dberdinka

"still, quality unclimb lines" in the Green Creek? Errr...maybe with a lot of work. I think Mike and I were real fortunate to find a relatively non-chossy route up the center of that wall. Looseness abounds up there. The Green Creek Needle might have a nice 2 pitch arete route to climb. Looonnngg approach to a small objective but it's a real gem. But who knows maybe I'm full of it. The area is definitely worth a visit regardless. Definintely more routes to be climbed up on Mamie, but I think the logistics of developing filthy rock into quality multipitch routes that you can't walk around to the top of is daunting for most people. I'll be real excited to see if how much development occurs up there in the future.

I'd like to take three days next year and climb The Mythic Wall, Ellation and The Arayete all as day trips. Seems like it would be a quality trip. Hard to believe it's going on 5 years since I set foot in the Green Creek Valley. I wonder if anyones going in there still? Someday I'm going get back up to that Labor Day Wall as well. I still have dreams of a 15 pitch rock climb on Mount Shuksan.

You just step down onto the snow. There are no chimneys in the Chimneys just gullies connected by ledges. I think it would be next to impossible to give a specific route description you just have to follow your nose and if it's harder than 3rd class and not obviously travelled you're off route.

Trip: Mamie Peak - Ellation Crags Date: 8/30/2010 Trip Report: So Mamie Peak is the large lump of granite that sits above the Hannegan Pass Trailhead. I'm sure every climber who passes through takes at least a moment to consider it but I'm only aware of at least two prolific route developers over the years who have wandered up there climbed a pitch or two then never returned. In July of '07 (the same day Sol got married) I was hiking to the pass with my wife and daughter Araya when I took the first photo below. While most of the rock has the appearance of choss I could make out a distinct, large smooth buttress of rock in the center of the face that appeared to be split by a single long crack system. Dissuaded by significant amounts of greenery as well as an unfounded reputation for friable crappy rock I managed to more or less dismiss it as a possibility. Mamie Peak from the Hannegan Pass Trail. Ellation climbs the center of the rounded buttress in 5 pitches just left of the central gully system starting off the obvious treed ledge. 3 pitch "approach" slab is somewhat out of view. The small, clean looking dihedral pretty much in the center of the photo is "Dave's Grand Dihedral" and is about 175' long. Another year, another daughter Ella. On a beautiful late fall day in September '08 I'm out alone reenacting the Sound of Music by traversing the superlative ridgeline from Hannegan Pass back over Hannegan Peak, Granite Peak, Peak 7020' and Mamie Peak. I'm surprised to find that Mamie Peak is composed of excellent, compact white granite when not covered in large mats of moss and krumholtz. The east ridge of Mamie Peak is a nice 4th class adventure. Several weeks later my first attempt to reach the base is stymied by steep dirt, wicked brush, and deep impassable gullies. Once again I almost dismiss it, but a week later I'm back this time nailing a more or less reasonable approach that reaches the rock at the base of a 100' long splitter finger crack. Right before Halloween I managed to spend a cold, wet day cleaning out the start of the crack. "Woodland Critter's Christmas" is a beautiful 100' 5.8-5.9 finger crack. This was the first pitch established. The 5.8 hand crack nearby is excellent as well. A winter, a spring, massive piles of avi debris close the road a mile before the trailhead. A ridiculously heavy load of ropes, brushes, saws, biners, bolts and other gear is hauled to the base. With the exception of a desert trip that spring every single day I "climbed" in '09 was spent scrubbing, scraping, trundling, drilling and generally thrashing around on ropes. Of course I didn't do this alone and am heavily indebted to the help and hard work of Gene, Justin, Matt, Tyree, Owen and Dave all of whom gave