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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Apr 26, 2006 - 02:04pm PT
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i'm a bit of an existentialist and favor a sense of urgency about life.
Go Bipley!
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old toad
Trad climber
yosemite, Ca.
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Back in the day, Don Reid and I were trying to tick off the new Shipley routes in the valley!! For some reason I had not met Walt yet and did not know what a wild and crazy guy he was... Well it did not take long for me to find out! After a few run out terrifying leads I said to Donny "Who is this guy"!!! These routes are BOLD... Well when I finaly met and climbed with Walt I understood why "Walt routes" were the way they are. We all miss him but as someone else said "As long as we remember him he is still here"
Toad
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Magumbus
Mountain climber
Fresno, CA
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Oct 20, 2010 - 06:35pm PT
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Not sure why but the other day I thought of Walt and decided to search him on Google. I wound up here and found out that that he was gone, so here are my thoughts on Walt.
I met Walt in college in the 70's and even shared a rental house with him for a semester until he decided to get more efficient and live in his converted van. In his quest for efficiency he would park in in the dorm parking lot and run an extension cord to an available electrical outlet to power his abode. He would go so far as to gouge out a line in the asphalt so the wire could be concealed from the campus cops for a time.
Once during a huge Halloween party at the house and after quite a few trips to the keg, a crowd had gathered in the garage. I looked up to see Walt hanging and spinning from a webbing ladder attached to the rafter, bellowing something profound at the top of his lungs. Another time I found him manteling onto the roof of another party house soon having to evade the football players who lived there. Crazy times, but he always stayed on track with his studies and made the grades too. Also he was as mentioned very conscientious and would not hesitate to offer assistance, give a kind word or help solve a problem if queried. His laugh was infectious and was preceded by his quick sideways glance and electric eyes that gave way to his wide grinned outburst.
I was attracted to his effervescence and intelligence. He introduced me to free climbing in the late 70's first showing me all of his buildering routes on campus at Fresno State. Walt partnered my first rock climb at Tollhouse Rock and I was hooked. I would question him for hours about gear, technique and route details. For the next few years I would tag along with Walt and Dave (he posted earlier) on trips to Matterhorn Peak, Keeler Needle and into Tuolumne.
After college we all went to work and I remember Walt describing his engineer duties with a defense company telling me with disdain that the unofficial company motto was "kill a commie for mommy". He did not last long there finding his way back to his first love the outdoors and exploring his physical and mental limits.
I ran into Walt several times after making may way to the Valley and looking around C4 and each time it was as if no time had passed and nothing was forgotten. He was like that and had the unique ability to form intense and meaningful relationships with many people. Sometimes his intensity was focused on total strangers and that was always a wild ride for everyone within earshot. He was a master at the uncomfortable question.
Soon for me was marriage and children and my meetings with Walt were no more. I did find his name in the summit register on Mt. Gayley only 30 days before my ascent but that was as close as I ever came to sharing the same space with him again.
Perhaps we will meet again my friend and I am sure you will explain to me in detail all the wonderful things you have discovered.
Thanks for all the memories and the jog of the brain that I'm sure will extract a few more details in the next few days as I reflect on his passing.
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Rob Roy Ramey
Trad climber
Colorado
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Oct 28, 2010 - 11:28pm PT
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Walt, a man of many talents, had a role in reestablishing peregrine falcons in Yosemite as well.
The El Cap Peregrine team at the base of the North America Wall in 1984 after recovering peregrine eggs thinned by DDT and replacing them with two healthy peregrine nestlings:. Cliff Neighbors, John "Yabo" Yablonski, Walt Shipley, Bill Rose, Rob Roy Ramey, Lee Aulman, Jeff Keay, and Mike.
Yabo and Walt speed climbed to the nest, while the nestlings were being driven up from Santa Cruz and hiked to the base. I followed on jumars up the 1,200' of (mostly 9mm) fixed lines, with the nestlings in the homemade plywood backpack (at lower left), leaving the ground as Yabo and Walt approached the nest. (As I was in graduate school at Yale at the time, I trained by doing a 100+ pull ups a day hanging from dusty door jambs at the Forestry School and Osborn Lab. I didn't want Yabo telling me that I was growing soft.)
Yabo and Walt broke into a mock piton hammer fight for this iconic photo. The NPS biologists, Jeff, and Mike, (and later Steve) and John Dill (SAR) has a world of patience working with such wild men.
Yabo and Walt, we miss you.
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deuce4
climber
Hobart, Australia
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Oct 29, 2010 - 01:10am PT
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Hi Rob-
That particular year I worked on the bird project too, though as a subbie of Yabo and Walt. I went up with Walt the first day and we fixed the first four of the NA for the project. I remember it well, because we didn't take a bolt kit, and there was a place on the second or third pitch on the NA where an old rivet had pulled and there was no way to pass. Normally we would have gone down to either get a bolt kit to replace the missing bolt proper but Walt just chiseled in a #2 head into blank rock. He later replaced it I believe.
