nolanr

I was on Golden Horn and Mt. Hardy this weekend, I think I probably saw Crater Mtn., and trust me, the views will be worth it.

100 oz. bladder...is that so you don't have to piss the whole weeekend? Kidding, I know what you mean.

Alright, so you've had your fun w/ me (Matt Anderson). I'll give you an example of what I mean. I did a multi pitch route on Icicle Buttress this weekend. On one of my leads, I did feel like I was about to come off. Got pretty freaky. Very motivating. I won't soon forget that experience. I couldn't tell you the name of the route, though, because I didn't even hear it's name before we started climbing it. And I didn't look up the name afterwards. I do know we did Spaghetti Crack or something like that just before the multi pitcher. Here's another example. One of the funnest days I've had cragging was at Frenchman's. We forgot the guide book. So we didn't know the names of the routes or the ratings as we were doing them. Had a great time anyway. It makes it hard to compare war stories w/ other climbers afterwards, but other than that, what's in name?

Right on, I hope it doesn't melt off before I get a chance to go play around in it this weekend.

Definitely not a pine marten, I saw some of them early this year. This guy was too darkly colored, didn't have the lighter underbelly. I think marten spend the vast majority of their lives in trees. This guy was on the ground, then in the water. Possibly a fisher, I think those are aquatic. I wish I had got a better look, but he didn't hang around real long.

Terminal Gravity--No problem, hope you get some serious climbers to come down your way. It's not that the area is unknown, there were lots of backpackers and horse packers around while I was there. It just seems to be a fairly well kept secret w/in OR, hardly anybody I talk to in WA has ever heard of the area.

MattP, Good points, I don't disagree w/ you at all. I also sometimes purposely head out somewhere w/out checking a route guide first, to see if I can find my own way up something. It does provide for excitement and a sense of discovery. I guess I was looking at bouldering more specifically. There probably are some boulders somewhere that nobody has climbed on before. But so what. Most likely in places like Ingalls Lake area, if there's an attractive chunk of rock, somebody's already been there. If a person wants to tote a crash pad around and have fun up there or other places, go for it. But to have the notion "I'm probably the first person to ever think of this or ever do this" seems silly. Maybe I was reading too much into this thread. I remember thinking the same last winter when there was a rash of posts about first ski or snowboard descents of various places. Maybe what really gets me about the whole idea is what I perceive as an arrogance. It seems to discount an entire previous generation or generations of climbers. "They couldn't possibly have done this, I MUST be the first." There have been excellent climbers and bold adventurers around for a long time, who have accomplished some pretty amazing things w/ crap for gear. Their deeds weren't always recorded. It just irks me when some Johnny Come Lately shows up on the scene and thinks he's going to turn the world on it's ear and do a bunch of stuff nobody has ever done before. Anyhoo, that's enough of that.

People come up with their lists of top climbs, and when they get to sport or trad routes on crag climbs, I get bored pretty quick. I don't say that to be condescending, it's not that I'm a great climber. I just don't find that I remember the names of crag routes. I probably couldn't come up w/ more than half-a-dozen that I've done. I like cragging sometimes, it's fun and challenging, I just don't store the names of the routes, it doesn't seem very important to me. Anybody else feel that way, or is it just me?

I must have gone right by the Great Trog, but didn't particularly notice it. The Cirque is a cool place. Got to see the N. (or is it E.) Fork of the Nooksack emerging from a little tunnel through the glacier. I think I saw a bear print by the river along the sandbar. It's one of those timeless feeling kind of places. Kinda primal. Like the earth is still forming right there in front of you. Another really big boulder you can camp under is "Shelter Rock" near the upper Royal Basin in the Olympics. Not sure how it would be for climbing, it's a huge chunk of pillow lava, might be a little friable. It did spit a chunk of icicle right down on my head when I was out there last November.

I meant east of the Wallowas, in the Seven Devils area. I made it as far as the Oregon side of Hell's Canyon.

Anybody been out in the last day or two? Did we get some fresh white stuff? With the rain and reported freezing levels down to 6 or 7 K, just curious.