up a day of their lives they'll never get back to bring these climbs to fruition. As the summer turned to fall the possibility that creating "Ellation" might drag into another year became very real. With weekends consumed by other responsibilities there were mornings I'd get up at 3 am drive and hike-in in the dark, start jugging fixed lines at fist light and scrub for a couple hours before rushing back down the trail to get to work before my absence was noticed. Seeing the sunrise on Ruth and Sefrit from high up on the wall was always well worth the loss of sleep. The colors changed, the weather deteriorated yet somehow it got done and on what might have been the last climbable day of the year up there Matt Alford and I finally climbed the route with a glorious backdrop of fresh-snow covered peaks. At the end of the day Matt just says "cadillac Darin, cadillac". Another winter, another year and I'm off chasing new obsessions. I finally made it back up yesterday morning. Brushed out and flagged the path which had remained surprisingly intact and gave the first pitch another light scrub. So many good memories for me, a happy place. The bugs were absent, the smell of fall in the air, colors will be changing soon, a perfect time to climb. I hope somebody gets out there and enjoys it! Ellation is 8 pitches long and can be rappelled with a single 70m rope. The climbing is varied with everything from full-on friction to finger and hand cracks to insecure face climbing to slightly-overhung jug hauling. Cruxes are short and the protection is excellent. The few moves harder than 10bish? can easily be french-freed. FYI pitch 5 starts by climbing alongside a precarious looking flake. I jumped up and down on it, bounced tested cams behind it and pried at it with everything I had short of a 3' crowbar. It's still there and will remain so in all likelyhood just climb ..ah..mindfully. Matt A approaching "Ellation" in October '09. The first pitch ends just above the obvious roof at the bottom of the photo. P2 & P3 climb the slab above. P4 through P8 climb the buttress above with P8 going through and ending just above the highest visible point of rock. Pitch 3 of Ellation, exciting and sustained climbing on small chickheads. Mount Ruth in the background The ramp on Pitch 6. This was the feature that orignally caught my eye several years before hand. When it peters out, really fun face climbs leads to the only ledge on the main wall which is all of 6" deep. Pitch 7 offers sustained but well protected slab climbing in an awesome position. Starting the first rappel. Amazing views of Sefrit, Baker and Ruth. Looking up the valley from somewhere on the approach. Link to Topo, print at 200 dpi Gear Notes: 70m rope. nuts, double set of cams tiny to 1.75", single set to 3". 12 draw/slings. Approach Notes: There are some nice car camping spots at the trailhead. Follow the Hannegan Pass trail about 4 minutes to a large clearing full of slide alder. A large white granite boulder is visible several hundred feet above the trail. Follow the trail through the clearing then another 40' until you reach a very small dry watercourse crossing the trail. Immediately after this leave the trail and thrash left through brush then into forest picking up the much larger extension of the water course, which now appears as a dry streambed. If you do not pick up a dry streambed within 30' of the trail start over or you will be in for a world of hurt! Follow this about 10 minutes up to the aforementioned white boulder, a great place to hang out or maybe even bivi. Continue up the drainage past the boulder maybe 150' until you can bushwack straight left through a clearing in the slide alder to reach forest at a 30' tall snag. At this point a heavily flagged trail switchbacks up through very steep woods. The next 10 or 20 parties (is that presumptuous?) are going to determine if there will be one good or many poor trails. Please make an effort to follow the existing path, I promise it's the best possible route, and leave the ugly flagging up. I'll go clean it out before winter. It takes about an hour from the car to reach the base of the climbs.

