Opinions on The Mountaineers?

[rockymountainboy]

Hey, just moved from Colorado-- most of my climbing has consisted of class 3 & 4 solo trips and some steep snow couloir stuff (also solo), with most of my roped climbing consisting of setting top-ropes for my daughter-- and The Mountaineers seemed like a good group to introduce me to Washington. BUT... there seems to be a pretty strong lack of respect for them on many of the posts on this site.

 

What's up? Any input about this group? Any better ideas? Thanks for any information...

[Dru]

 

They are very good at doing what they do!

[wayne]

My take is they have a slow and confining culture that has survived for many decades even though climbing has changed . You will get some good teaching from them but they can hold back someone with ambition.Their style directly clashes with the spirit of modern climbing and its anarchist pride

[Spliffy]

Mounties Expose Part 1

Mounties Expose Part 3

Mounties Expose Part 2

 

But my favorite part of the whole thing: Learning How To Love a Mountie

 

But, alas, this sort of group based, no holds barred creative expression no longer exists on this site.

This is about as much as the moderators will allow.

[Gary_Yngve]

My take is they have a slow and confining culture that has survived for many decades even though climbing has changed . You will get some good teaching from them but they can hold back someone with ambition.Their style directly clashes with the spirit of modern climbing and its anarchist pride

 

Part of what Wayne gets at is because of their size. MattP can talk about what I think is a relevant analogy -- Evergreen vs UW. Evergreen is small, so you get special attention and it may seem like you have more opportunities to succeed. UW is a much larger school. More bureaucracy, less of a chance to be an individual. The opportunties to succeed still exist, though you'll probably have to look harder for them.

 

I think the same is true with the Mounties. There are Mounties who are climb leaders and who are active with instructing, committee work, etc., and they climb hard.

An ambitious climber can learn a lot from such folks.

 

That said, there are bureaucratic annoyances that one must put up with.

[pope]

Part of what Wayne gets at is because of their size. MattP can talk about what I think is a relevant analogy -- Evergreen vs UW. Evergreen is small, so you get special attention and it may seem like you have more opportunities to succeed. UW is a much larger school. More bureaucracy, less of a chance to be an individual. The opportunties to succeed still exist, though you'll probably have to look harder for them.

 

I think the same is true with the Mounties.

 

Sure UW is big and you stand the chance of being lost and overlooked, but when you make a splash at the UW, you can be confident that you've achieved something great, that you've swum with the really big fish and you're ready to spawn. At Evergreen, I'm sure you'll get whatever attention your fragile academic background requires, but your degree will be about as desirable and distinguished as a sheet of well-used Kleenex.

 

I think the same is true with the Mounties (if that makes any sense).

Edited August 16, 2004 by pope

[Dave_Schuldt]

If you don't mind lots of rules then they are OK.

If you hate rigidity and like doiing things in a more disorganized way then don't join.

[selkirk]

It all depends on what your looking for. They do take a lot of s**t on this site and others but if you notice it's only from people who have never been involved them. The Basic course is awfully stiff, so if your hot shot who already knows his way around rock and snow, you'll learn very little. It's taught to the level of people who have little or no experience climbing or scrambling at all. As such they go over everything and do it slowly. It also only teaches you how to be a good follower on a rope (i.e. not kill yourself or anyone else). The intermediate course is kind of the next step and introduces leading on rock, snow, and Ice.

 

so down sides: Courses tend to be a ridgid due to size (slowly getting better IMHO though), they move at pace sufficient for an utter novice (with little or no backcountry experience), they accept just about everyone (so there will be some people who are just barely competent to follow in the basic course, and some just barely competent to lead in the intermediate course), definite bureacracy, they tend to travel in large groups (very large for the field trips, between 6 and 12 for basic glaciers, and between about 4 and 8 for basic rock, intermediate parties are smaller though), require a lot of auxiliary training (ie. first aid training, and navigation training)

 

so here are the up sides:

Extremely safety oriented (plays into party size as well. Every Mountie party is pretty much self sufficient if something goes wrong.) I know of very few incidents that resulted in very serious injury, and know of several where mountie parties become involved in succesful rescue operations at the scenes of accidents involving other groups, and at least 1 guided trip where the guide broke his leg high on Glacier peak.)

 

The move slowly and give you pretty much all the information you need (although it's heavily weighted towards climbing as safely as possible. I know a number of people who are slowly turning into competent climbers who had never touched a rope or even scrambled a peak before last year and are now leading alpine rock routes)

 

They'll accept just about anyone, and teach them to climb.

