dberdinka

Hi Tim. We've actually met. I jump-started your car in the parking lot of Index a month ago. Climbing access: Squamish, Darrington, Index are all just over 90 miles from town. Erie is often times good all year long and is 45 to 50 minutes from town. Some people hate it. But the climbing is decent and the views are amazing. Good for a spring afternoon. Bouldering at Larrabee State Park (10 minutes from town) can be a pleasant diversion as well. There are other areas near town but they're all pretty much chossy and forgotten (sorry Jason). Alpine climbing in North Cascades is obviously closer than Seattle. Lots of stuff in BC is close as well (i.e. Slesse's less than 70 miles away) Cost-of-living: Been here to long to compare. Rent is cheap. Buying a house is ridiculously cheap compared to Seattle. Covers at bars are generally non-existent to cheap. Milk is about $3 a gallon. If you've got a decent paying job (most don't) you'll be just fine. Climbing Gyms: There are two in town. The YMCA just installed a riduclously huge wall (70+ feet tall?)and plans on running it as a real climbing gym rather than a daycare. It will cost you though. Definitely a good place to get a pump. Community, Climbing and otherwise: This is the city of subdued excitment. It tends to be kind of quiet around here. Maybe it's just me but any sense of climbing community is fractured to nonexistent. The climbing gyms have certainly never been an epi-center. That said, most people here are very open and friendly, we just all tend to stay home at night. Other perks: Excellent system of trails and parks. Chuckanut Mountains have extensive trail system 10-20 minutes from town. Including a cool cave with an underground lake. Great mountain biking, good beer, good food, blah, blah ,blah. Curious to see what others have to say......

Check out the forecasts at www.nwac.noaa.gov they tend to be more detailed and accurate IMHO. Predicting a 4000' freezing level for Thursday and Friday with continued dry weather. I won't be making any bets but it looks like next weekend might be a good one to get out into the mountains. Cross your fingers...

The 'cheval off Springbok is a bit unique in that it descends significantly. Quite terrifying when you first look at it. I straddled out of fear and nearly cut the jewels off. Dull it is not. So what are the "classic" chevals in the Cascades? Descent off Les Cornes (Springbok) SW Buttress of Dorado Needle SE Arete of South Early What else qualifies?

Dave just got a ***** rating! Projects? projects? ...hmmmmm Go back to the desert. Get scared, climb the Titan.

On the Upper Town Wall yesterday I had the thrill of watching my static line slowly fray over an edge as I did a free hanging jug up it. By the time I got past the damage, the sheath was half gone and the core was just starting to go. Talk about a near-life experience! I was feeling pretty damn alive after that was all over. <--- me

quote: Originally posted by Scotch-a-Go-Go: I just hope that when one gets written that it will be done in a way that reflects the history of the development there. Which would probably mean coming to grips with the crowd who did a lot of it.... Ummmmmm.......I think DavidW has that part under control. [ 11-23-2002, 02:05 PM: Message edited by: dberdinka ]

Aaaaaaghhh! The wizen forecasters are calling for an extended period of sunshine! Can my soggy, pale skin handle it? I'm thinking I might head down to Index to do some aid climbing. Any recommendations for a clean aid rack for Green Dragon and/or Town Crier? Widgets and trickery? Thanks in advance. Darin

With so many good memories it’s always hard to pick five. 1) Soloing the Direct East Buttress of South Early (Lots of anxiety until I actually got on it) 2) Soloing Prodigal Son in good style (Zion rules!) 3) Climbing Warbonnet in the Sawtooth Range (didn’t see anyone for 2 nights and almost 3 days) 4) Yellow Brick Road in Marble Canyon (excellent, fun climbing on an apparently big, scary wall. Just do it!) 5) King Fisher and Ancient Arts in the Fisher Towers (beautiful landscape & scary fixed gear) 6) Optimism to the South Buttress of Notch Top in RMNP (8 pitch, 5.10-). Maybe the best alpine rock climb I’ve ever done. 7,8,9,10,11............. Sorry, 5 just wasn’t enough! Biggest Defeat: Having to bail from the approach to the North Central Coulior of Joffre when my knee decided to get angry. I let my partner down, it sucked.

I think being a "Northwest hardman" doesn't necessarily mean you need to climb 5.12 or WI6 (though doing either probably wouldn't hurt your chances) instead it means getting out and doing those routes that WE ALL keep telling ourselves we’re going to do but never quite get around too. Here’s my short list of the routes in question: Complete North Buttress of Bear Mtn Girth Pillar on Mount Stuart Thin Red Line North Buttress of Fury North Buttress of Terror North Buttress of Nooksack Tower North Rib of Slesse Ptarmigan Ridge on Rainier Anything technical in winter Any of those would be technically, physically, mentally and climatically challenging to just about any climber in the NW or otherwise. Knock a couple of those off and you probably have the Cascade alpine climbing thing dialed.