I think I saw one this weekend, along the banks of the Icicle, just outside of downtown L-worth. It was dark brown, thin and weasel-like, was in and out of visibility in a rock pile, hopped in the creek for a minute, then jumped out and disappeared. Anybody else seen anything like that? And I don't think it was thick-bodied enough to be an otter, and not so gangly on land.

Dru, is there a brain bucket under all of those stickers? Art is... God's Creation, the mountains, the crags, the lakes and rivers, sunsets and sunrises, alpenglow, moon beams. Everything else is Man's attempt to equal it, which pales by comparison. Oops, sorry if I offended any of ya' heathens out there. (Hey, things have been far too friendly around here lately, just trying to stir up a little flame fest!)

My take on it is, these guys looking for virgin territory for bouldering are glory hounds who can't quite admit to themselves that everything's already been done. I've been scrambling on some pretty shitty pieces of rock before, there's no reason why anyone else would have ever wanted to be there, so do I get to claim an FA? Write it up for the climbing journals? Whatever. Climbing should be fun, in whatever way you choose to do it, but this obsession I see with getting your name in the record book and climbing something nobody's ever done before is tiresome. My $.02.

Doh, you let the cat out of the bag. Seems nobody outside of Oregon has ever heard of the Wallowas ('cept me). I spent about a week backpacking there in '99, had a great time. Scrambled up Matterhorn and Eagle Cap. Ever venture east to the Seven Devils in Idaho? I've been looking at that area for a while now, haven't made it there yet.

Colchuck Lake approach is shorter but steeper. Pick your poison. Had some friendly goats hanging around waiting for us to piss up by Goat Pass a couple weeks ago, but they never jumped the gun and "milked" us. Sounds like an urban (or rather rural) legend to me. Dru, I'm a little surprised to hear that after all of your Canadian epics you had such an unpleasant experience in the Enchantments/Leavenworth area. Better luck next time, it's worth a repeat visit. Hey, if you think the drive sucks, just go later. We left L-worth around 7:00 this Sunday and were able to cruise along pretty good the whole way home.

I was in the Icicle this weekend and there's still a little smoke up higher. Some climbing areas are still closed. Not going to try to name all of them, I wasn't paying that close of attention.

Me and another guy took some beginners out there last year, we set up some top ropes, the rock quality may not be the highest but it was perfect for us because there was NOBODY ELSE out there the whole weekend, beats waiting in line in the Icicle. I'm not sure if you would see it from 97 or not. It's a fairly spread out area, there's 2 different access roads to it. No access problems that I know of. It's fairly much off the radar screen.

Yeah, but I'd have to say any man's used toilet paper is every other man's garbage. Hey, that reminds me, I'm just about finished reading David Roberts book on what REALLY happened on Annapurna w/ Herzog and the boys, and there's something in there where one of the climbers was sick and he reported "I shat myself." I hate it when that happens.

I'll take the road to Three Fingers over M. Fork Snoqualmie ANY day!

I knew Dru would have something good for us. Ah, screw the parameters. Feel free to share horror stories from anywhere in the world. I found the road into a portion of Hell's Canyon called Dug Bar to be not a lot of fun, either. Course it was dark and I wasn't quite sure where I was going.

The road goes to the TH as of 9/16, but it's in crappy condition.

Thanks. Is it possible there's more than one group referred to as the Tank Lakes? Unless I was reading carelessly, the lakes Beckey refers to can't possibly be the same ones that are near LaBohn Peak/Necklace Valley. Just curious.

I nominate Middle Fork Snoqualmie River. Maybe it was just my own damn fault for being out there w/out a beefy pick up or something, but that sucked! Brutal on my car (Sub. wagon, not an Outback). Took almost 2 hours to drive the last 13 miles. No wonder the FS wants to close the road, it's in horrible condition and they don't want to spend the $$ or take the time and effort to try to maintain it properly. Anybody been on anything worse that actually passes for a road in WA state? Alaska doesn't count, or northern Canada for that matter. Got that Dru?

Oh yeah, anybody else run into the hermit out there? I see him every once-in-a-while. He pretty much can't stand all the tourists out there running thru his backyard, but if you have climbing gear visible he'll actually talk to you.