Guy et moi...

I am in Bozeman watching the light come upon the land long dark cold night that it was. Over coffee I ponder the death of Guy Lacelle what if anything it all means. Having watched the Doug Chabot video I see how he died but the why eludes me. Was this competition and these lifeless gulleys worth a man's life?

No. They cannot be. Over Facebook I chat with Stephanie who knows Guy she is French possessed of that uniquely French fatalism, yes Rob, it could ahve been you but it could be any of us. Rob Fullerton has more the tally, his Freezing Gravity image exhibition now has 3 of the ten featured climbers now deceased, I am one of the seven still standing and frankly the math disturbs me.

Just the same I AM excited very much about my climbing, the new Fusion 2 is a remarkable instrument which I have used gleefully in my wooden cave almost every day so that my shoulders ache my tendinitis growls like a hurt animal in the corner. But what fun and climbing should be fun so it should not kill you nor your treasured friends.

After all, if Eric Deglerc should ever come back from Afghanistan and hold Festiglace du Quebec again who would be my partner? Not Guy, now... There is a hole in the universe in his leaving that I have stepped into stumbling over my own mortality. Last week on my birthday my partner was too drunk/stoned/disinterested to show up for our day of climbing so I went alone. I went up Secret Probation solo on a very cold morning with the ice like marble talking myself through this madness I say out loud "CONTROL YOUR FEAR" so I am not a crumpled bleeding heap on the cruel ground.

But Fusion 2 carried me through that and the years spent off the ground without a rope, that and my new outfit which made me FEEL strong competent. Which I really am toiling away in my home-made cave running across the frozen golf-course huffing like an old dog, so what?

For this is all gravy now, isn't it? I've done my climbs let others do their's let them eat cake. There is no one to impress now the younger climbers can phone me when the are over 40 or 45 let me know if they can still climb if they are even alive to do so. I have tried to puzzle this Guy thing out but truly there is no kharmic lesson gravity never fails in its task always vigilant ever patient. It's just that the Craig Luebben-John Bachar-Guy Lacelle trilogy in the last six months featured three older "masters" two of whom I've climbed with all of whom were accomplished soloists. I see the circle constrict with me still at the dwindling center most climbers of my generation having ceded to fat bald-dom or oblivion so should I continue if so, why?

Becasue it's fun I suppose. Buried somewhere in all the events amid the gear-mannequin poseurs resides this great activity, ice-climbing.

For that it's worth continuing...

Sharpening Steel

I am sharpening steel as of late, ice screws, ice tools, fruit boot plates, the file has been busy by the fire sending filings into the abyss. Here in CO there is but a brief, torrid respite from cold, oh I how I immensely enjoy the red-dawn forays out back in the nude to piss out last night's spirits the day already thick on my sun-browned skin. Now the wheel turns a great cosmic retribution for such sybaritic acts the sun fleeing south, away, a great pagan reckoning to come. The solstice looming birth death renewal days to grow longer again in freezing cold assertiveness...

I run from my car to work, to RC-2 across the parkway golf-course over the campus panting in the elevator like some alien being past the warm pastries at the cafe' up to the fifth floor the mountains silly beautiful with their cake-frosting snowfall helm, is this for real? Should really be getting paid for this?

I smell the winter "it beckons" so to speak my hands frozen so I could hardly work this morning so I press on smitten by the beauty of it all. When the post-docs arrive they are sullen will close the blinds on their side but I leave mine gawping for I see snow that one day will no longer fall when the world is reduced to excrement by the crush of humanity and christian investment bankers in their shit SUVS.

Steel begets steel for I am looking for bite-pump-terror the transfiguration one more year OH-F*CK-PLEASE just one more year one more fish one more 24 year-old woman writhing upon me, please f*ck please...

Good things may come to those who wait but good things are more likely for those who get up early do their pull-ups and bother to chat-up, I'm sprinting for a finish line that is really the edge of a cliff a void black infinite beyond open my arms tumble feel a rush of air then nothing the ride over but no one there to even recognize said fact...

This week the storm come the mother of all storms that ushers in the horned God Goddess in descent still I pray for that rotation the end of winter resumption of green the promise of grandchildren I old and broken only stories to tell of a time when the earth held ice and cold life not obliterated by the crush of humanity still wild creatures and places.

Tell us grandpa what did snow look feel taste smell like?

The Great Beyond

I was flipping through my Facebook feed last night there amid the usual personal drivel was a post by Micah Dash. For those of you unfamiliar with the illustrious Dash he is/was the archetypal Boulder yuppie climber who perished under and ice-fall over the summer.

Accidents of course happen. It has been my observation that such accidents are more prone to happen when folks go off seeking fame and glory with a cameraman in tow then the onus is upon them to proceed instead of saying FUCK THIS when conditions are sub-optimal or just downright suicidal. In this case as with the late great and woefully uninsured Alex Lowe climber(s) and cameraman were buried alike. Nobody of course thinks they are going to die except of course me who knows he's going to die any damn day all it would take would be a moment of inattentiveness on I25 and some crack-whore subdivision mom in her Honda Pilot yacking on her phone to her life-coach/yoga guru/colonic therapist will plow right into my Cooper forever snuffing out my cantankerousness.

