Marko

Thanks for bringing up "Degrees of Freedom" Bob; good article. Slawinski says something about bolts and M-climbing, though, that I've never been able to understand, about bolts and hard climbing in general. "...This brings us to the thorny issue of bolts. Much of the recent push into extreme technical difficulty in mixed climbing seems inconceivable without them..." And, "...Part of the reason why bolts have become an issue in mixed climbing is that rising standards have expanded our notion of what is climbable. Where it used to be that climbable and protectable lines more or less coincided, the new dry tooling skills have expanded our notion of climbable terrain far beyond what may be naturally protected. Conversely, it is absurd to pretend that mixed climbing standards would have risen as high and as quickly as they have without wholesale acceptance of protection bolts..." So, whether pushing the limits in M-climbing or rock climbing, the idea is to make hard moves without the risk of dying. Assuming I've got the premise correct, why the fuck not TR instead of placing bolts? The consequence of falling onto a bolt is about the same as falling on a top rope. Sure, leading is funner than following but if it's just about the moves why not TR? Or headpoint like them crazy Brits. And yeah, some cave routes would be pretty wacked to TR, but in general you could certainly reduce the hole count. Anyway, what do you guys think? Oh, for what it's worth, I have fun clipping bolts on occassion and don't climb hard. -M

But of course that is training

Did you give it a go?

Nice work lads; and damn cool shots of that chimney! Looks like yet another trip up there could be warranted. -M

Blake, I think your cam and sling were maybe more like 40 or 50ft below the traverse pitch. I'm guessing it was a bare slab when you guys were up there? We got lucky and found thin neve and alpine ice. A few pics finally-- The start is the 2nd ice corner from the left: The start of the 1st pitch: Looking up the 1st pitch: The start of the 3rd pitch: 3rd pitch: More 3rd pitch: Looking down from the 3rd belay: Wayne starting up the steep bit on the 4th pitch: Wayne stylin' the last technical pitch (5th):

Good job lads! Yeah, the second pitch we did went straight up from the 1st pitch's tree belay and then we entered the dihedral just left of your ice ribbon pitch. I don't remember seeing that ice ribbon formed at the time. Looks like our routes met around the 4th pitch. Man, there is a lot of ground to play around on up there!

Additionally, the tents I've seen are lightweight for the room, well designed and thought out, and frickin' bomber. Three of us spent a few weeks in a Keron 3 up in the Alaska Range and were very impressed. Spendy, but about the best I've seen.

Now there's a proper winter ascent; in full conditions!

Cool beans, man. That 2nd ice pitch looks like the business; definitely harder than any ice we found. How did the line look between Watusi and your route? -M

Indeed we did, Ivan. We also took Tricams though, which I think would even up the style points!

Excellent! What's next? Slesse NE Buttress of course.

Thanks! Pro was OK. Conditions were good in that the ice took (short) screws and we didn't have to dig much for rock pro, especially on Colin's steep pitches. We made sure the belays were good...

Freezing but not freezing well really. At the road it was about 20°F at noon, 300' uphill from the valley it warmed up to around freezing and then basically stayed that temp day and night at every altitude. It was June-uary in the shade and full on June in the sun. On the well-shaded face the snow was definitely not slushy and there was no crust so it hadn't thawed either. Other than the last curtain not touching down and being kind of drippy (Colin lead rightward instead on insecure rock), the route is in great condition! For the approach we stayed pretty high above the creek but on the way down we were much closer except for the last bit, and thought that was much better; more open forest and less tedious traversing.

Inconsequential my ass! Sure was beautiful up there this weekend. Cheers!

Another fine day out with the Alpine Ropegun: http://www.colinhaley.blogspot.com/ (To be clear, we camped at 3200', to make it a day and a half with the AR.) From the sound of other ascents we had pretty nice conditions; good traveling down low, not too much postholing up high with decently attached snow bands, and excellent ice pitches. After the second ice step we took rock and turf to the right because the normal (I think) pitch after that wasn't touching down. It may have been quicker (though less exciting!) to connect snow ramps to the summit on the left. The traversing descent from Colonial's west shoulder down easy slopes to the west edge of the lower basin was painful wallowing, even following Colin's steps. I'd definitely say get on it in the next couple days, it's probably getting even better since the weather's starting to cool up high again. Bring pins.

Very stoked you got up it, mate. Excellent!

Check it: http://www.colinhaley.blogspot.com/ F**king inspiring amigo!

Right on! That's our boy, er, Alpine Ropegun...

Proud indeed!

You hear that people? TRICAMS! Warms my heart.

Those are some cool looking overlap type features at Looking Glass

$80 for all. One has a bit of rust on the shank but all are very sharp and still drive well. I've just got too many screws and these are the oldest.

you mean up the source lake drainage (S. Fork Snoq)? There is a nice waterfall about 30 min up the drainage from the alpental parking lot. I climbed it a few years ago in another cold spell. Temps were single digit during the day. Seemed about what was necessary to freeze the high volume. I would expect it to come in now. I thought it was one of the finer easy single pitches I've climbed in WA. Can be easily top roped too. This was forming up Sunday when I wandered by; I bet it'll be a nice little outing this weekend. Not super steep, 25 meters, probably cauliflowered.

Very cool!

Nice work!