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Washington Ice - Columbia Basin conditions


Alex

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Vantage:

* Frenchman Falls - (th)in but there

* Fugs Falls - In. Really good actually. The first pitch is WI3, the second pitch has a very difficult WI3+/mixed pitch up the center, or WI5+ R pitch up a stellar pillar on the right. Pins, Camalot for pillar.

* Running Gear Death - in, go do Fugs instead.

 

Soap Lake -

* All the (unnamed) Soap Lake climbs on the shores of the lake look pretty good actually.

* Bavarian Dark et al not very in, but trying.

* Guiness/Kickapoo - not.

 

Blue and Park -

* Champagne - really good, difficult 5+. The first step was TR'ed Saturday? but we did the entire thing. Upper pitch isnt really there this year, might want to wait for that to fatten up.

* Clockwork Orange (edit) - upper pillar in, bottom not touching.

* Scotch on the Rocks (edit) - just a very thin icicle seeping out from rock, nothing there to speak of...

* Children of the Sun - anemic, stellar though in WI6/mixed shape if you do the upper half, really fuckin hard. WeTRed. It was fridgid and brittle. First bit was led by some Spokane dudes Sunday am, way to get on it! We lost a crampon here, if you find pls PM.

 

Banks Lake - not enough water this year!

* Absent Minded Prof is absent.

* Cable still doesnt touch, TR'ed all weekend though.

* H202 - anemic

* Agent Orange, thin on bottom, upper pillar in same shape as FA conditions.

* Salt and Pepper - completely missing this year!

* some other really hard unnamed stuff in, though, looks awesome!

* Zenith, not touching, but prob leadable with some real balls

* Devils PBowl in, with enormouse deathcicles. Trotskys looks really good.

* Emerald - dont know, but doubt it. it was sooo cold this weekend I dont think these climbs grew much.

Edited by Alex
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I don't want to start a pissing match but when I sent this link to Mark Shipman (who was involved in many of the early climbs in the basin with Bruce White and helped name a lot of them) and he sent me this e-mail. I include it for information - maybe Paul can comment on the correct names

 

(paste from e-mail)

 

I've climbed at the Basin the last 2 days. The photo they labeled Scotch on the Rocks is Clockwork Orange. The photo they labeled Zenith is something else. Zenith isn't quite down yet, but there is 1000% more ice on Zenith than what they photographed. I'd let the people @ cascadeclimbers.com know, but they never let me log on.... We (Bruce and I) T.R.ed at Cowgirls yesterday; there are several great lines. We (Curt and I) climbed a couple of really fun lines (harder than Fug's but climbable) at Peawee's Playground today. We took a good look at Champagne. I would try it tomorrow if I had the time. It never got above 23 degrees F where we were climbing today

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The photo they labeled Zenith is something else. Zenith isn't quite down yet, but there is 1000% more ice on Zenith than what they photographed.

 

Hmm, I knew I was having problems reconciling the guidebooks with the actual routes but was fairly sure that was Zenith - my picture in the gallery is from the north side and all the published pictures seem to be from the south...

 

Anyway thanks to Mark on the correction; any thoughts on whether or not the lines will grow any more this season, or will this warm weather just burn em down?

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any thoughts on whether or not the lines will grow any more this season, or will this warm weather just burn em down?

Right now it is anyone's guess, but if the temps drop again this could be really good. Most of the Basin drips are fed from ground water seeps and there hasn't been much water so this could be ok. Most of this formed up in a pretty short time of temps in the teens and might reform again. Stream fed things (Fugs, Cowgirls, etc) will probably wash out. I'd sure avoid the Punchbowl for a while tho.

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Freeman, no worries, nothing personal

 

Mark and you are right that what I labelled Scotch is in fact Clockwork. I often get them mixed up driving up there. (Scotch is down the road about a mile or two, and was not really forming, sorry for the confusion!)

 

However, that really is Zenith. Mark, take another look at the pic!

 

I agree, avoid Punchbowl when its warm and there is ice above it!!

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