Having had a bevy of tins of strong ale I wrote on his (MD's) page "holy shit dude yer dead..." as if from beyond the River Styx this person still sought fame and recognition. Mind you I had never even met or heard of this person before they requested me as a friend then I come to see what a famous personality they indeed are which is why I assume they befriended me in the first place. I should note that good men and women get killed nearly every day in those far-flung shit-holes Afghanistan and Iraq, for what purpose I cannot say. Yet they are fellow citizens some of whom I actually met while practicing down by Fort Carson soldiers there with families and worries off on 12-15 month deployments where they are not exactly always welcome yet they saddle up and go anyway from a sense of duty or out of a need to pay the mortgage.

The point being that if you walk around Boulder you'd think the wars existed on another planet everyone being so health conscious and self-absorbed. When there was a draft young men were conscripted and sent off to places like Vietnam which maybe cured them of the urge for subsequent adventure travel. Now that there is a privileged leisure class freed from such societal obligations with nothing better to do but recreate and go on luxury vacations by way of a profession we are supposed to feel a deep sense of grief when such a holiday goes awry.

If I actually knew these people that might be the case my own feeling that there is a certain amount of nose-rubbing into the fact that these folks have such a cool life being featured in one catalog or magazine or another aren't they just so amazing? Then there's the fact that I HAVE known some of these people although not this particular bloke which leads me to think to some extent that they might have got their comeuppance for a lifetime of questionable antics whilst being rather smug up until that point.

So we are all free to do, and write, whatever we wish. By inviting me to be his "friend" he invited me though unintentionally to comment upon his demise, the keepers of the flame may be offended by this and so they may but I too take umbrage with their insistence upon lock-step adulation. I can recognize the need to grieve as I have for parents and a lost child but revisionist deification I have little patience for.

For no one is getting out of this life alive, of this I can assure you all. Yesterday Susanne popped open a bottle of red wine we were saving, "for what?" she said and so we guzzled the warm drowsy red fluid in the last warm sun of 2009 a sun which soon slid behind the mountains with the ensuing autumnal chill seconds behind.

I must have slept soundly for just before 7 (a luxury to sleep in so late for me who is usually up before 5 out of the house before 6) I awoke to the dawn illuminating tall yellow grass on my property. A fresh day full of potential, all I ever really hope for...

The Buffalo Commons

The wolf is back, so much so that red-necks shoot them in Idaho for a fee, good...

The Buffalo cannot be far behind, supplanting European cattle once for all, pull up the fences, bulldoze the SuperTargets, every man women and child gets one buffalo per year, hippies can sell theirs if they wish only to eat green burritos, let them...

I foresee the plains as they were, wild, lost, uninhabitable as they again prove to be, the wolves among the herds, humans permitted to come and appropriate their own, they must. My dog LIKES Buffalo, Bison, the gristle I can't chew she inhales, that's what dogs evolved to do, not go to doggie-day-care, crikey...

End of Days, End of Empire Part1

Summer is is wrap cold hard rain blew in from the west this morning driving me in tattered Italian robe back into the house. Susanne is in England with my global phone so Cormac and I are bachelors-in-residence, all quite groovy with Saturday hot sunny up on the Carter Lake boulders. Ryan came back after taking the cure up in Sheridan having gained weight & color his left leg looking rather worse, his mishap on Hallet's in the spring of 2008 being one of the more insane accidents I knew of personally.

Sunday my bitch was berserk from her heat so off we went for a 40 minute trail/road run the day warming upon us. That afternoon Zack avec Ryan appeared for a cave session with Lucky Dube and Bob boomin' in the background. My feet are a ruin so I climbed without shoes: the bigger the moves the better. I had a good session until Zack suddenly decided to try and swap-out his wasted Monsters for my set hanging there, my set a gift from the lovely Betta Gobbi some years back.

Dude, do I LOOK bigger than you?

Autumn thus begins the horned God ascendent Goddess descendent, I am eyeing a massive patch of mint out back mint jelly in mind a present for Susanne when she prances of thge plane in a week.

In August we drove through Yellowstone, spent a few nights there. One morning I got up after coffee I crossed under the road stepping out onto a river bottom under brooding mountains. The river was low only small fish about soon I noticed the umber mass of a solitary bull bison in recline along a bend to the south. Earlier I had walked by his dust wallow, his fresh fecal splatter, his piss stains. These lone bulls dot the primeval landscape within the park ousted from the herd they live out their days in solitude munching grass, lolling in the dust, dosing, just taking it all in until a pack of wolves happens by, wolves who by hard-wiring have again learned to stalk, harry, then bring down that one-ton bison supermarket extravaganza.

End of days...

I see something in that old bull, something in empathy. There are always challenges, the oldest bull would seem the most comely of opportunities for the upstart, yes? Randy Couture might prove otherwise though even he has of late taken his share of lumps. So is this the path to enlightenment?