Very near the top of the South Ridge of Gimli my buddy and I were simuling across 4th class terrain. He stepped up on a big block maybe 3'x5'x8'. It began to slide! He surfed it for a few feet before jumping off. It clattered down the slabs past me, then took a 1000' dive down the SW Face. Lots of noise, lots of dust. Next day we checked out the trail that runs below the face torwards Mulvey Basin. The block had dug a crater a couple feet deep just above before ending up in pile in the trail. Glad the place was deserted!

The west ridge of North Twin Sister is a popular winter climb (At least as popular as winter climbing gets around here). What makes for a beautiful scramble in summer can be quite exciting when plastered in snow. Furthermore, the approach in winter is no longer than it is in summer due to the always closed gate. Thats a rarity.

A climbing (sort of) near-death epic About 4 or 5 Februarys ago a couple buddies and I decided to go ski the White Salmon Glacier on Mount Shuksan. Temperatures were very cold and it hadn't snowed since a major storm about a week before. Most shady aspects were covered in a beautiful, deep layer of hoary powder. Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle, slog, slog, slog. After much suffering we finally turned around not far below Winnies Slide as the day was passing and conditions had changed to wind crust. Taking the lead I headed down. The best snow seemed to be right up next to the Northwest Rib, so we tracked down along this eventually ending up in a very exposed spot directly below the Hanging Glacier. I cliffed out above a nasty looking shrund while my friends were far enough back that I managed to point out the neccesary traverse to bypass the mess I was in. They disappeared while I popped my skis off to hike back up to the traverse. The absence of fresh debris in the basin below the Hanging Glacier indicated that nothing had come off in the previous week. Of course at this point there was a thunderous CRACK! I looked up to see an enormous avalanche pouring off the lip of the hanging glacier. This is all taking place about 2000' directly above me. It's growing bigger and BIGGER getting louder and LOUDER. There's a little outcrop above me so I slam my skis into the snow and try and get REAL small. Last thing I see is this powder cloud the size of GOD baring down across the slopes above me. I close my eyes and bury my face in the snow. The rumbling grows louder and louder, suddenly it grows very dark even with my eyes closed. I'm getting slammed into the snow by vicous blasts of wind. This goes on for 20 seconds that felt like 20 minutes. As quick as it started, suddenly the rumble diminishs and the winds stop trying to tear me from the hillside. Looking around, all that is left is a quickly diminshing cloud of powder and a HUGE debris trail maybe 75 feet to my left. Later that day I remember standing in the forest, looking at hoar frost crystals and feeling really, REALLY, REALLY! alive.

I am proud to have climbed the first (5.4) pitch of Sunday Cruise on Witch Doctor Wall and lived. For those interested here is a description. From base of wall scramble 3rd and 4th class to pin belay on ledge below vague right facing corner. Climb corner. Corner is composed of stacked, loose flakes up to 30' long. Handholds and pro can be found by digging through moss and ferns. Eventually bearhug a very large, very scary flake wedged in corner to wide crack and decomposing chockstone belay. Look at mossy, schrub covered headwall. Bail A forgettable Darrington classic.

I attest to the fact that you need to give Red Rocks some time to dry out after it rains. I experienced the pleasure of climbing on damp rock there a few weeks back. Holds get wet, holds get brittle, holds break off. Climber collects bad karma for ruining routes. Once it stops raining, wait until the next day before you start climbing. Just for added incentive one of the desert guidebooks states that sandstone looses up to 75% of it's strength once wet. Scary!

to hell with cracks in j tree. Lets go down big cracks in sand stone called canyons!!!! don't make me tell you again jason.

Not sure what the weathers doing up there anymore but Rainman is one of the finest climbs in Darrington. It has 4 well protected 5.10 pitches in a row featuring a lazer-cut corner, a steep hand crack, cool underclings around a roof, sustained slabs (of course) and some fun overlaps. An approach pitch about 150 yards north of the west buttress leads to an obvious, very angular left facing dihedral. It goes at about 10b. Followed by pitches of 10b, 10a, 10c then 2 easier pitches to the big tree ledge. Sweet!!

Climbed Springbok in mid-August this year. Now that I've forgotten about the lower half of the route I remember it being pretty damn awesome. The approach sucks (but better than Ibex). The pitch descriptions in the Becky guide seemed more accurate than those in the new Mclane Guide. Personally I though rock quality was horrendous on the lower half of the route and perfect above. The right hand variation to Pitch 7 (??) has some scary stacked blocks as does the next pitch. The 5.10 fist crack is burly, but begins the good rock. Above there every pitch is quality particularly the 5.9 slab pitch. Getting off is way more mellow the rumor has it. The cheval descent is spectacular and fun. The rappells and downclimbing are no worse than plenty of other alpine routes. So in general a worthy climb, though somewhat stained by super lame rock down low.

