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henny
Social climber
The Past
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Everybody is making me crazy with the great pictures.
So, why the downturn in the popularity of Idyllwild? Some of these are pretty obvious but here's some possibilities:
Sport Climbing. It's steeper and physically more challenging. As rap bolting became mainstream the availability of sport choices exploded. Rock types that would be hard to bolt on lead were suddenly wide open. Most people would rather do steep limestone or something similar, and for some pretty good reasons. People are attracted to the spectacular, steep, powerful options that sport offers.
Bouldering. It's now a complete end to itself. There's a lot of very talented people who just don't have that much interest in doing routes. The envelope can be pushed without ever putting a rope on.
Granite. Hard slabs have a lower ceiling for high end grades. It doesn't take much for something to become virtually impossible when it's almost featureless by nature in the first place. It's really hard to imagine what .13 slab at Idyllwild would even look like, much less .14 slab. Plenty of 12-, some mid 12, few 12+ and up. That's what Idyllwild granite usually gives you. If there are no holds and it's too steep for friction; it doesn't matter how strong you are, you can't pull on air nor can you stand on it.
Skill Set. Pretty hard to be a gym product and do well. Even though it's mainly bolts you still need to be able to place gear. It helps to know how to fall, sometimes big. How about pure edging skills? They're needed.
Sand. The ratings sometimes tend to be off by a grain or two. Although people like Randy have done a pretty good job of making the area be at least self consistent. For some reason slab seems to have suffered perhaps a bit more compression in it's grades than other types of climbing. Almost everything has been compressed into 12-. If standards get pushed what will they be? 13- would be the logical extension. (see Granite above)
Recognition/Visibility. Yeap. If that's the game you're not going to get there from here. (see Granite, Bouldering, and Sport Climbing above, plus the comments made by others earlier) Too little payoff for the effort that may be required.
Familiarity. As John said, people move on. And that's even more true now with all the options. Most people excell when at their home crag. But Idyllwild is actually fairly limited in size, and with not much obvious potential left (Granite). So they move on before they've made it their home crag by climbing there enough.
I'll bet people can come up with other good reasons as well. With the deck stacked against it, it's kind of understandable why it's no longer as popular. Which is fine. More solitude when we can get up there. Their loss, our gain.
Looking down Sundike.
How about the Double Exposure arete in the background.
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apogee
climber
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"So, why the downturn in the popularity of Idyllwild?"
I dunno, but it's all good to me...!
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Todd Gordon
Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
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Sideshow area
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Todd Gordon
Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
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Needs no explaination
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dogtown
climber
Cheyenne,Wyoming
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Henny wrote; I'll bet people can come up with other good reasons as well. With the deck stacked against it, it's kind of understandable why it's no longer as popular. Which is fine. More solitude when we can get up there. Their loss, our gain.
That's the way I see it !
Wish I could go back there more.
But I have a new home crag now ( Vedauwoo ) which will hav-ta-do ! ( sh#t )
Bruce.
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henny
Social climber
The Past
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More like, Can't be explained.
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Todd Gordon
Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
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Time to go on a diet;..I pulled a piece...oops...
Forest Lawn
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Off White
climber
Tenino, WA
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What a great thread, I had no idea the place was becoming unpopular, I'll have to make a trip back down there. I'll throw down some old pics too, though I suspect I've posted these here before a couple years ago:
John McManus leading El Camino
Mike Palm following El Camino, John's feet showing
Stitching routes together, headed for Traitor Horn eventually
Largo working on The Hangover (I think)
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Mungeclimber
Trad climber
sorry, just posting out loud.
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nice Offwhite!
yeah, i think some of mine are repeats too, I'll try and find that thread...
maybe we can repost some more. hahaha
worthwhile for sure
edit - found it...
http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.html?topic_id=406102&msg=419687#msg419687
Mimi posted a Summit 1960 article that is worth the link and Reddirt has a shot of Weeping Wall
the other thread was mine that only went to 18 posts, and all images are dupes.
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dogtown
climber
Cheyenne,Wyoming
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Late April could happen Munge !
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henny
Social climber
The Past
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I was going to debate Randy's comment on the current SYN rating being meaningless. Then I realized he would just go all lawyer like on me and turn anything I said into something that supported his position instead of mine. (joking, well, sort of)
It doesn't matter much what it's rated. It's superb rock, great climbing, a somewhat perplexing crux, and hard enough. That's what matters.
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henny
Social climber
The Past
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Anybody done routes they thought were sandbags? I've always found The Man That Fell to Earth hard for the grade.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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"I've always found The Man That Fell to Earth hard for the grade."
I thought that one was way harder than the other stuff of its grade. And I followed-- Gilje took a nasty whipper on the lead, but went back up and finished.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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"So, why the downturn in the popularity of Idyllwild? Some of these are pretty obvious but here's some possibilities:
Sport Climbing. It's steeper and physically more challenging. As rap bolting became mainstream the availability of sport choices exploded. Rock types that would be hard to bolt on lead were suddenly wide open. Most people would rather do steep limestone or something similar, and for some pretty good reasons. People are attracted to the spectacular, steep, powerful options that sport offers.
Bouldering. It's now a complete end to itself. There's a lot of very talented people who just don't have that much interest in doing routes. The envelope can be pushed without ever putting a rope on.
Granite. Hard slabs have a lower ceiling for high end grades. It doesn't take much for something to become virtually impossible when it's almost featureless by nature in the first place. It's really hard to imagine what .13 slab at Idyllwild would even look like, much less .14 slab. Plenty of 12-, some mid 12, few 12+ and up. That's what Idyllwild granite usually gives you. If there are no holds and it's too steep for friction; it doesn't matter how strong you are, you can't pull on air nor can you stand on it.
Skill Set. Pretty hard to be a gym product and do well. Even though it's mainly bolts you still need to be able to place gear. It helps to know how to fall, sometimes big. How about pure edging skills? They're needed.
Sand. The ratings sometimes tend to be off by a grain or two. Although people like Randy have done a pretty good job of making the area be at least self consistent. For some reason slab seems to have suffered perhaps a bit more compression in it's grades than other types of climbing. Almost everything has been compressed into 12-. If standards get pushed what will they be? 13- would be the logical extension. (see Granite above)
Recognition/Visibility. Yeap. If that's the game you're not going to get there from here. (see Granite, Bouldering, and Sport Climbing above, plus the comments made by others earlier) Too little payoff for the effort that may be required.
Familiarity. As John said, people move on. And that's even more true now with all the options. Most people excell when at their home crag. But Idyllwild is actually fairly limited in size, and with not much obvious potential left (Granite). So they move on before they've made it their home crag by climbing there enough."
Plus most folks now learn to climb in the gym, and that means that a lower percentage of all the n00bs will be at the crag on any given day, getting familiar with approaches and descents, the weather, the rock and all those unquantifiable things that go into useful experience even before you start reaching for bigger numbers. That also makes Tahquitz less obvious as a destination crag once they've started edging into intermediate skill levels.
So far as the top end is concerned, I think that a lot more talent has gone into bouldering. Certainly way more than when I was living there. Black Mt., Tram, a jillion other local areas-- Idyllwild has world-class, destination bouldering. It isn't even close to being climbed out, and the quantity of high quality, elite level untapped rock is mind boggling.
I don't know of a jillion new lines awaiting development on Tahquitz.
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henny
Social climber
The Past
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I also think bouldering is a major player in the reasons. And the highballs prove they've got heads and are more than one or two move wonder climbers. If some of that bouldering talent wanted to do hard routes, they'd do them.
Oh yeah, that Man That Fell to Earth is one funky deal. I mean, what's with that?
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