max

Ive decided that just as suffering Christians developed this concept of "heaven to give them hope, so too have suffering W. WA ice climbers developed a concept called "Banks Lake". So in the spirit of eastern philosophy, I encourage all you suffering ice climbers to remember that suffering is part of life, sufffering is part of ice climbing. You must transcend being distracted by suffering and joy to achieve enlightenment through ice. If you continue to dwell on the rotten, wet, picked out, skinny flows at Alpental, you will die and be reborn to a less enlightened state, like a lost soul or a sport climber.

My experience w/ the entiat boulders is "don't bother". One of the "areas" is a single, huge block with two (?) "hard" (5.11+) lines, and a couple of high 5.9-5.10+'s. I was told by locals that the other area (with several rocks) is on private land. If your there, check them out, otherwise you'll just be wondering where your tank of gas went.

http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/images/home/front_86.jpgDamn. [ 01-23-2002: Message edited by: max ]

quote: Originally posted by Dru: Long and Sherman have been riding the same joke too long. Amen.

quote: Originally posted by mattp: Now, when it comes to "the 10 best packs for alpine climbs" or some such thing, I believe those magazines are totally worthless. Or, "this is how you should plan your trip to Red Rocks" – give me a break. ...If you read a glossy ad-filled magazine for serious information about any topic you probably don't know a lot about the subject matter or you just aren't all that serious, but if you read it because you are interested in the subject matter, and the magazine might happen to be entertaining and occasionally informative – well, that's why we subscribe to magazines, isn't it? Nice. Good call.

Tuscon AZ Mt. Lemmon's within ten minutes, has great bolted and gear climbs on clean granite similar to j-tree's, and doesn't experience near the crowds and scene of j-tree. http://isaac.exploratorium.edu/~pauld/climbing/mtlemmon/windypt.html http://www.climbingsource.com/LocalBeta/Arizona/mtlemmon.html Cochise Stronghold is within an hour and a half of Tuscon and has mostly trad and some bolted multipitch climbs. Note quite a few of the AWESOME climbs in the eastern Stronghold are closed spring and summer, but the west stronghold has plenty to offer. Also, camping in the Stronghold is great: secluded, un-trashed, and close to the climbs. http://home.attbi.com/~cspieker/slides/arribas/arribas.htm http://www.climbingsource.com/LocalBeta/Arizona/cochisestronghold.html

quote: Originally posted: ...where the balloon popped. A bit of geek trivia: "Free range" latex-type balloons generally do not fail due to popping. The explanation I heard was that the low density gasses inside the balloon difused through the (barely) permiable latex. Similarly, atmospheric gasses difuse in (remeber: by the requirements of bananced forces, the pressures inside and outside the balloon are very close. Anyways, eventually the average density of the balloon is less than the average density of the atmosphere and the balloon descends. I can't say if this is true or not for mylar/laminate balloons. I suspect not in that mylar balloons are much less elastic, screwing with the "balanced forces" babble. Source: I think I can trace this back to Wenatchee High Chemistry/Physics teacher of the 88-94 vintage whose name will remain unnamed. Maybe my split personality made it up. [ 01-21-2002: Message edited by: max ]

quote: Originally posted by glacier: Not particularly of local interest, but my folks have recovered the occasional weather balloon on their farm in Nebraska... My department at CU offers a course in which the freshman-level students design, build, launch, and generally drool over a weather balloon. Someone in this class this year told me about recovering it from a farmer in Nebraska or maybe Kansas. See thread on gun-toting locals (I sympathize!)

quote: Originally posted by Dru: The CAJ and AAJ are the only Great Reads out there. On The Edge (UK)High mountain sports (UK)Climber (NZ)Climbing (USA)Rock (Oz)Rock And Ice (USA)Climber (UK)Gripped (CAN) Are the CAJ and AAJ those thick bookish things that come out once per year? Or are there more frequent publications? Where the hell are you seeing these magazines? I feel like I've seen a good sampling of the mags out there, and I'm not seeing many of these. Well, I should say I'm not seeing them enough to make much of a judgement on their quality. So maybe you've got subscriptions? I'm interested in hearing other's opinion on this.