 

They teach also teach quite a few other aspects of climbing, Aid, small party self rescue, water ice.

 

They have climbs of varrying difficulty scheduled pretty much every weekend from may through sept. (So if you don't have a good size very dedicated group to go with this can be a good thing).

 

So if your already an "expert" like most of the people ripping on them than there probably isn't much value there for you. But if your interested in learnig to climb in a safe and structured manner and if your willing to put up with bureacracy and quite slow pace with lots of focus on very fundamental techniques then it might be worth looking into.

 

I know I've learned one hell of a lot through them, and my wife is now reasonably comfortable leading 5.6 rock, and climbing on glaciers/ice when before Jan 2003 she had never done anything more adventurous than the occasional weekend bacpacking trip with me.

 

And as for as much crap as they take there are some pretty serious hardmen in the orginazation as well. If you want to climb hard you just have to do a little more work to seek them out.

[mattp]

Wayne mentions a spirit of anarchy and individualism that is often touted on this site as the spirit of cascadeclimbers.com and northwest climbers in general, but I think the reality is that we are a much more sheeplike bunch.

 

The frequent dumping on the Mountaineers on this bulletin board is in my mind a clear example of this: everybody knows it is cool to trash the Mountaineers and even the stupidist joke or most trivial complaint directed their way will draw applause so we do it over and over again. Similarly, everybody seems to think that car-to-car speed climbing is the only commendable way to climb anything, or that the only climbs worth doing in Washington are listed in Jim Nelson's guidebooks. Anarchism and individuality? No. That's more like centralized group-think.

 

As pointed out, the Mountaineers have a definite "program" that is very structured and one is going to have to work at to get outside the box, but if you work through their checklists and keep your eyes open you will definitely learn something.

 

Pope: I think what you say about Evergreen may be vaguely and generally true if you are talking about an "average" student who just wants a degree and doesn't have a specific goal, but for years (maybe still?), Evergreen had a much higher acceptance rate as a pre-med program for top medical schools than did the UW. Also, with less hoops to jump through and a faculty who actually thinks it is their job to teach instead of to publish or whatever, there has been generally more opportunity for students wishing to do graduate-level science as an undergrad at Evergreen than at the UW.

[tomtom]

Continuing with the university analogy, once you get through the core courses, things get a little more interesting. The Mountaineers offer courses in Waterfall Ice, Aid and Big Wall, Self-Rescue, and Climbing Denali. These are smaller, less structured and more intense.

 

The same people who wrote Mountaineering: Freedom of the Hills teach their classes.

[rockymountainboy]

Thanks for all of the information. It sounds like their rock climbing class is presented as all-or-nothing. In my case, I've worked as a ski patroller, am certified as an EMT, WEC, etc., so the first aid stuff would be a bunch of review-- time I could better put to use on other aspects of climbing.

 

Has anyone had experience with another group that offers a better class? Maybe one with a focus on teaching "the next step" to someone such as myself, who has plenty of experience scrambling around the Colorado mountains, but has rarely used a rope for anything more than the occasional top-rope?

 

Again, thanks for taking the time to share your experience.

[selkirk]

You might look into the Cragging course they offer. The Basic course is general covering rock, glacier, and alpine, as is the intermediate. The Crag course is all rock climbing and lead skills. Sounds like it might be a little more what your after.

Mountaineers Crag Course

 

You'd still need to take the First Aid portion if you want to graduate and climb with the club(I think, I know they'll waive it for Dr's), but if your just interested in the training on not necessarily club climbs than it's not necessary.

 

I know there are other clubs in the area that teach climbing but don't know anything about them.

Good luck in the mountains.

[marylou]

If you can afford it, you might check out this guiding service. I took a basic avy course from them last year and can't say enough about the quality of the experience.

[catbirdseat]

The Basic Course is Alpine Mountaineering. It covers, in addition to following on rock, glacier and snow climbing.

 

If rock climbing is what you are interested in, they offer the Crag Course.

[iain]

If they don't waive their piddling first aid course for certified EMTs or OECs, well I would look elsewhere for training.

