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Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
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+10000 for Quagmire, maybe best 5.10 crack in town.
Well, there might be a couple of other contenders, but QC has to be on the short list.
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'Mo
Big Wall climber
Squamish, BC
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Those pix above show there is an anchor right above the lip. Who put that in? I don't recall that being there when we did it.
Hello Tami,
I put those anchors in in 2010. They make it possible to lower to the ground with a 60m rope.
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Big Mike
Trad climber
BC
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Topic Author's Reply - May 9, 2012 - 11:46am PT
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Big Mike
Let me get this straight. You took a Power Washer to the crag fired it up and power washed all the vegetation off the climb above?
Bruce is right, no I had nothing to do with this, simply enjoyed the fruits of thier labour. What I was saying was my buddy (who is a professional painter and very skilled with a pressure washer) and I should go down there with a pressure washer and blend out the marks so it looks more natural.
Big Mike you do know down here we get 300 days of sun and there are 100 Squamishes in the high country with nothing but clean splitter granite that you can walk right up to and start climbing without a wire brush or a pressure washer.
Ahhh.. I have heard the tales of such beautiful stone but alas not yet had a chance to sample it. FA's around here are a rather dirty affair, which probably explains my prefrence for classics and newly unearthed gems... I do have one to my credit now, thanks to Luke (which still needs some scrubbin!) and I saw another one that was worthy of my attention yesterday.
Kieran! Welcome buddy! Nice pic! Hope to see a few more.. there's still a couple good ones from Sandra's Dirty Rope that I haven't touched yet.
Chasing Rainbows, the first pitch is grown over. I did both pitches a decade and a bit ago, 2nd pitch was really good. I suspect it is grown over too.
Not true, Kyle went and looked at Chasing Rainbows P2 the other day and he said it looks good. You can walk there on the old trail then take a left onto the bench before you get to the railway tracks.
Well, there might be a couple of other contenders, but QC has to be on the short list.
Lower Malemute has a bunch of awesome mid 10's Cresent Crack, Hand Jive, Caboose, Quagmire, Cling Peaches (that's the pitch you were looking for Ryand!)
Kyle and I rapped down on a fixed line to Quagmire 4 or 5 years ago and ushba'd out of there. It was hard to start and then sustained the whole way. I definetly need to go back.
Edit: And speaking of John Howe, and pressure washing etc, I remember many years ago when word of the environmental destruction that passes for cleaning at Squamish seeped southward, somebody wrote a long rant in one of the mags about how horrible this was. When John saw it, he said "They just don't understand. Up here, the trees are winning."
That explains one of KM's captions...
Got a couple nice shots this past weekend of some cragging. Showed up at Neat and Cool and saw these gents.
Nathan on Lieback Flake 5.9 R
Fish belays for fun.
We chose to amble down the trail a bit to a less busy crag.
Kyle starts out Gord's Block 11a
The crack is mashing his untaped hands.
Stemming on Gord's Block
He didn't get much further than this unfortunatly.
Nina led Picket Line 5.9
Grant on Supervalue 10c
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Big Mike
Trad climber
BC
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Topic Author's Reply - May 9, 2012 - 11:51am PT
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As far as the Lower Malemute goes, anything that's not within 15m of the tracks is considered fair game.
I actually spent a week in Squamish where the sun shown every day till the last night and I woke up floating on my therma rest in my tent in that campground on top of the hill. It was great the rain forest canopy in camp was amazing. Probably in my top 5 favorite places to be and climb.
I went to Skaha the week after what a transition and a great place as well. All of this was some 20 years ago, man would I love to spend a few weeks up there again.
What did you climb while you were up here Silver?
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MH2
climber
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Big Mike, you are doing credit to the thread title.
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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Big mike! Hey i don't think it's Cling peaches i'm talking about. Cling peaches if i'm not mistaken starts on agonal then goes straight up?? I haven't done it but i'd like to. The one i'm talking about goes straight up from the anchor at the top of cider crack. Some nice crack climbing that gets thin thru a little bulge, then a funky traverse through some overlaps until you step left again up onto a slab with a few bolts, probably about 40m or so & an awesome pitch. Maybe this is knuckleduster??? A good one to do on the ushba.
Sorry but i think Quagmire dominates all the cracks you mentioned. Don't get me wrong those climbs are all amazing- But QC is steep, exposed, sustained, long (40m), with so much variety & different sections, fingers, hands, a big flake you get to bear hug & even a classic squamish tufa that you mantel on(stump), not to mention it's up there a bit right smack in the middle of a beautiful white shield of granite on one of the best cliffs around. The only negative is you need to rap in or climb your choice of a heinous chimney flare(canadian compromise?) or dirty barley route (smithereens) or Fungus razor (good luck) to get there. Not sure why it isn't more popular these day...
