Discussion Topic |
|
This thread has been locked |
Prod
Big Wall climber
A place w/o Avitars apparently
|
|
BUMP for a great thread.
|
|
Jaybro
Social climber
wuz real!
|
|
Note, handy buick spotting the thimble.
|
|
MH2
climber
|
|
|
Aug 29, 2009 - 01:30pm PT
|
I would like to thank rgold for being shameless and linking to this thread.
His story of the F(free)A of The Needle's Eye is great.
Also, the other stuff strums a lot of chords from my own climbing past.
Such as meeting Jim McCarthy at Steve Komito's boot shop, and he expressing wonder how a guy as big as Gill could climb on the unreliable crystals of the Needles. The answer being that no matter what broke off, Gill could hang on to what was left.
Such as numerous dinners at Pete Cleveland's place just outside The Lake and hearing him describe the Super Pin ascent. "And then the sun started to come out."
And many other names and events.
The Needles. Modest heights but a vast surface area of brain-like contours. The only place I've been lost 50 feet from the road.
|
|
mucci
Trad climber
The pitch of Bagalaar above you
|
|
|
Aug 29, 2009 - 03:30pm PT
|
"And so it was that I found myself up at the fold with my belayer locked in a mammaric trance below."
Absolutely classic writing, short and concise, spelling out the adventure in but a mere page.
Mucci
|
|
Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
|
|
|
Aug 29, 2009 - 04:19pm PT
|
Mark Powell is great face climber and spent lots of time poking around the Needles often in the company of Bob Kamps and Beverly.
Prior to an interview, Rich helped me out by researching Mark's accomplishments in the Needles of South Dakota. Here is part of our correspondence:
Entries from Touch the Sky, Paul Piana.
If only a grade is given with no route description, the route is the first ascent route of the spire and still the only route on the spire. If there is now more than one route, I tried to add a minimal description, and in such cases if the route was the first-ascent route for the spire, I've indicated that as well.
I only had time for a single pass through the guidebook, so it is possible that I missed an entry or two and/or made some mistakes transcribing what is here.
SYLVAN LAKE AREA
Duet, cracks right of SE Corner, 5.9, with Bob Kamps 8/18/66.
Robnobs Spire, left-leaning flared crack, 5.8, with Beverly Powell, 8/7/65 (FA of spire).
NEEDLE'S EYE AREA
Gnomon, steep crack on S. Corner to SE face, 5.7 with Beverly and Kamps, August '66.
SWITCHBACKS AND TENPINS AREA
Dave's Dinghy, SE Corner, 5.9, with Beverly and Don Lauria (no date) (FA of spire)
Phallus, 5.8, with Kamps, Rearick, Lauria, August '65.
Twin Pins "These pinnacles may have been climbed as early as 1965 by Mark and Beverly Powell" ---Piana
Split Pin 5.7, with Beverly, 8/14/66.
Podunk Pinnacle, W. Chimney, 5.5, August '65, with Beverly (FA of spire?).
CATHEDRAL SPIRES
Javelin, reg route variation, 5.9, with Beverly and Kamps, August '65.
Laureate Tower, South Chimney, 5.7, with Beverly and Kamps, August '65.
Station 13 variation, 5.7, with Beverly, August '64.
Khayyam Spire, S. Face, 5.6, with Kamps, August '62.
Rubaiyat Spire, N. Face, 5.7, with Beverly and Kamps, 8/11/66.
Aku Aku, 5.9 (FFA) with Rearick and Kamps, 1965.
Frug 5.3, with Beverly and Kamps, 8/15/66.
Freak's Foot, NE Face, 5.8, with Beverly and Kamps, 8/15/66.
Eye Tooth, 5.8, with Beverly and Kamps, August '62.
Unapproachable, 5.7, with Beverly and Kamps, August '64.
Empire State Building, Wavy Crack, 5.9, with Beverly and Kamps, 8/7/64 (FA of spire).
Spindle, uphill side, 5.8, with Beverly and Kamps, 8/5/64.
Spool, 5.8, with Beverly and Kamps, 8/6/65.
Bayonet, 5.9, with Kamps, August '64.
Caboose, SW Face, 5.6, with Beverly, August 1970.
PICKET FENCE
Stile, 5.3, with Beverly 8/17/70.
Wicked Picket, W. Face Variation, 5.2, with Beverly, 1963.
Connspire, 5.7, with Beverly and Kamps, August '63.
Pud, two routes, 5.4 and 5.8, with Beverly and Kamps, 8/8/64.
El Mokana, E Face, 5.6, with Beverly, August '69.
Auntie, 5.7, with Beverly and Kamps, August '66.
NELSON CREEK AREA
Bosun, 5.2, with Kamps, 8/12/70.
Beacon, 5.8, with Beverly and Kamps, 8/10/70.
Prow, W Face, 5.2, with Kamps, 8/12/70 (FA of spire).
NE Face, 5.8, with Kamps, Dave and Judy Rearick, Chuck and Ellen Wilts, Tom Higgins, 8/9/71.
Helm, 4th class, with Kamps, 8/12/70.
Next to Nothing, 5.6, with Beverly, Higgins, Dennis Horning, 8/11/71.
Five Freaks and a Friend, 5.4, with Beverly, D&J Rearick, Higgins, and Horning.
Argument, 5.6, with Beverly, Kamps, and Horning, 8/14/72.
LOST FORMATIONS NEAR THE CHESSMEN
Geek, with Richard Goldstone, 8/5/69.
