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dberdinka

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Everything posted by dberdinka

  1. Well Mr Conway your panties are certainly in a wad! From what I've read one gets the sense that K2 has been turned into a circus ala Mt Everest style. A lot of those ballsy and skilled climbers died on fully self-supported expeditions or doing small alpine style climbs. This waiting around and getting all bent that the other guys didn't fix ropes to your liking or blaming your gear (WTF?) is ridiculous. While I don't doubt these were all good folks, I'm of the impression they were all not the Rob Slater and Allison Hargreaves of the climbing world.
  2. It's pretty fucking simple. If you're reliant on porters carrying and fixing ropes for the final summit push on K2 you're probably in over your head. Hubris has a way of catching up with all of us.
  3. 3 pics and a single paragraph? Thats all I get! I'm left feeling deprived. Great work, looks like an amazing route. I need to get some of that. D
  4. Friends from CO climbed Roan Wall ~ a week and a half ago. Road, approach and climb are in good shape. Bivi Boulder was buried under 30' of snow still. They had many sightings of reticent humanoid type beings equiped with hand drills and SS gear.
  5. That is friggin INCREDIBLE!
  6. Noyce. Did you climb it or just read this > ? Climbed other stuff up there in June. Lots o rock. The Complete Black Pyramid
  7. Black Pyramid - NW Face Beeatches!
  8. Is your partner the Reinhard Fabish of North Face - Robie Reid fame? While the direct start is heavily threatened by serac fall from both sides of the buttress, the approach to the North Rib crosses an apparently much more stable "glacier" and has very little if any exposure to crevasse fall. For a lot of reasons it's the better climb IMHO.
  9. Take it all with a grain of salt as I've never been there, but it looks like 10km from the main Harrison Lake Road to a junction with the old Chehalis route about halfway between Statlu Lake and Nursery Pass turnoffs, with minimal elevation change (~140m net in and 40m net out). Sounds pretty doable.
  10. Well nearby at least....evidence is accumulating that there is an actual, breeding pack in the Methow Valley. First time since the 1930's. Very cool stuff. Wolves captured in Okanogan County
  11. Amazing photos as always, but whats up with the tiny sizing? Need more pixels!
  12. I'm sorry you lost your gear, hopefully someone will find and return it. Sounds like a very dangerous epic, fortunately we all tend to live through a couple of those when starting out. Save Slesse for the end days of summer when the ice is all gone (might not happen this year?) and you can approach in tennis shoes without having to roll the dice.
  13. Anyone been back in here recently? Print at 150 dpi and it fits nicely on a page.
  14. Jacobs Ladder up through P6 or so and the first two 5.10 pitches on RainMan make for a mostly nonslab day with lots of excellent crack and face climbing. CombShot on the Third Tooth of Comb Buttress is 3 pitches of good face and crack climbing. Around the corner is an amazing steep arete with a mix of bolts and cracks that is supposedly 2 pitches of mid/hard 5.11, looks a lot more like Index than D-Town.
  15. What ridge route on Dome?
  16. A long time ago two dudes went in there and failed. Then they walked all the way home and sent a letter to the AAJ proclaiming it ass. Yet they were inclined to mention that it could hold several grade IV routes if you were into that sort of thing (ass). Then no one every went back. At least no one who sprays all over the intertubes. The End. Oh and one more note. John's photos are amazing and I have burnt as much time as anyone staring at them. But (based on personal expereince) when it comes to rock faces they are not an effective tool for ascertaining rock quality or potential lines. The only way to find out is to boat, bike walk and schwack all the way in there.
  17. Beautiful Area The approach is long, hard and enjoyable. Give yourself 6-8 hrs to get in there via Frosty Peak Trail then alpine wandering. Ignore Kearneys advice for the drop down to the pass at the foot of the mountain (Is it Pass and Cow creeks?) Instead walk up to the highpoint and drop straight down the ridgeline to the pass. The pass is a special place. The climb starts out great for the first 6 pitches (as counted in Kearney's topo, many of these could be linked). The crux pitch is one of the best I've done in the mountains, hard crimpy climbing through a roof followed by a 100+ feet of steep, clean hands to fists. Above that point the rock gets really dirty and P8 is a loose, filthy POS. Easy climbing above, never found the squeeze chimney he describes below the east summit. A good but not classic route dye largely to the extra manky 8th pitch and the somewhat unasthetic easy stuff on the upper half. Still a worhtwhile way to spend 2-3 days. Bring a medium rack including doubles of blue and yellow TCUs for the sustained finger cracks of P4 & P5. Again many pitches could be combined. Probably a Grade III. Will encounter steep snow on the descent until late summer. Potential snow or ice on the approach year round. You can see the very foreshortened hand crack on the crux pitch running across the slab sandwiched between the two big roof bands. If you could figure a way to punch through those upper roofs (and hey maybe all it takes is looking) you might have a classic route.
  18. WTF? Are they like holding onto the molding with their foot jammed next to the door? Hate = form of attachment. Sounds like you still have lots of attachments to this person that you need to let go of. Work that out and stop worrying what form they take in your head.
  19. Those somebodys have access to a key cause they're special. The rest of us will continue to push, pull and ride our bicycles for the forseeable future.
  20. Like Blake says you could probably get by without, a couple bugaboos or thin LAs might not hurt to have but I would consider them optional. And yes, the rating is probably a bit soft but this isn't a route for a leader maxing out at 5.8 or 5.9.
  21. In the last year the Arayete has seen at least three repeats. There seems to be some general agreement that it is in fact an enjoyable route. Most parties have apparently taken "variations" on P3 and P6 resulting in substantially harder climbing on looser terrain than Matt and I encountered (both pitches were enjoyable 5.7 for us). So to that end here is an overly detailed topo of the route to help keep things mellow. lick on it for the full-size version. Enjoy...
  22. Labor Day Buttress is a good day out, but more for the scenic approach and descent. It's really beautiful country. The route itself is so-so. The start is definitely harder than 5.4! More like 5.8! The rest of the route has some ok climbing and lots of mossy climbing. Consider one of the east face routes if you're up for it (Drew might have details). Also, this time of year you could be exposed to a lot of perched snow slabs ready to rain volkswagon size blocks of death down upon you, might be a better climb to try in the fall...
  23. It's been awhile assmonkey. LONG LIVE ASSMONKEY!!!
  24. Great TR and nice climb. That peak deserves respect. How long until that line gets skied? Nooksack Tower - harder East Mox - harder Assassin Spire - definitely harder
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