Discussion Topic |
|
This thread has been locked |
Oplopanax
Mountain climber
The Deep Woods
|
|
|
Jun 15, 2011 - 09:31pm PT
|
buzowski howe pillar still hasn't been freed yet to my knowledge.
Craig McGee (and Brad, I think) freed all the previously aided pitches & continued up to around p10, then bailed in a rainstorm. So all the aid has gone free but the route hasn't been done free to the top in one push.
Since then, in 2009, there was a large rockfall from around p5
The west face of South Nesakwatch is a popular crag these days, with 10 or so routes. Dairyland and Fairytales & Fantasies are the cream of the crop in terms of quality and have seen repeats (E and H) although F&F maybe only one repeat so far.
Common Knowledge on the south pillar of Rexford's False Summit still hasn't been repeated to my knowledge.
|
|
Bin Dur
Sport climber
BC
|
|
|
Jun 16, 2011 - 01:41am PT
|
Did the Flavelle/Howe on Vienesse with Ed Spat eons ago - great climbing - sparse pro, fine rock!
Usta like hiking nakid on hot days, and upon reaching the bivi I was airing out the boys when I noticed Fred Beckey looking disdainfully in my direction.
"How's it going?" I said.
"Where are the girls?" he countered.
Ha, anyways we traversed in above them in the morning, got on the route, and trundled a few rocks to discourage them from following us. We didn't wanna be the gumbies that took out Fred . . .
Super climb!
|
|
Todd Eastman
climber
Bellingham, WA
|
|
|
Jun 16, 2011 - 02:17am PT
|
Now this is a thread!
Thanks for all the tales.
|
|
Oplopanax
Mountain climber
The Deep Woods
|
|
|
Jun 16, 2011 - 11:43am PT
|
Bruce, they are logging in Centre Creek right now so when that's done there should be an access-spurred renaissance on that side of the Rexford/Illusion group. The west sides although shorter, are from experience much cleaner than the east sides. Not quite sure why. Must be a microclimate.
I'd like to go try the stuff on the Bastion, that looks mint. The Fairley guide has you and Carlo credited with a FWA on Max's Memorial Pillar route, but I hear that's a typo. Is there a story you have about that though?
Speaking of Max, he sent me this awesome shot of the Chinese Puzzle Wall last year. Took it from his paraglider on an evening flight.
Who can post up some of the Chinese Puzzle's history? I have heard Beckey and friends took a poke at it in the 70's or 80's. And that a group of Squamish climbers had a go in the early 90s. Both attempts were aid climbing or mostly aid (?) Apparently neither attempt made it to the top. In the late 2000s a pair of strong Fraser Valley climbers had a go on this thing (my info is second hand, which is better than for either of the other attempts) and freeclimbed up to 12b or so, bailing off a pitch or two from the top due to scary loose blocks.
As a matter of fact almost every tale I have heard of the Puzzle suggests that it is well named and that loose or movable blocks are common.
The right arete (partially out of camera) was soloed by a friend of mine in the early 2000s, bushy 5.8 to the summit of South Illusion. He had been trying a line on the south pillar of South Illusion, further up the gully, and retreated after some 5.11 climbing. Came back the next year to find that the cracks he had been attempting had exfoliated and a new 3-pitch high scar was where his project used to be :(
|
|
Oplopanax
Mountain climber
The Deep Woods
|
|
|
Jun 16, 2011 - 11:55am PT
|
BJ, there's a geology layer on the iMapBC map which tells me the Chehalis granodiorite is mid-Cretaceous stuff, 97-112 mya.
|
|
Oplopanax
Mountain climber
The Deep Woods
|
|
|
Jun 16, 2011 - 11:56am PT
|
Speaking of that 10 inch offwidth, Andy Cairns has some pics of it with the bongs still in place. MH2, post up?
|
|
Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Jun 16, 2011 - 01:04pm PT
|
How about all those Illusion peaks walls and buttresses? anybody climb anything since the Max Dejong days?
Dick Mitten and I climbed a couple of things, but that was maybe even before the Max Dejong days. One thing I always wanted to get to, but never did, was that big cirque on the east face of the Illusions -- I think Peder did something fairly burly in there. Maybe with Max?
|
|
Oplopanax
Mountain climber
The Deep Woods
|
|
|
Jun 17, 2011 - 12:38pm PT
|
Illusion Peaks bump
So it's not the Chehalis, so what?
|
|
Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Jun 17, 2011 - 03:03pm PT
|
So it's not the Chehalis, so what?
I think it's time to officially declare this the "Fraser Valley Peaks" thread. Or some such. Those Illusion Peak pictures are fabulous. Dick and I spent a lot of time looking down into the cirque (top pic) when we were climbing something up out of the notch. Amazing place. Someone should nudge Peder to post something about the climb he did in there.
FWIW, here's a couple of screen captures from Google Earth showing the peaks between Nesakwatch and Center Creeks.
|
|
Oplopanax
Mountain climber
The Deep Woods
|
|
|
Jun 17, 2011 - 07:22pm PT
|
I think it's time to officially declare this the "Fraser Valley Peaks" thread.
ask and ye shall receive!
We got the Anderson River Range
The Old Settler
Urquhart
the big S
(Easton-Edgar routeline shown]
And of course the lesser-known stuff...
|
|
Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
|
|
|
Jun 17, 2011 - 07:43pm PT
|
Damn, I knew I shoulda asked for asylum when I was working on Vancouver Is.
|
|
Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Jun 17, 2011 - 10:20pm PT
|
Way to save the thread by broadening the horizons!
