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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 9, 2007 - 07:41pm PT
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Yup,
Gonnah go find that Soarks, with or without the leggy perching lass, probably gonnah bring a real hammer...
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Oli
Trad climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Oct 10, 2007 - 01:35pm PT
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Soarks was done on a day so hot your hands felt as though they were placed in a bucket of hot water every few moves. My hands don't sweat that much (though I like chalk), but that was humidity and heat beyond humidity and heat. Tom made those lost moves in his usual bold style, moving out under the overhang, getting in a marginal nut. If I recall, the nut fell out just as he was on the hardest move, but there was still a sling around a strange-looking flake. I never saw the girl, but at the moment of following I didn't care about any girl. It was titillating enough moving out second under that overhang, looking at a swing of about 80 feet if I came off. The swing would have gone out into space, then around the corner to the south, and Higgins was telling me he wasn't sure if he could hold me or if his anchors were any good. It was airy, and there were gliders floating over the mountain -- adding to the hollow stomach sense.
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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Oct 10, 2007 - 01:58pm PT
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Good stories past and present.
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L
climber
A chartreuse glider in an azure blue sky...
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Oct 10, 2007 - 02:38pm PT
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Thank you, Pat, for those endearing and thoroughly entertaining historical recaps.
And Tarbaby--excellent thread!
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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Oct 10, 2007 - 02:51pm PT
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And Tarbaby--excellent thread!
Things would be less excellent around here without him, there's no doubt.
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bluering
Trad climber
Santa Clara, Ca.
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Oct 10, 2007 - 02:52pm PT
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Good stuff!
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cowpoke
climber
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Oct 10, 2007 - 03:39pm PT
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Wow, threads like this are what make ST such a fabulous place to lurk. sincere thanks to Tarbuster and Oli.
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Alex Perry
Trad climber
California
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Oct 11, 2007 - 11:38pm PT
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Why isn't this thread still going? Nothing better than when you get those two, Higgins and Ament, going, about their climbs. Thanks to Tarbuster for starting this. Some more to say? Or did the subject switch (to Soarks) kill it?
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Oli
Trad climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Oct 17, 2007 - 02:10am PT
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There is another climb of mine in the area, up north a little from the backside of W.C. Fields, a short, overhanging crack called Fail Safe. It's so steep it's almost a roof and really seems preposterous when you're under it starting out, but hidden holds make it surprisingly climbable. I first led it with Gordy Ryan, then did it with lots of others, Jim Erickson one day, then Henry Barber (he was barefoot), and others. Anyone done it? I would imagine it might be 5.11, but who knows?
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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Oct 17, 2007 - 09:25am PT
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Why isn't this thread still going?
I'll keep reading it, if it does. Pat, Roy, Tim, others .... Got more photos of forgotten flatirons climbs? I used to love those hills.
Pat, doesn't High Over Boulder tell the story of Jim E's big soloing fall?
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 17, 2007 - 11:57am PT
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Well, thanks all for the kudos.
It is fun to set these things up and watch/listen as Pat & Tom knock 'em over with detailed accounts.
Personally, I really enjoy following the links in the chain, back to the genesis; somehow it completes a sense of encounter with these climbs.
The back sides of the Flatirons hold all kinds of steep terrain; there is a vertical 5.4 on the back of the third flatiron called the Winky Woo; pretty cool for the grade.
Then there's a 10.D called Pentaprance, a very prominent corner: I get the feeling it's hardly ever done (certainly not by me, not yet). Of course there's Death and Transfiguration, one of the most well-known, which I have done a bunch of times.
I don't have any pictures of that stuff, but I intend to go get a look at the routes Pat mentioned (Soarks, Failsafe) and more...
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Alex Perry
Trad climber
California
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Oct 18, 2007 - 01:46am PT
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Erickson was soloing a lot, went for a steep 5.8, perfect hand jam near Death and Transfiguration. His hand slipped out of a perfect jam. He fell to the ground twenty five feet, broke both legs and an arm, if I remember, crawled down the long scree slope. He was whimpering and about to go into shock when some lady hiker heard him who was walking the Royal Arch trail far below. Ament did another good route on backside of Third Flatiron, very upper west most wall, Saturday's Folly all free.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 18, 2007 - 01:51am PT
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Death and Disfiguration.
It doesn't look so great...
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Alex Perry
Trad climber
California
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Oct 19, 2007 - 02:49am PT
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It is just a short route way down the wall east from Death & Trans. A good lesson maybe in what can happen if one gets too casual at soloing. Erickson sometimes just fell off, did a huge whipper off Black Walk almost to the ground on first free ascent. Good climber, endurance type forearm strength, but now and then got out of the zone or something.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 8, 2007 - 12:00pm PT
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Chiloe,
"Any more forgotten Flatiron climbs" you ask?
I was thinking this would be just the thread for such things. (Oli we'll get to Soarks I assure you). Goatboy and I just picked one off last week: The Mere Wall on the south face of the Finger Flatiron. One of the old guard, John Auld, recommended it and said it was stiff and necky as 5.8 goes, so it hung out there on my list for some time.
The Finger Flatiron is the long thin rectangular slab in the center of the photo, the south face would be around the left edge, and it is difficult to photograph the stature of the Mere Wall:
The climber encounters two leads, each one graced with multiple sets of moves both puzzling and committing, which slowly unlock fairly steep terrain mixed with finger buckets, head walls, tantalizing traverses, and spirited steep friction passages; all conducted under the duress of very sparse protection and the everpresent stimulating run out:
Oli?
And by the way, we climbed the northern edge of the East Face of the Finger Flatiron as our approach, which Rossiter notes was soloed by Erickson, and perhaps by you? (I see no mention of that solo by you in your High over Boulder). This was a pretty cool run out with some heady and committing moves right out there on the edge...
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Toker Villain
Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
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Hey Roy,
sorry I missed you in Boulder, but my companion is enjoying welcome sobriety so we took a pass on the Sun.
Still the next morning we had breakfast just south (Walnut Creek?) with Alison and Dale and were discussing Hankster's downtown Denver landing technique when the culprit himself stumbles by with dirty laundry!
Sorry you missed it, but then Mark and I were sorry Oli couldn't show at the SushiFest. Oli, where were you?
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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That red Fountain Formation stone looks and climbs like nothing else. Wish I got back there more often.
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Hardly Visible
climber
Port Angeles
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Great stuff Roy, glad to see you and Goatboy out having some fun.
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Oli
Trad climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Roy,
I spent a lot of time up in them their hills, know every face of rock and every grassblade. I'm just now thinking of a time Steve Wunsch and I spent a whole day walking (no climbing) up among those pinnacles, with my big dog Blue along (a huge blue-merril collie). Blue's hip went out at one point, and I had to carry him a very long way back down home, like carrying a huge sack of potatoes. I climbed so many things up there I didn't even bother mentioning a lot of them through the years. At one time in the early 1960s Dalke and I were trying to climb every little pinnacle on Green and Bear. Then I did the same thing again with various other friends. I've spent many a warm night up there, just sitting on some rock beneath the stars...
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goatboy smellz
climber
लघिमा
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Aug 15, 2014 - 03:17pm PT
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Despite the flood last year some of those grassblades held up from the downpour. Did a quick repeat when we were back in town and it's inspiring how the more things change in town the more the Flatirons stay the same.
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