GRIZZLY BEAR CREEK AREA
Alley Oop, 5.8, with Beverly and Kamps, 8/11/70.
Patriarch, 5.6, with Beverly, Kamps, D&J Rearick, 8/14/70.
He also had this tale to tell about doing a route with Mark and Bob Kamps.
Steve,
Although we always camped together in the Oreville Campground, I don't recall many times when I ended up climbing with Mark. In fact, the only climb I can remember was an ascent with Mark and Bob Kamps of Sandberg Peak, a preposterously named precarious-looking pinnacle perched right at the edge of a Cathedral Spires pullout.
Probably the most memorable feature of that climb was an interaction I had with some tourists, a story which now has been told and retold, having now been appropriated by others and recounted as if it had happened to them. But you twisted my arm so I'll tell it again...
Mark was leading, Bob was belaying, and I was on the ground watching. A tourist pulled up and watched Mark lead for a long time, long enough to see him place a piton or two and clip into them, and finally reach the tiny summit. After watching all this, the guy got out of his car, walked over to me, and asked, "How'd they get the cables up there?" (Mind you, he and his wife had just watched how they got the cables up there.) I was very polite, and in my best imitation of the professor I would become, I offered a careful and detailed explanation of exactly what Mark had been doing. At the end of this mini-seminar, his wife (whose size seemed to preclude an exit from the car) leaned out the window and shouted to her husband, "How'd they get the cables up there?" To which her husband replied, in tones rife with exasperation, "I don't know, I can't get a straight answer out of this guy!"
Experiences like this caused me to print up a bunch of tee shirts with the legend "Needles Repair Servce" on the back. Bob had one; I can't remember whether Mark got one or not. These shirts were, as I had hoped, self-explanatory to most of the tourists who stopped, the clanking of iron and occasional banging of pitons only reinforcing the repairing theme. Pinnacle repair was a notion they had probably already been exposed to by postcards sold locally showing Herb Conn rappelling down George Washington's nose while on one of the Park Service's periodic missions to patch cracks in the sculpture. The tee-shirts were more successful than I anticipated, leaving us to ponder the fact that many people are happier with a false explanation that conforms to their preconceptions than with a true explanation that does not. One cannot help but wonder, 30 odd years later, what role this phenomenon may have played in the civic and political life of our nation.
|
|
Curt
Boulder climber
Gilbert, AZ
|
|
|
Aug 30, 2009 - 01:58am PT
|
The Needles are great. Nice bouldering, too.
This was 4 weeks ago.
Curt
|
|
Porkchop_express
Trad climber
the base of the Shawangunk Ridge
|
|
|
Aug 30, 2009 - 01:01pm PT
|
I am so psyched to go through the Needles! This will be our second time climbing there. If I can lead tent peg and tricouni, it will be sweet. I am but a young n00b, but the tradition of the Needles makes the feeling of inherent value of every successful climb escalate.
It definitely makes me want to sack up and take inspiration from those who came before. If I could find a job out there I would move out that way...
|
|
Chinchen
climber
Anacortes, wa
|
|
|
Aug 30, 2009 - 01:57pm PT
|
Nice pic Curt.
|
|
Curt
Boulder climber
Gilbert, AZ
|
|
|
Aug 30, 2009 - 01:59pm PT
|
Thanks. My wife Lisa took it.
Curt
|
|
Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
|
|
|
Aug 30, 2009 - 02:18pm PT
|
Now that I have an official "Dolt" t-shirt, thanks to the Taco, I think Steve Grossman's post above points toward the next logical t-shirt revival, rgold's classic:
"Needles Repair Service"
How about it guys? Please?
|
|
adam d
climber
closer to waves than rock
|
|
|
Aug 31, 2009 - 11:59pm PT
|
I started up this feature once with no beta...HA! I was somewhere left of the "needle" and made it up a little past half way before downclimbing to a nut and bailing. Bold FA for sure! though I could do without the tourons. (makes me snicker about a female friend who stood on top of one of the 10 pins naked, arms up, glorious, stopping traffic)
|
|
Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
|
|
Well, you can do it yourself, the way that Bob did! Bonnie Kamps just sent me this shot of the real deal done in the Oreville campground with iron-on tape! Absolutely classic!
Thanks Bonnie!!!
|
|
Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
|
|
|
Sep 13, 2009 - 01:40pm PT
|
Pinnacle Repair Bump!
|
|
neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
|
|
|
Oct 16, 2009 - 03:32am PT
|
hey there say, thanks for the link rgold...
:)
|
|
Reilly
Mountain climber
Monrovia, CA
|
|
Nice! Whaddya expect climbing with a guy named Don 'Big-John' (translation)?
|
|
Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
|
|
|
Sep 19, 2010 - 10:52am PT
|
How'd ya get that rope up there?!?
|
|
donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
|
|
|
Sep 19, 2010 - 10:56am PT
|
After guiding in the Tetons the summer of 75 Steve Wunsch and I, thinking we were pretty hot stuff, headed East on a climbing trip. First stop the Needles...you know the rest of the story.
|
|
couchmaster
climber
pdx
|
|
|
Sep 19, 2010 - 10:57am PT
|
After guiding in the Tetons the summer of 75 Steve Wunsch and I, thinking we were pretty hot stuff, headed East on a climbing trip. First stop the Needles...you know the rest of the story.
Whoh? I don't know anything of it....got a link or a remembrance? This probably should get it's own thread and 200 replies.
|
|
|
SuperTopo on the Web
|
Let us know!