You guys should go do it tonight & take some sunset photos!! They would be spectacular!
Cool photos again everyone, thanks! I agree that if possible, pressure washing is a stroke of ingenuity. Here's a shot from near the base of a cliff where i did not pressure wash a few climbs, but instead ripped my knuckles apart brushing. Should be ready to go soon, just need it to dry out a bit & go send! Nice place to be when it's hot.
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Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
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Next time there's Bluegrass at the BAG, come on out.
Where/what is the BAG? Down here, BAG is just shorthand for Bar and Grill. As in "The Sixth Avenue BAG" or "Joe's BAG" etc.
And will Parry be playing there this w/e?
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Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
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You should do the route in the original style of the first ascentionists or leave it alone.
Or, if you really believe that an improvement on the original is in order, approach the first ascentionists and ask for their thoughts on the matter.
To alter a much-respected classic simply for one's own convenience, without asking either the original climbers or the community at large, is seriously uncool.
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Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
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So people DO contact climbers about adding bolts to routes.
I know. I thought about mentioning Jeremy. But there have been plenty of other cases where first ascenders have done something dumb, and later been quite happy to have someone else make a change for the better. Mostly though, routes were done the way they were for a reason, and ought to be climbed as they are or left alone.
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Relic
Social climber
Vancouver, BC
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RyanD, the pitch you are talking about is on Grub Street, the upper 10c pitch. Yes it is good to Ushba. Cool crack.
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MH2
climber
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Somewhere in the vicinity.
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thekidcormier
Gym climber
squamish, b.c.
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A closer look at mine and Ruperts bivy on Uncle Bens
The only thing lamer then aid climbing?!?
AID CLIMBING WHILE LISTENING TO MTN FM
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TheSoloClimber
Trad climber
Vancouver
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That last picture is fantastic Luke!
Good pictures Mike. I had only climbed Lieback Flake once before on TR, and figured I'd lead it while waiting for the Circus to open up. I was expecting a bit more than only 2 pieces of pro, and it got a little spooky above that bolt.....
Funny story about Grant there: Last week I went to a buildering meetup at UBC. It was cool seeing some of the routes that Dick Culbert and some other old timers put up there. Anyways, I met up with a couple people there, including Marc-Andre (who I had met once before, but never climbed with) and Grant and Megan.
Fast forward to Sunday. I took a bus up to Taylor Way and stuck out my thumb at the onramp. Ten or fifteen minutes passed with no luck, and then a cop pulled up. I grabbed my bag, half hoping he would drive me up, and the exchange went something like this:
Cop: Hey, where you headed?
Me: Squamish....? (wondering if it's a trick question due to my rope, shoes, water, hanging off my backpack)
Cop: What are you planning on doing there?
Me: ......Rock climbing.....? (now really confused)
Cop: You hitch hike often?
He didn't give me any trouble..... just told me as long as I wasn't on the highway or impeding traffic, I was all good. He said that it's West Van so someone would probably end up calling it in.
Anyways, he drives off, I stick my thumb back out, and an SUV pulls up. I run up, and completely randomly, it happens to be Grant and Meg from the preceding Wednesday. I drove up with them, and ended up climbing with them and their friends for the day.
Small world, eh?
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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Haha that's awesome Luke! Mountain FM, the soundtrack of all sea to sky tradesmen! Alanis morissette & roxette all the way. Those photos are sick BTW the one of u with the beer looks like its from 1975 for some reason??!
Hey Relic I think your right about that pitch being part of grub st, I thought it might have a name of its own as I was always under the impression that grub st was the 5.11 finger crack pitch right of cider crack but I guess not, which one is knuckleduster??
Bruce the pool is, like most climbing around here just a 5 min walk from the hwy, not a malmute or nothing but there's 2 climbs there as of now -one fully bolted 5.11 called "salmon handcuffs" which climbs really nice & one mostly bolted 11+/12- that should be done soon at which point I'll put up a topo here. Nice place to stop at the end of the day for a shower in mid summer. The rock is Murrin-esque & close to vertical. Theres a few easier cracks there as well which I don't think I could be bothered to scrub at this point but yea if u had a pressure washer or just loved scrubbing there could be a few more lines from 5.8-10.
