These guys do a lot of great work and know what they're talking about.

How much for your ticket to NZ?

Piss on the Gallery and all those other short climbs. Shit, there's huge sandstone walls all over the place. If you want to clip bolts, climb Prince of Darkness, 5.10c. There's only one 10c move ... the 6 pitches are sustained 10a. Super cool place with huge vertical walls. If you want to climb trad, try Dream of Wild Turkeys (only a couple pitches of trade rest are bolted), right next door or Chrimson Crysalis (start super early) or any of the other long moderates.

This is so rich!! A bunch of maladjusted socially inept misfit climbers debating the merits of marriage from behind the protective cover of their computer screens. "That bitch can't pull 5.12 - skank!" "My climber husband's a jackass - dick!" "Peace and love to everyone!" "Shut the fuck up dirty hippy!!"

The bolting war continues. Two weeks ago, I found three new bolts atop White Rabbit at the Breakfast Cracks. Yesterday, all three were gone. Doesn't seem to make much sense to me, but there you have it.

The rattlesnakes will kill you if you camp out. Try the hojo's in town.

No reason? Its the hallucinogenic drugs making them paranoid. Come on. Same thing that inspired creation of the biblical tales.

Guye Peak – The Improbably Traverse I had been in contact with Tom over the last several weeks, trying to set up a trip before the end of the summer. I had never climbed with him before and had only heard stories of his times with my father back in the ‘70s. We had originally talked about the N. Ridge of Stuart, but time ran short on his planned trip abroad. Outerspace came up as well but I had done it earlier this summer as had his son Bob, who would climb with us. I hadn’t even seen Bob since I was 6, back in 1978. I finally got a message from Tom on Tuesday, suggesting the Improbably Traverse on Guye’s West Face. I had often looked at the face as I drove out I-90 for other adventures. The Beckey guide describes several routes but doesn’t inspire much confidence on the quality of the rock. Nevertheless, the face looked steep and promised excellent positions and fabulous views. I couldn’t turn down the opportunity and decided at the last minute to ditch work and make the drive to Seattle. I met Tom, Bob and his daughter Melissa at the trailhead at about 7:30 on Thursday morning. We parked near the ski club and thrashed through a bit a brush on our way to the scree gully leading up the west face. We roped up and started climbing at about 10-ish I think. I tied in with Tom with Bob and Melissa on the other rope. Bob lead up the first pitch, which was easy class 3-4. The ramps lead to a broad broken corner that heads up the south side of the west face. I followed closely behind Melissa and brought Tom up at the first belay. Bob led out the second pitch and stopped part way up the corner. I started out in front of Melissa and managed to thrutch up some broken terrain of questionable quality. The rock was interspersed with dirt and shrubs, and none of the rock looked very reliable. A short step led to a solid sling belay, and I brought Tom up as Melissa reached Bob’s belay a bit further below. From there we had one more pitch to Lunch Ledge. I led out in front of Melissa, who took this pitch for the other rope. The terrain started to bulge, looking like horizontal dinner plates that offered almost no protection and inspired even less confidence in the rock. I hadn’t really minded placing 2-3 pieces on the first couple of pitches, but I was soon wishing for better cracks. I had to cut back from right to left across the broad corner to find the decent rock and the easy way through the bulges, but I soon found myself in the corner with a 4 inch fist crack, 5.6-ish, and smooth slabs on either side. I managed to get in a #3 cam, which felt much better, jammed my fist in the back of the crack and pulled through to Lunch Ledge. We brought everyone up, and took a look at the improbable traverse. Bob led across, finding good protection and built a belay anchor right before the final corner which takes you to the class 3 ramps. Tom led across this pitch in excellent form, clipping Bob’s piece, which Melissa had left in place. I really enjoyed this part of the climb, watching Tom work his feet on the traverse, thinking through moves while comfortable on lead. With air beneath his feet, Tom made the final careful moves to the small belay ledge. Bob again led around the corner, which was probably the crux of the route. A couple of nice handholds on solid rock lead right to the start of easy slabs. Melissa followed and then I led Tom across. From there it was a long easy scramble to the top. We topped out, shook hands and talked briefly about the wonderful retrospection inspired by a climbing trip with friends I had really only known as a toddler. My sister stayed with Tom when I was born. My family spent many hours with Tom’s when Melissa was born. Tom and my father has shared many experiences over the past 30 years in the same field and with the same friends. But since 1979, when we mvoed from Seattle, I had only seen them ocassionally once very 5-10 years. We descended through the blueberry fields, and I lagged a bit behind stuffing my face as I flashed back to other childhood memories of similar scenes in Maine with my parents. We eventually got back to the cars at around 6-ish. We sorted some gear, exchanged a few hugs and drove our separate ways. Hopefully our climbing paths will cross at some point again in the near future. I returned back to my sisters’ house, took a shower and had a full home cooked meal and 3 screaming adorable nieces waiting for me. I wonder if I’ll see them on the rock 20 years from now.

I think he's still working the sequence on buckets.

Pffft ... the rock looks like complete shit. Who's in for Rocky Butte tonight?!

My partners both pissed in a huge puddle at the second belay station of Dark Shadows and then ran the rope through it as it splattered all over us. Should I soak them in baking soda and fucking shit all over them?

sweet. We'll have to set up a TR on Vomit Launch the next morning.

This will theoretically result from a reversal of thermohaline circulation, resulting from an excess of fresh water from melting polar ice caps. I think the scientific community has reached much less of a consensus on this theory then on the greenhouse effect in general. The beauty, however, is that the rapid shift in temperatures and beginning of a mini ice age could happen in as little 5-10 years. Neat ... sharpen your picks!!

Yeah they have developed a bunch of stuff on the west side of the range. The Mongolian side is more moderate and less trammeled. We won't be climbing anything hard ... hopefully just remote.

Alright, so I just got engaged, we're getting married next summer, and we are both taking off three months starting July 4 for travel. Now the question. Do we got to Mongolia to climb in the Altai Mountains with a quick stop in the Kamchatka Peninsula, or do we drive around in our car in North America and climb our asses off for three months? Mongolia pros: Remote, third-world travel. Rare opporunity to use three months for Asia trip. Big ass, untouched mountains (5-6000 m). Mongolia cons: Climbing may be a bit over her head. Less pure climbing time. Greater risk of incident in remote location. More expensive. NA pros: Holy shit could we do a lot of climbing. Probably less expensive. Tons of climbing. A lot of climbing. Then some climbing. Maybe some time with the family ... if they want to go climbing. We're both in our early 30s. She is leaning towards NA, because she wants to spend 3 months climbing while we're still somewhat young. I sort of want to go to Mongolia, because I want to check it out before it gets fucked up by the west. Anyone care to provide input?

TG - Wreck me. You've got a streak to keep alive here. Bring the racing fuel.

Yeah right, the end may be near. Try a few years of litigation over the ROD and EIS and then maybe they will reach the end of the road ... maybe.