There is no more discontented group of folks then the "professional photographer" in the digital age.

Trip: Sheriff's Badge - Cowboys & Indians V A3+ Date: 8/21/2010 Trip Report: "A man can be himself only so long as he is alone" - A Schopenhauer Apparently aiding climb is about as popular as Barack Obama these days. While considered a classic (I think) the Google did not turn up a single scrap of beta, photos or TR on Cowboys & Indians. Well here's to changing all that! So maybe standing in aiders isn't particularly fun but being alone on a 1000 feet of stone, laying in your portaledge making sandwiches, what could be grander? This was a fine line on great stone. The pitches are all really long and sustained, they just go on and on and on. A nice aspect is that the crux comes low and the route gets progressively easier the higher you go. Once you pull the roof it's almost all A1 to the top, pretty sweet considering how committed you've just become! The crux itself is tenuous for sure, be ready for lots of positive hooking way out from anything that's going to hold a fall. Finally don't underestimate the descent. Once you "top out" it's still a long way back to the ground. It took me six hours (without water) shuttling loads to get all my 100+ pounds of junk back to the car. That Sasquatch Ledge is a real treat I tell you. The Badge from the new Casino. C&I climbs just right of center topping out at the highest point of the white scar. Sasquatch Ledge cuts across top of wall. After doing lots of routes that I mentally chalked up as training it was nice to finally jump on something that felt like the real deal. Looking up from the base. Fixed lines on P1&2. P3 traverses left on obvious crack. P4 follows clean flake then rivets, hooks, pins and bolts through roof. Looking back across the "A1" traverse on P3. This is the underside of a huge, brittle, expanding flake. In my Squamish Guide (pub. 2000) there's a picture of Rich Prohaska half way through this. In retrospect I realize he now looks sad. For good reason, I though this was the scariest section of the climb. The beautiful A2 flake system that makes up the start of P4. Absolutely no perspective on the size of the roof. Pulling back into the anchor after rappelling p4. Notice the absolutely enormous shit stain on end of P3, lower right. It's not really big wall climbing until you have to climb through someone else's rectal explosion. WTF? After pulling into the anchor you could let go and take a 60' pendulum into space. Fun! Terrifying! Pigs in Space! Hah! Looking back from the edge of the roof. The roof is passed mostly on high quality rivets and bolts though there are some hard to place, but bomber, pins as well as some consecutive hooking. Save plenty of rivet hangers (8?) for above the roof or back clean madly like I had too. Morning over Howe Sound with a well timed moon set. Looking back at the top of pitch 4. An exposed but well configured anchor from which to bivi. Final pitch to Sasquatch. Easy aid in a low angle corner. Brings lots of this. Plenty of these as well. Don't be afraid to bust out the hammer. And make damn sure you've got a Hawk! As much as I enjoy being alone, if there's anyone out there with the skills and desire to get on lines like Humpty or the original Badge give me a shout, I think my wife would really appreciate it. No drug addictions or significant personality disorders please. If you're middle aged with a healthy pallet of responsibilities; career, family, mortgage we might even have something to talk about. Note on the bolting The route was established solo by Squamish legend Perry Beckham, the first 2 pitches in 1989 and the rest of the route in 1999. The difference in bolting technology (and security) is pretty astounding between the two eras. Pitch 2 consists of several short bolt ladders between long stretches of hooking, beaks and heads. While there are several relatively good 3/8" bolts most of them are terrifyingly rusted 1/4" buttonheads with Leeper hangers, there are even some 3/16" buttonheads. The holes are frequently cratered and they all look like they could have been placed 40 years prior. After pitch 2 Perry switched to using 1/4" SS Hilti wedge bolts. They look like they could have placed yesterday and feel totally bomber. If you go to do this climb you might consider bring the tools and skills to upgrade pitch 2. It would make sense to upgrade the buttonheads to the same hangerless Hilti rivets used higher on the climb and would probably knick the + off the rating. Just make sure you know what your doing with a drill. Gear Notes: Rack (I carried a lot more unnecessary iron than this) micronuts: 1-2 sets (offsets useful) nuts: 1-2 sets (offsets useful) cams: 2 ea .4" (offsets useful) 3 ea .5"-1.5" (offsets useful) 2 ea 2”–3” (double #3 for P3 only) 8 peckers: 4 #1, 2 ea #2, #3 5 KBs: 1 ea #2 - #6 5 LAs: 2 ea #5, 1 ea #4, #6, #7 4 angles: 2 ea ½”, 1 ea 5/8”, ¾” 10 heads: #1-#3 hooks: 1 Grappling hook 1 pointed Cliffhanger 1 Hawk (modified cliffhanger) 1 bathook rivet hangers: 15 (Moses keyhole) bring 6 or so 1/4 nuts & washers as well Many (20+?) slings and draws. The pitches are huge. Approach Notes: It's now the third trail off the road. About 30' in is a BC Parks sign that says Sheriffs Badge.

Bet that's some clean rock though! Nice work.

I'm glad you climbed that corner. I remember walking over there and looking up it and thinking how beautiful it looked (your pics don't do it justice). To bad about the munge, our route had some of that too. Nice work.

Back in the day when ropes were shorter everyone had to jump off. But they were a bit tougher back then too.

Hey. If that's at the top of the overhung crack/corner on ?p4 of Green Dragon it's mine. I recognize it. Thing is I left it up there in early April! Gorilla Tape is some good shit!