I'm pretty sure 'Mo meant no disrespect by adding the station. It seems as though the reason was purely functional & if it draws more traffic to what had become an obscure climb due to the now pain in the ass legistics involved with climbing down there it may actually not be such a bad thing. Asking would have been nice sure, but I don't think what he did detracts from the nature of the climb, I'm sure if u are that bummed about it Tami he would probably tear it down but when I tried it I was glad it was there so when we got to the top we could bail & get the hell out of there before the rail cops showed up & I would be forced to tell them my name was Wayne Lemieux. I have a pretty good idea who he is & he has greatly contributed to climbing in Squam & will probably continue to do so for years, not to mention he's a super nice dude. Maybe he will reveal himself & start wasting time on here as well with some stories & photos??
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Big Mike
Trad climber
BC
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Topic Author's Reply - May 10, 2012 - 12:11am PT
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Big Mike, you are doing credit to the thread title.
Thanks mh2! I try :) I'm happy people enjoy it, you can thank Pat Ament. He inspired me to take more photos with his Old Photos thread. He showed me that capturing images of his past and friends was irreplaceable, and got me thinking about how many times I'd wished I had my camera in the past rather than leaving it at home because it's a nuisance.
The most important part of course is that I enjoy it, and I do, every aspect.
Nice picture of Cling Peaches.. Luke led that one when we were down there recently... a fine pitch
Here's another one for the Supervalue fans.
Grant makes his way around the corner.
Relic is correct it is Grub Street. Knuckleduster is the thin dirty crack directly above the top of Cider crack. If you have two ropes you can fix one at the Grub Street anchor then rap to the cider belay and fix the next and climb the whole Malemute on ushba!
Luke hahhahahaa "I would rather listen to static than Mountain FM" :)
Nice, I was gonna ask you to post those pics!
That's funny Nath.. :) I did warn you about Lieback Flake ;)
Funny you should mention Dick Culbert. I saw this the other day while trying to find a picture for another post.
http://vimeo.com/27064156
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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May 10, 2012 - 12:22am PT
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Ok Mike now I'm really tripping balls here, correct me if I'm wrong- Grub street is 3 pitches. It's starts on old style, then climbs the 5.11 crack right of cider crack then finishes up the 10c which I speak of?? Yes??
And cling peaches I believe is climbers right of the crack/face shown in MH2s awesome photo, Robin told me one day when I ran into him down there that the pitch shown in MH2's photo, which is directly above the thin 5.11 crack on grub st is a new bolted/crack route that finishes up on the left side of stooges slab whereas cling peaches starts on Agonal & finishes on the right side of stooges??? Sorry if I make no sense & not like it really matters but there's a few new pitches down there & my guide doesn't explain it very well in the first place. My brain & fingers hurt from too much climbing & thinking of climbing, kind of feels good :-)
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Big Mike
Trad climber
BC
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Topic Author's Reply - May 10, 2012 - 12:33am PT
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Ryan, right. Grub street is those three pitches (Old Style, Cider Crack, 10c) or the knuckleduster variation which starts from the agonal belay and goes two straight up pitches. according to KM
Cling peaches originally started on the right but the prefered route is now to start up old style the veer right on the dyke to the agonal belay, then start up agonal and go straight up, and the next pitch is the one that mh2's photo displays because this is the one that Luke led after we moved right at the top of cider crack.
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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May 10, 2012 - 01:38am PT
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Wow, thanks for walking me thru that one boys.
Super value looks awesome, I've never done it but will jump on it next time I'm in the area. Big Mike i can't believe you didn't try True Love after doing picket line! Its easy to TR & I'm telling you man, it's a tricky one but with your span you will be able to cruise the crux & laugh about it after & call it 5.11 while the rest of us 5'9"ers will maintain belief it's the hardest 12a in town!!
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hamish f
Social climber
squamish
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May 10, 2012 - 12:11pm PT
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I certainly don't mind chiming in.
If anyone wants to add any bolts whatsoever to any of the routes I had any part in, please contact me so I can say no.
I'm not trying to be stubborn here, I just believe the bolts, the spacing, the run outs, it all adds up to the experience on the route. Many of these routes are more about the mental anguish than they are physical challenge.
Now if the issue is rusted or otherwise manky pins, that's open for discussion.
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Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
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May 10, 2012 - 12:52pm PT
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ok so it changes the character of the route. forgetting for a moment the pro's and con's of social protocol, is it always so great an idea to preserve the character of the FA regardless of anything else?
Of course not. There are plenty of stupid FAs. But that doesn't mean that the starting point in any discussion of changing a route shouldn't be respect for the FA.
If you think a route needs changing, then talk to the people who were there first. Talk to people who climbed it (or chose not to climb it) in the era of which it is a part. Talk to the community as a whole.
But don't just rap into the thing with your drill and do whatever the f*#k you feel like doing.
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