Yes, but we have to be careful not to broaden them too far. We start talking about things like the climbs that have been done on Mt. Judge Howay and our American friends will start fainting. Best to keep it to things that look sort of cool, in a vaguely California granite sort of way, and not get into too much detail.
|
|
Oplopanax
Mountain climber
The Deep Woods
|
|
|
Jun 17, 2011 - 10:47pm PT
|
That's not Ibex, that's Steinbok. Both the NF and EF have been attempted but, I believe, not successfully. The cracks on the NF are full of munge, too. The EF is much cleaner.
Craig Mcgee's routes on Springbok/Les Cornes are supposed to be top notch.
Speaking from experience I can say the south face of Ibex is chossfree the whole way up. We climbed a 6 pitch 10c there a few years back that was totally immaculate. The rock definitely is grainy a few other places in the range though.
Last pic is not Lindeman at all.
|
|
Oplopanax
Mountain climber
The Deep Woods
|
|
|
Jun 17, 2011 - 11:18pm PT
|
Shaun and I tried to repeat Max's magnum opus on the east face of Urquhart and made it to around p7. To that point, many of the old bolts had either been bent by rockfall or the whole piece of rock they were placed in had fallen away. We climbed ( I think ) the pitch Scott Flavelle? took a big whipper on back on the first push on the route, and then decided to bail. It was getting pretty tiring getting hit with big rocks at the belays, a lot of them have no real shelter and we figured the possibility of chopped rope was looming large.
On the way down we were rapping off a two-knifeblade anchor when one of the pins pulled and we both shock loaded the other one, which held.
F*#king sketchy route. Probably with new bolts and more traffic it'd be absolutely stellar but it might kill someone in the process of getting it rebolted.
We were somewhere left of the huge orange spot when we bailed.
One base jumper I know of investigated the launch but he says it's not steep enough at the very top and he'd need to rap in at least one or two pitches to get to a possible launch ledge.
|
|
Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Jun 17, 2011 - 11:30pm PT
|
F*#king sketchy route. Probably with new bolts and more traffic it'd be absolutely stellar but it might kill someone in the process of getting it rebolted.
If we delete what we've posted about the sketchy parts, and keep showing really enticing pictures, maybe we can lure some of the American STers up onto these things. We'd lose some of them to rockfall, drowning in stream crossings, chopped ropes, etc. And probably some would just plain get lost on the approaches. But there are plenty of them, so a few won't be missed...
|
|
Oplopanax
Mountain climber
The Deep Woods
|
|
|
Jun 17, 2011 - 11:59pm PT
|
What I was told is that Scott and Max tried it first, then Carlo and Max. Finally Max rope soloed the thing. I chatted with him on the phone and he was describing freeing pitches up there by himself with some hairy two-clove-hitch belay system. He mentioned about 7 aid moves off hooks; later Don gave me a topo Max had given him and it had 10 aid moves marked. About half of that is in one A3 pitch marked as "very loose" on the topo...
Given that the Cogburn road is washed out at the moment and the Urquhart road is just alder another attempt may be a long time coming. I guess flying in and out is an option. The non-dyke rock on the face is a lot more solid but lacks good continuous crack lines. It'd be lots of expanding flakes and hook/bolt ladders by the looks of it...
|
|
Wayno
Big Wall climber
Seattle, WA
|
|
|
Jun 18, 2011 - 02:27pm PT
|
I'm telling you, these Canucks are crafty. Not even one yank has posted about ever climbing in the "Chehalis" Peaks region. Someone should check to see if there are any missing person reports of "Merkins" from north of Vancouver. I smell something funny.
|
|
bmacd
Social climber
100% Canadian
|
|
|
Jun 18, 2011 - 07:39pm PT
|
way killer thread, I've got sweaty palms from gripping my rocking chair arms too tightly …
It's maybe time for another .05 mg Ativan and a nap …
please keep posting guys and more pictures too
|
|
MH2
climber
|
|
|
Jun 20, 2011 - 12:05am PT
|
We interrupt this program to bring you current Squamish conditions.
We now return you to the regularly scheduled program, which is still in progress.
Oplopanax and others have shown us nice pictures. Mostly pictures taken from a distance. Let's take a closer look. Since he asked about the Memorial Pillar wide crack, here is what it looked like when I was taken there.
It looked like this on the approach.
Getting closer.
On the retreat.
(We were originally planning to do a new route on the wall seen upper right.)
We had to settle for this, high point at arrow.
We were stopped because neither of us had what it took to climb this crack, despite the alluring artifacts within.
This was the previous pitch. I got worn out seconding with the pack. What in Hell did we have in it??!!
Nice pitch, though.
Happiness is just an illusion.
Filled with sadness and confusion.
What becomes of the brokenhearted?
My partner went back and got up the wide crack.
But he didn't get to the summit.
|
|
MH2
climber
|
|
|
Jun 20, 2011 - 01:37am PT
|
The things we learn from you, Bruce.
Did you see the thread in which I met a local lady, on the Sahalee trail, who had started climbing in nailed boots 60 years ago in Scotland and who has fond memories of your Mom? Also named Jean. Such as going out for the day and on the way down, your Mom asking her if she wants to take the easy way or the interesting way?
|
|
|
SuperTopo on the Web
|
Let us know!