Nice TR. A friend and I did a very similar trip a couple years back spending I think three nights at the little tarn up there. Couple other greats routes up there include a west to east traverse of Razorback and Comet. Maybe 4-6 pitches of 5.6-5.8 on great rock with some exposed 4th class thrown in. We also climbed the East Face of Lighthouse Tower. While the first pitch is garbage the rest is excellent and includes several stretches of great hand cracks. Sort of a classic. Click for bigger

Hah. Ain't that the truth!

Hey,nice TR. You can always tell the hardcore alpine climbers by their dynemma helmets. So reading between the lines here is this a classic example of a still motivated climber with to much else going on who gets a free day then says....honey we're gonna drive out the night before...then says ....honey we'll be home late so don't wait up. Who's day trip then becomes a +/*- 33 hr epic! Sweet. I like it. Beautiful photos I can't believe you went all the way in there and back out in a day.

Nice work Sol. 12c in the mountains, hell anywhere, is some serious mastery. What's next?!

Thought I'd point out that Mike is apparently a 5.12+ photographer as well. Nice work on these FreeRider, thats gotta be a serious effort getting into position for some of those shots. BTW Mike (if your out there) as a freeclimb would Town Crier be much improved if a majority of the rusty fixed gear on the Triple Roofs was removed? It certainly would improve the aesthetics of the route as an aid climb.

I was checking out Forbidden from the north (Ruby Mtn) last weekend (7/10) and the northwest aspect was still quite snowy. Looked like it might be a couple more weeks before it fully melts out.

Looked real snowy from the top of Lib Bell on 6/26. While I doubt much has changed since then I bet it's about to change a lot. All in all that might be the most classic route in the North Cascades. Have fun!

The comment "as the loops can slip when loaded individually" originally had some appeal as this indicates that the knot would essentially self equalize regardless of direction of pull. I haven't considered what might happen should one anchor fail. Came across another interesting knot here.... http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.php?topic_id=239823&msg=240945

Looking for a knot-nerd to critque a setup. Will I die if I use a "portuguese" or "french" bowline in the end of a rope to equalize two bolts? Check it out.... Portuguese-Bowline

Trip: Liberty Bell - Thin Red Line Date: 6/26/2010 Trip Report: Clear skies, dry rock, long days, no mosquitoes and plenty of snow for an easy descent. It doesn’t really get any better. Which begs the question, where in the hell was everybody? Well it had been three years since I had made it up to Washington Pass and at least six years since I had climbed Liberty Bell. WTF? There’s just not enough time anymore for all the things I might like to do. Drove up to the pass Friday afternoon lolly-gagging along with our road sodas and parked it at the Cutthroat Trail Head for the night just like the good old days. Woke up stupid early, but already the eastern sky had taken on a soft glow. It’s a nice time of year for the alpine start. The approach is still snow from the road, and while it was frozen hard its sun cupped enough that we managed in our tennis shoes. Sun finally broke over Kangaroo Ridge just as we started climbing leaving us slightly overheated most of the day. Having never done the route before I had always had the impression that the route was a stellar looking line that was actually sort of mediocre on mediocre rock. As it turns out the climb is excellent, a genuine classic, and pretty darn chill in its current state. The original first pitch looks crappy but there’s a nice pitch of bolted face climbing (5.10?) that leads almost directly to the anchor. Owen led that then I set of short-fixing through the next four pitches of aid that we figured were sort of the meat of the climb. This was all quite nice with lots of easy aid, the occasional tricky bit (C2ish) and some fun, easy free climbing. There is a lot of fixed gear currently on route particularly at what might be considered the cruxes. The beginning of pitch 2 is a C1 clip-up on many fixed lost arrows and the double roof of pitch 5 has some pins and a welded beak near the lip that kept it casual. I thought the start of Pitch 5 with the pendulum to hook moves (or mantle) off the belay on an otherwise blank face was really neat and the highlight of the climb for me. I had the impression that someone might have fixed all this gear recently to work it as a free climb, or has it always been like that? After clearing the roof we went back to pitching it out and were pleased to find continued excellent climbing. Pitch 6 offers some nice moderate crack climbing to the first good belay ledge on the route where we had a lunch break. Pitch 7 might be the most aesthetic of the route, long, vertical and clean on great rock. Plugging along we eventually made M&M then lost some time finding the route above. Make sure to start up the partially-hidden left-trending ramp directly above the right edge of the ledge. Again I had figured the upper pitches would be crappy as most topos say things like “loose blocks” but again we both though the climbing was great. Plenty of good rock with a long fun layback, some nice face climbing followed by some splitter hand cracks. The slab traverse up high was trivial and the climb finished with some nice crack climbing along the arête separating the north and east faces. This time of year the descent is a real joy as the chossy approach gully on the west side is still filled with snow. I was pleasantly surprised by how enjoyable this route was and would highly recommend it. We climbed it at 5.10 C2, though with a couple hook moves between bolts on the first pitch it could go at 5.8 C2. The climbing seemed to be about the same difficulty as Green Drag-On or Town Crier. None of the belay ledges looked at all comfortable and hauling above M&M ledge would be horrible. I think the best strategy would be to fix and fire or just fire. Grievously sprained my ankle while walking on flat grass the following day and am now hobbling around on crutches so my summer might be over just after it began. But it sure was good while it lasted! Gear Notes: Double rack to #2 C4s along with a #3 and #4 worked great though you could probably drop the #4 and be fine. Definitely include some offset nuts and micronuts and some small single-stem cams if you’ve got them. Climbing this route hammerless seems highly dependant on the presence of copious amounts fixed gear. I would definitely bring a small rack of pins in case some of it goes missing. Next time I’ll bring a #2 & #3 copperhead, a #2 and #3 LA and a ½” and 5/8” angle just in case.