In early August unstable weather, general lethargy and the Squamish vortex turned a planned trip to Waddington into two weeks of cragging. Driven from Squamish and Joffre by rain then snow we found ourselves camped out in Marble Canyon. I'm of the impression that while many people have ice climbed here relatively few have rock climbed. A night followed by a morning of rain kept us in our tent until about noon on the first day. The sun eventually broke out and we went cragging on the lower walls. Theres a number of good pitches here in the 5.8 to 5.10 range, generally low angle face climbing. The obvious attraction in the area is the main wall. 1700' of slabby to overhanging limestone perched high above the canyon. The wall is breached by one route called the Yellow Brick Road, climbed between 1973 and 1994 (or something like that). It looked very intimidating, however careful reading of the guidebook indicates that there was a judicous use of bolts on the first ascent. Leaving the road at 6:30 AM we spent an hour and a half scrambling to the base through a lot of ball-bearing scree. A bit of sporadic rockfall adding to the character of the wall. First two pitches were excellent, well-protected face and crack climbing followed by four easier pitches the led to the base of the steep center portion of the cliff. Three steep pitches of very well protected but occasionally loose rock led up through the headwall. The postion was incredible and the climbing generally excellent. The bolt ladder is pretty damn long (20 bolts ??). I was glad to have aiders and my partner was glad to have jumars. Bring lots of slings and biners. The 5.10 free pitches have lots of bolt protection and the cruxs could easily be aided. From here 4 more pitches of fun climbing followed by a long stretch of 4th/low 5th led to the top of the wall. Total climbing time was 7 hours plus another 1.5 hours for the descent. All belays were 2 fat bolts, route finding was obvious, climbing was fun and everything was well protected. There is certainly enough loose rock that I wouldn't climb behind another party on this route, but it didn't seem to detract from the climb at all. Descent down the North Gully was fast, obvious and beautiful. Good on the knees too! as most of it is through squishy forest. All in all an awesome route that is far better, safer and straight forward than you would think. Highly recommended for a fall adventure. One last note. Though Marble Canyon supposedly scorches in the summer we wore long underwear, wind breakers and wool hats the entire day and were still cold. Strange, strange weather in early August this year.

Back in the day when I was but a wee lass, some fools were always talking about going to the Van Zandt Dyke. Me thinks it's a chossy outcropping you can see from both Highway 9 and 542. Have fun. If the rock won't hold a drill hole I swear I've seen ice there in the winter as well. Whatcom County -- The second best soft sandstone climbing in the world [ 07-19-2002, 08:16 AM: Message edited by: dberdinka ]

Once melted out, the easiest route is a sloppy scree pile. NE ridge is lots of fun, Plexus has description spot on. Reminds me of slightly humorous insight.... What is a mountaineer? Someone who climbs the descent routes.

Last year we bushwacked in, got lost in thick clouds, climbed the prominent gendarme on the west ridge in the photo above, rappelled of in the pouring rain and bushwacked/slid back down in a torrential downpour. The Mclane book certainly underestimates the time it would take to get in and out of there. I think our biggest mistake was underestimating the distances you have to cover in the alpine area. That face is a long way from the ridge you cross! All in all a beautiful area. I don't remember the bushwacking being that bad! Oh. And the rock was pretty nice.... [ 07-15-2002, 10:06 AM: Message edited by: dberdinka ]

Other great routes include SW Ridge of S Early 7-8 pitch 5.8 on great rock W Face of N Early 4 pitch 5.10+ with a short crux E Face of Lexington great rock, bring a big cam!

The chimney pitch on Prusik is harder, or at least more awkward, than chimney pitches on Epenephrine. It's also much, much shorter and, as previously pointed out, it protects very well. Have fun!

After crossing creek low in valley we headed upstream through slide alder then talus to below fairly large gully/waterfall. Climbed up rib and slabs on the west side of this. Looked imposing but was mostly scrambling with 10' of low 5th. More slide alder and some lower-angle slabs led into steep open terrain above. That was late September of last year, in early season I imagine it could be very different (wetter).

With the forecast looking less than wonderful (the weather forecast) I'm thinking of adventuring off to the hopefully warm and dry side of the coast range. Any first hand experience in Marble Canyon? Worthy of a roadtrip or scary choss pile? Thanks for the beta. Darin [ 07-01-2002, 04:14 PM: Message edited by: dberdinka ]