[payaso]

Actually their basic class is pretty much EXACTLY for someone like you. Your scrambling experience will be a definite plus though. While there are students with varying degrees of backcountry experience, that has little to do with learning the technical climbing fundamentals. More scrambling experience will just help you make a smoother transition to climbing, thats all. It takes a some determination to get through the class, but it sounds like you have that. You will likely learn a great deal and if you like it, you can then join climbs with others in the program. They catch a lot of shit mostly for large group size and for having people with little experience. We all started somewhere. Take it and see for yourself.

[catbirdseat]

If they don't waive their piddling first aid course for certified EMTs or OECs, well I would look elsewhere for training.

In fact, they do, Iain. Also for nurses and doctors and those who have taken WFR.

[selkirk]

Have you taken the course Iain?

[billcoe]

You don't see me dissing them.

 

For price/performance ratio for learning technical things: the Mazamas and the mounties are tops. They can teach the critical safety aspects that you need to learn fairly inexpensively and throughly (abiet slowly).

 

What Wayne says holds somewhat true as well, but if anyone had a large group, and needed to teach the group in a through and safe manner, that's probably exactly what you would get.

 

Highly recommended. If Wayne and a couple of his friends let you tag along and teach you the technical rope work you needed, that would be the fastest/cheapest/best most likely, but sometimes thats difficult as well for a number of other reasons.

[knelson]

Another group offering classes is BOEALPS (boealps.org). While they are a Boeing organized group, last I remember they still let "outsiders" in to take classes. (I'm sure I'll be corrected if I'm wrong, as I see a few closet BOEALPers floating around on this board!)

 

Any organized group offering instruction will be... well... organized. As many have noted, depending on what you're looking for, this could be a drawback. From what I've seen, Boealps groups are a little more laid back versus the mounties. The instructors are there teaching because they WANT to, not because they HAVE to. The offer both a basic (basic skills) and intermediate class (leading)- pretty much mirroring the mountie's classes. Depending on your skill level, from what you describe for experience you could *probably* get into Boealps Intermediate class without going through the basic class. Maybe. With the mounties, pretty sure that wouldn't happen.

 

Anyway, there's another option to look in to. Their basic class starts up late Feb/early Mar and I'm thinking the Intermediate class starts in late April. Watch their website for more details...

 

-Kurt

[dberdinka]

Honestly, if you have done much of your scrambling and climbing solo I think being part of a mountaineers group would make you freaking crazy! If you're looking for a social experience and a way to meet typically middle-aged individuals it might be worth the effort.

[iain]

Have you taken the course Iain?

 

No. Why? Are you suggesting a MOFA actually is equiv. to EMT/WFR/OEC training?

 

Catbirdseat - that is good to hear.

 

I have no beef with the Mountaineers, though friends of mine certainly have some horror stories. I have had good experiences with them in places too. Same with the Mazamas. I have definitely been in situations where Mazama parties have endangered everyone on a mountain before. Likewise, I know many very good climbers who are Mazamas. Just depends on who you are dealing with I suppose.

[selkirk]

Exactly, the Mounties/Mazamas/Boealps are just like every other group of climbers.

 

There are incredibly talented climbers who climb in good form, and wankers who are a nuisance and danger to everyone.

But since they're willing to train new climbers there are a larger number of newbies in their ranks making the same mistake everyone made as a newbie. It's just that their actions cause people to scorn the groups as a whole, when it all reality it should reflect less on the organization then on the individual. I've meet more than a few people i'll never climb with because I don't think their safe. That doesn't have any bearing on most of the people in the program.

 

In all reality considering the number of climbs that the club puts on every year, I'm a little shocked there aren't more horror stories. The various branches run over 100 climbs per month during the climbing season with no more than 1 party on any given route. It's kind of amusing that it always seems to be the same 5 or 10 pictures dug up though for spray. Most of the partys climb in good form.

 

 

And no i'm not saying that MOFA is the equiv. to much more advanced training, but just because they require some for of medical training for everyone and in general use MOFA as the standard doesn't mean it's not worthwhile. When i took it last year there were 2 Dr's voluntarily in the course because the focus is different. WFR is certainly more extensive, and i'm not familar with OEC. And a great deal of it would be redundant with EMT as well. But then again, I don't know if EMT training covers some of the steaksauce alpine stuff like the various forms of altitude sickness.

[Gaper_Jeffy]

 

Virtually anything that gets fat people to be less sedentary is probably good. I think Iain said it best here.

[billcoe]

Virtually anything that gets fat people to be less sedentary is probably good. I think Iain said it best here.

 

 

Hey, that's what my wife tells ME!