Nice pic mountainmatt Here's some interesting writeups out of the AAJ. The first route referenced seems to be the start of Solid Gold followed by a finish up and right. The second route reference seems to take on the big roof crack just right of the Solid Gold start then finishes with the upper pitches of Solid Gold (beautiful white dihedral by a thin finger crack). So SG is really a combination of two routes done previously. Then they did two routes on the nice looking wall left of Solid Gold. 1988 AAJ pg 130 must be 1987 route Prusik Peak, South Face of West Ridge. On August 16, Rich Romano and I ascended the leftmost crack system on the south face of Prusik. The large overhang on the second pitch was passed on the right. A short overhanging hand crack and airy face moves brought us to the west-ridge route. (The climb is left of the Boving-Christensen route.) (II, 5.10.) FRED 1989 AAJ pg 142 Prusik Peak, South Face of West Ridge. On August 3, after being stopped the previous day, Rich Roman0 led through the large overhangs 50 feet to the right of our 1987 route. A pitch higher in a big alcove, we crossed left of the other route, then climbed a beautiful white dihedral by a thin finger crack, gaining the west ridge (II, 5.11+). The following day, we climbed a diagonaling crack system up and to the right to a belay on the southwest arete and ultimately to the west ridge (II, 5.11). On August 11, David Goland and I did a route that starts further left, in a striking right-angle dihedral. After two pitches, we were forced out of the dihedral by the lack of protection. We entered a curving slot up and right, which placed us at the base of the now familiar finger crack (II, 5. IO+). The climbs are named Double Bein, Keep on Belton. and Notley’s Direct. FRED YACKIJLIC

One would have to be pretty jaded not to enjoy that route or any route on Prusik for that matter. I think general agreement is that it's more of 10+ than 11-.

Up the wide, slabby buttress that sits left of the summit (topping out halfway up the skyline). I remember 7ish pitches of fun easy climbing on small incut holds. It received an embarassing-ly long route description in the new CAG. Though anywhere else I'm sure it would be quite popular.....

Handbrake worked fine for me. Stuck all my kids Diego videos on an ipod to keep them happy while camping. Once you install Handbrake though you also have to install a seperate de-encrypting application. You sorta have to read between the lines to figure this out. Reason being it's illegal to burn DVDs even if you actually purchased the DVD. Handbrake gets around this somehow by offering only part of the process. Sounds sketchy but it works fine and seem legit.

Scottsdale? Like in Phoenix? Look for the guys in pink panties. They might be able to help you But if you run across Sheriff Joe you should probably just keep your mouth shut.