quote: Originally posted by AlpineK: I'm no lawyer and Erik may be in the right based on the law, but it seems to me a FS trail through a ski area should imply an easement. Yeah, my "peeve" is not that someone mis-interpreted the law, but more that the law seems unfair. I don't think the ski area should be able to do that. quote: Originally posted by AlpineK: Certainly having lived in CO and skied at Eldora I think it might be equally likely that the ski area employee may have just been trying to restrict acess not based on laws but based on intimidation. Another piece in this puzzle is that earlier this year, one skier was killed and another generally fucked when they were swept into Yankee Doodle lake, approached via our route through the area. I suspect things are in a hightened state due to this incident. quote: Originally posted by AlpineK: Given that ski areas are on public land and the government indirectly subsidises them through low lease rates I don't see why they shouldn't have to put up with people walking through, "their land." Yeah, this is more what I'm whining about. For me it's not a matter of being strictly justified, I'm just annoyed by it. As to the comment "there are plenty of other places to ski/climb": yes this is true. And again, I'm not saying these places should be open, I'm just lamenting that a great day was dulled by being brow beaten by a (only moderately) power-trippin' ski-area dude. Further, this argument is somewhat invalidated by applying it's principle other access issues. No one would accept the argument "there are plenty of other places" if it were a matter of a crag being inappropriately bolted or a municiple trail being decommisioned.

quote: Originally posted by Zenolith: ...my post was sarcastic. Right on Z. Ditto.

Another Access Issue (Actually, just a peeve): I'm cool with what seems to be the WA standard: A ski area has the right to mess with you if you ride their lifts and exit the area w/o some sort of permission. But recently myself and a friend were greeted at the base area of Eldora ski area by a relatively nice area-guy. My friend and I had driven to the ski area, traveled into a basin on public FS trails, come back out of the basin and exited through Eldora. So the guy at the base tells us that in order to ski in the area, you had to buy a ticket, independant you're method of ascent. (So this seems a litle frustrating. It seems like you should be able to operate as an autonamous unit on public land, leased or not). So we said, "Thanks for the info, but it seems like you should post this on the FS trails that lead right onto ski runs!" (we were very polite. Remember: humble and passive behavior can get you out of alot of trouble). He had no responce. He just kept sayibg it over and over and we kept nodding. "Yep, u-hu. Yep. Right. Ok. Later." The whole situation just seemed dumb, primarily because it was (admittedly leased) public land and that we weren't being stupid in their ski area, and that the ski area guy just wouldn't SHUT UP! ok. That was my access gripe.

I'm amazed at the negative responces, and I've no problem with those that disagree. But... I'm assuming the average of the "great"/"sucks" ratings for all the magazines out there must be near "neutral". So it seems that for most magazines out there, most ccc'ers would give ratings somewhere less than "neutral" ("R&I", "Climbing", that brittish-like Brittish magazine ("High"?, "Elevation", "V-something", etc...). Further, if the average rating is to be near "neutral", there must be some "great"'s out there. Any nominations?

quote: Originally posted by crazyjz: Max,Most of them live either 40 minutes west of Denver... Yes, an intersting topic I'd love to pursue, but my weekly allotment of library computer time has expired!

I thumbed an issue of the magazine "Gripped" a few nights ago. I would recommend this magazine to anyone looking for a fresh prespective on the climbing media. This Canadian born publication chooses the diversity of the climbing experience as it centre. The topics, locations, people, and yes, even the advertisments vary more than your standard Boulder ass-wiping material or Brittish scribe records. But this is not just another outlet for wana-be journalism majors/climbing bums (the "wana-be" applies to both studies and non-occupation) expressing their "high climb". Each article has a well defined, well entertained, and interesting perspective. Most artcle come with an appropriate number of colorful photos. Limiting the number of photos increases the remainder's inpact and relavancy. Finally, the publication sells at a competitive rate of C$4.99/US$3.49.

