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johnkelley
climber
Anchorage Alaska
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Some more random stuff from the late 90's / early 00's.
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TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
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over fifty years of fine adventures
including early 1960s first solo ascents (that is if JGill didn't get there first and isn't talking): Irene's Arete, Direct Exum, Teewinot, Grand North Face, Owen-Spalding, Symmetry Spire routes, various un-named aretes on Disappointment Peak and Teewinot, etc...
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okie
Trad climber
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In the 80's a group of us Oklahoma climbers were working as guides on the Snake River. My buddy Jon went off one day to solo the Exum. He was a strong, confident climber so he threw himself at the route basically without thinking a whole lot about it. He found himself a bit off route on 5.9ish stuff in his running shoes (he hadn't thought climbing shoes necessary for the route). Jon wasn't so good at altitude so he started throwing up as well. Even so, his skill kept him alive.
I wanted that summit too, but being less talented and gifted than Jon, I chose the easiest route for my climb. In those days I had an excellent set of lungs, if nothing else, and I remember pausing only once in a field of boulders to snack on some grapes on my way to the top. The Owens Spaulding was easy but on that North Face the cracks were a bit iced up and in that incredibly exposed position I kept in mind that the longest fall had been taken from just right there, thousands of feet down the face. You do that belly crawl to get out there onto the route and then you're looking down that couloir, down the whole North Face.
On my way down I encountered an interesting character at the lower saddle. This guy was some sort of ascetic, high on his particular brand of Jesus Joy. He had managed to make it up to the saddle in his bare feet. An integral part of his life method, he explained, was to never wear shoes at all, under any circumstances. There wasn't a lot of snow/ice up there that summer so he had managed to do this with just the simple vagabond threads on his back and his feet at every step intimately connected to the earth.
I was impressed with this strange human creature and couldn't wait to tell my friends about him. When I did, far from sharing my enthusiasm for what I'd seen, the consensus was that he was a worthless lunatic.
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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[One of the paradigm shifts in my very young climbing career was encountering the Vulgarians in the Jenny Lake Climbers' Campground in the early sixties. The following account is a slightly edited version of ones I've posted on this site and elsewhere.]
My first encounter with the Eastern Wild Ones occurred in the climber's camp in the Tetons, a place that used to be at the epicenter of American climbing.
Except for some minimal instruction from a few Exum-guided climbs, I learned about climbing on my own, primarily from books. My impressionable adolescent psyche had been deeply influenced by the purple pro---uh, the lyrical writing---of Gaston Rebuffat. From his books I learned about the beauty of the mountaineering experience, the brotherhood of the rope, the necessity of being fashionably attired at all times, and that under no circumstances was the leader to permit the perfect vertical line of his rope to be broken by pictorially distracting protection points.
Having marinated in matching-patterned-sweater-and-knicker-socks idealism, I made my way to the Teton climbers' camp. Oh, the horror! The place was infested with badly dressed, apparently unwashed, and thoroughly unkempt vermin, drinking, copulating, disrupting Teton Tea parties, roaring around the loop road in their Triumphs, sounding the Vulgaraphone, and indulging in all manner of activities inconvenient, if not impossible, to carry out in woolen knickers.
I feverishly consulted my copies of Neige et Roc and Etoiles et Tempetes for protective incantations against these alpine demons, no doubt the same ones feared by the early peasants venturing into the heights for the first time. Now these fiends had somehow been transplanted from Chamonix to Jackson, screaming like the hounds of hell, enraged, no doubt, by the color coordination and tell-tale scent of my dry-cleaned climbing outfits.
As I cowered behind Orrin Bonney's teepee, watching the End of Days unfold before me, I realized that the apocalypse had arrived---probably during AP Calculus class---and that from now on Fire and Brimstone would be replacing Starlight and Storm. Still, I managed to cling to one eternal verity: these were not Real Climbers. No way.
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kpinwalla2
Social climber
WA
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This post inspired me to dig out my old Ortenburger guidebook and reminisce a bit. I climbed there a bunch in the 80's when I lived in nearby Pocatello, and by the guidebook entry for each route, I wrote the date and the name of my partners. By Exum Ridge, I had written "William Meyers, age 55", and that brought back some great memories and inspired some introspection. My partner Geoff May and I were approaching the base of the route when we caught up to an "older" couple. The guy explained to us that he and his wife had planned on climbing the Exum Ridge, something he had done 25 years ago. He said he figured it was his last opportunity to do it as he was getting older and starting to have some health issues. However, it turned out that his wife was not up to the challenge and wanted to turn back, so he asked if he could join us while his wife hiked backed down to their camp at Garnet Meadows. We welcomed him, even though we were worried he would slow us down considerably. It turned out that he was still a good climber and his previous experience on the Exum helped keep us on route. I led most of it, and I can still remember being somewhat annoyed hearing him yelling from below "no, the REAL route goes THAT way". I also remember thinking how cool it was that this "old" guy was still getting out and climbing - but that his days were definitely numbered. Well, now I'm almost 57, have a brand-new knee and I'm wondering when or if I'll ever make it back up into the high mountains. Incidentally, my partner Geoff was the rescuer that found Hugh Herr on the slopes of Mt. Washington.