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Wade Icey
Trad climber
www.alohashirtrescue.com
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nice shot Dan.
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shipoopoi
Big Wall climber
oakland
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i still think of walt every time and look down into the maw of what bill russell and i came to call walt's hole. walt would go in there willingly just to see what would happen. bill and i cowered from a distance in the eddy. after awhile it became walt's hole. and there it still lies, still gnarly at nearly any water level, lying innocently enough just a bit below the hanging bridge, churning and boiling, with tight escape routes on either side. and i look, and i think of walt, go walt go.
shipoopoi
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wildone
climber
Troy, MT
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Nice one Steve. I'll go look at it some time.
Base104, Walt's reply to the cop reminds me of some lyrics of an Eagles of Death Metals song "I Came to Make a Bang":
Don't move, don't speak, even whisper
There's something happenin' but don't be scared
I'm too smooth, you never see me coming
I'm never in a hurry, I'm just movin' fast
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcNNwF56Cmk&feature=related
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dadodeaf
Mountain climber
Portland, OR
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Oct 22, 2011 - 02:16am PT
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I used to work with Walt from 1980 to 1982. We climbed a couple of routes together, including Fairview Dome in '81. Walt was a good friend, though a little crazy at times. We hung out a lot together in those early days, both having been dumped by girl friends. We ended up climbing, riding our bikes all over the Bay Area, playing endless hackysack, and just trying to figure out life.
The link below is a letter from him I just found from after I left Lockheed (where we both worked) to go back to graduate school. Walt carried on, though he eventually dropped out of Lockheed and moved to the valley to live.
The letter contains some pretty vivid descriptions of some of his climbs up to 1988, for those that might be interested.
He was a good man, though at times he was looking for answers that he may never have found.
I miss him a lot some days.
Letter from Walt
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Cancer Boy
Trad climber
Freedonia
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Oct 22, 2011 - 04:48am PT
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Thanks for sharing Walt's letter to you. It made me reflect on my own choices in life. I recall Walt giving his Tisaack solo slide show to about 5 of us on the Lodge stage shortly after he got down. He borrowed the electricity for that too.
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Chicken Skinner
Trad climber
Yosemite
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Oct 22, 2011 - 09:49am PT
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Dadodeaf,
Thanks for sharing the letter. That brought back many memories.
Ken
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Oct 22, 2011 - 10:13am PT
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Fantastic letter
sometimes I almost forget how Walt could demonstrate the universal, through introspection of the particular
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Conrad
climber
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Oct 23, 2011 - 09:27am PT
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Thanks for sharing Walt's letter. His written voice reflects his wild energy. All this before the internet and cell phones. The fall of '87 Troy and I worked the Stanislaw Complex Fire from a camp at Evergreen. I was in total awe of their adventure on Native Son.
Hey Walt, you continue to inspire.
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zip
Trad climber
pacific beach, ca
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Oct 23, 2011 - 09:15pm PT
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The only time i ever climbed Snake Dike was with Walt, and his sister, Viela.
This was near the top of the route.
The month before he died, in Joshua Tree.
Me, Bill Russel, Jeff Perrin, and Walt.
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dee ee
Mountain climber
citizen of planet Earth
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Oct 24, 2011 - 12:11am PT
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Thanks for sharing and reviving memories of Walt.
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Paul Martzen
Trad climber
Fresno
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Mar 31, 2014 - 09:27pm PT
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Woke up from a dream this morning. Was skiing at a dream changed Badger Pass, then it closes. I make arrangements to climb with McTwisted. I find his truck and throw my gear in the back. Open the passenger door and Walt is eating breakfast in the seat, waiting for Dan. He says they are climbing at some cliff which I have not heard about. Dan does not show up so Walt and I go hiking to kill time. Then he starts climbing through these trees, traversing from one to another, me following right behind. It is easy but super fun. Walt is as crazy as ever and has not aged a bit. But it is sure nice to spend time with him, even in a dream.
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couchmaster
climber
pdx
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Mar 31, 2014 - 10:13pm PT
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Holy smokes, what a great thread. Thanks all who pitched in to make it so. Wowzer.
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BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
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Out of all of the old buddies that I had from the old days, Walt is the only one that I think of fairly regularly. We had a lot of good times, and this thread has captured those qualities, good and not so good, about him.
Sean's death will be like Walt's. It will never go away with time.
I still miss him. A lot. He was really special.
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Mungeclimber
Trad climber
Nothing creative to say
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Thx for bumping this Russ. Every mention of Walt I heard about has good stories and remembrances.
I re-read some of Deuce's posts above, and I'm off to search the interwebs for "Organ Rock" route info...
+++ for inspiration
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