quote: Originally posted by Zenolith: Klenke, ... we need to pretend ...they ["commies"] don't exist anymore. Zenolith: Lucky, this seems to be a reasonable thing to assume. There have never been any communists, at best progressive soscialists. The incorrect tags communist, commie, etc. could best be justified as descriptions of their ultimate objective.

quote: Originally posted by Retrosaurus: I am embarassed about posting here and would be humiliated to be associated with the copious amount of drivel on this site. But I have no self-esteem so it doesn't bother me that much. I think behind the humor in mitches post lies the actaul issue at hand. I think Rod's idea of someone great is someone who doesn't have time/ambition/humility to go to this board. It's like if I was at a mini-golf course and my friend asks me "how come no good golfers show up here?" I point to Woody Woodstick and say "what about woody? He's awesome!" And my freind says "how good can he be? He comes here" So inherent in some people's definition of "great" is "does not post to cc.com" Maybe they just have a bad conscience or feel guilty for posting on cc.com. I know some pretty awesome climbers that post here. And from the way it sounds (maybe it's just spray), quite a few of the regular posters have climbed some pretty sick stuff!

One time, in band camp.. I was mopping up on a fire last year near Chelan. I stopped to take a pee and less than two minutes later I was frantically clawing at my drawers trying to stop whatever was going on down there. Removing my pants and unders, I found the stinger of what I suspect to have been a ground hornet still dangling from the very tip of my weenus. This is all true. Hurt like f**k. And not to get too graffic, but due to the structure of penile tissue, the swelling was actually quite interesting (and disgusting!). That night in the mess tent, I heard some version of the story at nearly every table. I was famous!

This isn't a direct responce to the question posed, but I think it's relevant and I'd like to think it's inbsightful. I had the opportunity to spend a couple of days skiing with two different people. THe first day I went out with this older guy, somebody alot of people would laugh at for being so non-hardcore. But he shredded. He skiied my ass into the grtound, effortlessly. THere were several slopes that we approached and he'd say "yeah, it just looks sketchy. Maybe some other day" and I'd roar and pound my chest and say "lets hit it!" Knowing he had been able to grow old for a reason, I defered to his judgement. We passed those slopes later that day and people had skiied them and they had not slid. Oh well. So a few days later, I went out with my roommate (who always reminds me he got in over a hundered days last year. Oh good.). He hadn't skiied any bc all winter, was fresh off a visiting the relatives, and had to go back to school in two days. We came up on a slope and it had all the bad signs (I'll spare you the spraY) but he still wanted to ski it! So here's my punchline: The difference between these two and what made one safer than the other is that one simply got out more and knew that there'd be another day and another chance to see the suspect slope in good shape. He didn't feel pressure to ski it. The second guy felt like he had to get his shredding in 'cause it's be a while till he got another chance. If you don't get out much, you're not going to be very likely to pass up a slope, even if it's unusually risky. Oh yeah, as a side...About this Freeman fellow: I've met him, and he's the type of guy that when he starts talking, you shut up and listen. Freeman: thanks. [ 01-16-2002: Message edited by: max ]

[ 01-16-2002: Message edited by: max ]

How do you tell if someone's actively writing? [ 01-14-2002: Message edited by: max ]

A serious question (I'm looking for help): How the hell do you keep so up on this damn board? my last post wasn't up but a minute and you had replied. Do you have some sort of "new message" alert? dave

quote: Originally posted by Cpt.Caveman:My Alpine Jerkoff award goes to Lambone. He instantly jumps in and belittles me... Fuck off once again uninstigated bitch. kind of the pot calling the kettle black, huh? [ 01-14-2002: Message edited by: max ]

quote: Originally posted by Cpt.Caveman: Hate to see lads get locked up! who cares if some stupid drunk fuck kills somebody...

Actually, once you explained it, it really is quite funny! the "harvesting" metephore is good!