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hobo_dan
Social climber
Minnesota
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Jackson Hole was a pretty good hang. My climbs in the Tetons were usually suffer fests going up Garnet Canyon. finding maybe three good pitches of rock climbing and a lot of scrambling. I was more interested in the flesh pots of Jackson--particularly a Mexican cafe called the Merry Piglets that made some thing called a Cheese Crisp- it was about the size of a frisbee and cost under $4.00.
I do have a story worth sharing: Friend of friends had managed to find work as raft guides on the Snake river. They were required to run the guests down river, regal them with stories of machismo and to fish them out of the water when they fell in.
After the run they were required to shuttle the gear and people back to the put in and then do it again.
The lower end of this social spectrum were the poor slobs who had to strap on the rafts to the trailers and then pull it back home using an ancient schoolbus.
The mind numbing job was made more amusing by the "drivers challenge"
While on the twisting Snake River road the driver was "required" to let go of the wheel and then turn and run back as far as they dared into the rear of the bus-touching a seat (or the mythical rear emergency door) and then hauling ass back to the driver seat/wheel before the bus went off the road/into the drink/head on collision with mini van family, etc. No fatalities were reported and a good time was had by all.
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BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 5, 2016 - 12:15pm PT
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RGold,
That was one of the best posts that I have ever read here!!!
I cut and pasted it so I can pilfer from it some day.
My first trip to the Tetons must be put in context. We were babies.
I began climbing on some local 30 foot limestone crags after finding a copy of The White Spider in the Ada, Oklahoma town library, where I spent a lot of my free time. I pulled that book out at random, not knowing that it would change everything. From there we found a copy of Basic Rockcraft at a back packing store in the city (Oklahoma City), but that book wasn't very comprehensive. We learned to climb in a total vacuum. We had a few books about climbing. One of them was Chris Jones' Climbing In North America, which we read so many times that it fell to pieces after we learned it by heart. I would love to read that book again, after all of these years. It made guys like Kor and Robbins sound like giants. We saw no reason why we couldn't be giants as well.
Our parents had allowed us to spend our savings on a week being taught and guided by George Hurley, who drug us up a ton of routes during a week in Eldo and the Flatirons. We came away with a basic knowledge of how to climb safely, set pro and anchors, and safely rap back down routes. The hardest route we did was the Yellow Spur, which didn't seem overwhelmingly difficult. Then we took off for the Tetons. I can't believe that our parents allowed us to go. We were nigh babies. We saved up for the trip by flipping burgers every night after school.
Jones's book had a fair amount of discussion regarding the Tetons, and it was just up the road from Boulder. A day's drive. So we pointed the landshark north and made our way there with great excitement. We were real climbers now! I should note that Hurley did a damn good job with us, and after a week with him, we knew how to climb safely. We were like little monkeys, so it wasn't difficulty that stopped us. It was gear knowledge, and he taught us that. We also scored a copy of Climbing Magazine from Culp's store, and from an ad, we later bought all of our gear by mail order from EMS in New Hampshire.
We spent our savings on rope, shoes, and gear at Bob Culp's shop in Boulder, and marched forward, with all of the confidence in the world. Being kids, we didn't have a good risk meter, and got ourselves into a few epics, but on we marched, trying to be just like Kor and Robbins. I should say that my shoes were Shoe-Nards, which totally sucked. I didn't learn about EB's until much later. My friend bought a pair of PA's. It didn't matter. All of the old pictures showed Robbins and Kor climbing in what looked like hiking boots.
We knew of the Vulgarians from Jones's book, which has a few hilarious stories, so when we went to do that route on Moran (can't remember the name. It is in the old 50 classic climbs book), we met two true Vulgarians with a pilfered canoe to shortcut across the lake. We all jumped in and it barely held us all.
We peppered them with questions, and they provided answers and hilarious stories at a shared camping spot that evening. They shared their booze with us, despite our young age. We felt a hundred feet tall. Nobody back home would ever understand the adventure road that we were now firmly on. I didn't know it, but the trajectory of my entire life changed in less than two months that summer. Anyway, it was ALL about adventure. The Tetons were bigger than anything we had seen, so when we crossed that pass and got our first view of them, it was like stumbling onto Valhalla.
That would have been around 1977. We managed to climb every route that we tried, and wanted to cap it off with an ascent of the N Face of the Grand. The climbing rangers put a huge scare into us when we stopped off to sign in, and we decided against it. We should have ignored them. We were doing OK. I remember romping right up the complete Exum Ridge and standing on the summit. We were alpine heroes, not far from the rolling ranching country where we grew up. The route was easy. This climbing stuff isn't so bad...
Everyone seemed to be staying at the AAC climbers ranch, which was pretty spiffy compared to a campground. It was sort of like Camp 4, but with manners....sorta kind of. We had heard of Camp 4, but this gathering of so many climber in one place seemed incredible to us, having grown up nailing rotten rock routes with our 5 pitons in the middle of climbing nowhere.
Anyway, it was all a great adventure. I still regret not doing the N Face. It was only 5.7, after all, and 5.7 seemed pretty easy to us. We had grown up climbing rotten rock near my hometown, so bad rock didn't frighten us either. The Climbing Ranger made it sound like a total death route.
Within a few weeks of starting college, I managed to hook up with the local climbing scene and that was that. Childhood was over. There was a very hardcore group growing up there at that time, and I climbed El Cap only a couple of years later.
It all started with George Hurley's tutelage and the trip to the Tetons, though. It was a great adventure. I can still vaguely remember climbing on Falling Ant Slab at the Jenny Lake Boulders. Everyone went there in the evenings.
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wallyvirginia
Trad climber
Stockholm, Sweden
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RGold,
That was one of the best posts that I have ever read here!!!
+1
And it captures exactly what I was trying to say about why the older photos are resonating so well with me.
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johnkelley
climber
Anchorage Alaska
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Here's a few of the FA of Tango Max with Matt Neuner in 2001 or so.
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wbw
Trad climber
'cross the great divide
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One of my college buddies once told me, "someday you're gonna look back at our days at school, and realize those were the best years of your life". My reply was, "nope, I'm living the best days of my life right now." This conversation was had several months after I had moved to Jackson, Wyoming from Winston-Salem, North Carolina. I was 22 years old, and thought I had found paradise and would never leave.
I spent 5 years living in various locations in the valley, working at various hotels and restaurants, and getting into either the Tetons or Winds every weekend during the summer. During this time I transformed from a backpacker into a climber. My memories during this time: winters so cold that ice climbs don't form up (at least not near as many as one would think in a place that wintery); getting off the night shift from baking at the Bunnery and skiing the Pass every day from November til sometime in February; first "long" rock climb on Rock Springs Buttress; hanging onto Wes as we rode his motorcycle at high speeds from the Village to Moose to climb each weekend in the summer; doing many of the climbs that I have seen gorgeous pictures of on this thread, with the most memorable one probably being the Italian Cracks car-to-car.
Two things from upthread I have to take issue with: first is that Steve Quinlan ever went to Blacktail Butte. We could never drag him out there, except when he and I removed a couple of bolts that had been placed from rappel next to cracks. (I think the bolts were probably replaced the same afternoon, and we were accused of being elitists.) The second thing is that the Tetons are one of the few areas in the lower 48 where one can engage in real alpine climbing. This is not even close to true.
Then there were the 5 seasons I went back to the Tetons from Boulder to guide for JHMG. I have mixed feelings about that experience overall, but the 4 day trips up the Grand were almost always fun. While guiding the Snaz, my client and I were treated to watching Mugs catch up to us with his client by placing gear only for belays. When I commented to him about the lack of protection he was placing, he told me that it was good training for The Alpine. During this time I would routinely see Mr. Pratt on the trail, as well as Schmitz, Bridwell and Roskelley, and each time I felt like a teen-age groupie. I think Dean Moore had climbed the Grand close to 500 times by then.
I still like hiking to get to climbs (even though my feet hurt constantly), and by God as hard as I've tried I just can't get away from my love of climbing frozen stuff. We called ourselves Teton Dinks, and I will always be a Teton Dink, even though I haven't lived there for nearly 30 years.
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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After the age of fifty (1987), and a bad arm injury, I gave up serious bouldering, and for the following twenty years would try to take a summer trip to the Tetons, mostly soloing modest routes I had done many years before or wanted to try. I remember meeting Gary Neptune in Garnet Canyon as I was going up to climb something I hadn't done on the South Buttress.
Also, I had a wonderful time solo-exploring the Granite Mountains in central Wyoming. Rattlesnakes and all.
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wbw
Trad climber
'cross the great divide
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Another memory is of not being able to do any of the Gill problems on the Jenny Lake boulders.
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johntp
Trad climber
socal
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BASE104-
Thanks for the post.
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Base104
AWESOME!!!
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the idle rich
climber
Estes Park, CO
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Rich (Rgold)...I also enjoy trying to decrypt Ortenburger's route descriptions. I think my favorite was where he described climbing up to "a nearly vertical ledge". I couldn't decide if it was a steep slab or a ramp/corner. There must have been something to his descriptions...I was able to follow them and was occasionally on route I would guess.
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Sierra Ledge Rat
Mountain climber
Old and Broken Down in Appalachia
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Great pics, Mr. Kelly
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Larry Nelson
Social climber
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A worthy bump
Have never climbed there, but this is one of the best threads going.
Thanks to Base104, johnkelley, jgill, hamie, Brian in SLC,
and especially rgold's classic pictures and great stories.
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Great photos, Rich--is that Donini?
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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I would guess Bragg.
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