I see today in the UK times that we will lose now in Afghanistan, shades of Vietnam the fall of which I watched with incredulity by black and white TV in 1975. Rome had such far-flung wars most of which she eventually lost going bankrupt both financially and morally in the process, the analogy being obvious.

Being a Good Partner-Staying Alive

Autumn, a time when I begin to recieve nibbles about going climbing. I so look forward to those first days, crisp, cold, thin ice, that first flash pump, clipping the slings. In the old days before my brains came in I would solo waterfall routes in the Canadian Rockies, my favorite part being to rappel back down the ice and see finally just how steep and harrowing the ice was, magnificent!

I will say I see a disconnect at times between what people anticipate in a day out and what occurs, there are a multitude of reasons for this I suspect so in the interest of writing a primer plus checklist here goes, what to expect on a day out upon the hill.

STAYING ALIVE
The list of the famous & recent-dead is long and storied, I don't intend to join them anytime soon. With that said if you climb with me there will be expectations, no one in thirty-plus years of climbing has ever been seriously injured climbing with me and that pretty much includes me, that record will remain unblemished in 2009-2010. Yup, I have taken some big whippers but thanks to diligent belaying I have survived with only a little missing paint, so...

1) KNOW HOW TO BELAY!!! Sounds easy right? It is, but you will need to pay attention, maybe for a while, in the cold, and no you can't talk on your cell phone at any time during this process. For winter I like the Grigri, although a skilled plate user is fine as well, do not use a Reverso for mixed climbing as these are designed for guiding not actually belaying a leader trying to pull rope for a difficult clip, if I see you pull out a Reverso I'm going top snatch this away from you and throw it off the cliff.

Any send takes two people, leader and belayer, the belayer needs to anticipate what the leader is doing, movement, particularly making clips, in general leave a slight "belly" in the rope. This is essential as it prevents nasty, jarring falls, the leader "boinks" down rather than swinging back into the route. A tight rope sucks when you make it to a dagger, pumped and here your belayer is keeping a tight rope putting, 5, 10, 15 pounds of back-pull on you, so knock it off!

2) Wear your helmet! Yes, I know there are all those groovy Alex pictures taken in Hyalite bare-headed (scary lady magazine editors all swoon here), but, he's dead, right? A few years back some dork knocked a whopper off and hit me square in the noggin BOOM!, according to the EMT who actually witnessed this I staggered a few steps and kept right on walking as I was wearing this cool yellow Grivel helmet betta Gobbi gave me, the shard dimpled the shell and split the foam liner, I had a stiff neck for a few days. Without the helmet someone else would undoubtedly be shaggin' Mrs. Cotter and that frankly is right-out.

Tools, crampons, ice screws, ice shards, rocks, quick draws, will all hurt you if they fall and hit you, they can kill you if they hit you in the head. In 2008 in the Ouray final Ines Papert fell from the diving board, left a Fusion tool rocking on a plastic hold, the tool then fell and popped Ines right in the head, her tracer spared her a serious injury or even being struck fatally thus preserving the very outside chance that I may at some point get to yet date Ines Papert.

Last winter I fell out of a Yaniro and went head-first through a curtain, spectacular but my Cassin Stunt plowed right through the icicles, violent but uneventful.

3) Don't use spurs! Sooooo 1990s, these things are excellent if you like to flip over in a fall, expose the blue-white intimacy of your tibia for all to see or disembowel your friends, not to mention that when walking around they will cut your rope without your even knowing it.

In fact I don't even wear a heel-plate on my Kayland Ice Dragons, lighter, they pack easier, less lethal, easier to walk in and unloading the yaniro is much easier.

4) Be prepared... Food, drink, warm clothes, tools, boots, harness, HELMET, belay device, spare gloves... Guys show up with a Blackberry and no helmet, or all their pot-smoking gear and no water, I'm not yer' mom which means I didn't pack your lunch. At a minimum you need a good belay jacket, a warm hat, gloves for climbing and belaying, spare (dry) socks, harness, tools, fruit boots, grub, fluids, a foam pad to sit on.

5) Be stoked! Most people in the world don't have enough to eat, no access to medical care let alone postable water, you are getting to go climbing for the day in the beautiful winter mountains so ENJOY YOURSELF!

6) Get up early, be on time for said rendezvous, don't plan on leaving early. I like to be first on the hill, pick the choice routes first then project when all the knuckleheads appear late for their flail on the aforementioned routes. I can't recall how many times I am clipped into bolt one, belayer is in position, I'm just giving my hands a final warm when up trots some bloke, "Duh-uh, are gonna climb that?"

What does it look like I'm "gonnadooo"...

7) Which leads me to point next. GIVE PEOPLE THEIR SPACE... Never fails a plethora of routes to choose from and along comes some tosser, wanting to climb exactly whatever route it is I am on. Why? My favorite is the guy who always has to climb right next to me (dude, WASH YOUR CLOTHES), newsflash, I don't care what you climb, I just don't...

8) My tendency is to move away from crowds, not towards them, much safer, quiter, I say whassup and off I go, much safer to not be hit by them or their falling tools or listen to them shrieking FUUUUUCCCCKKKKKK!!!! TAAAAAAAAKKKKKEEEEE!!!!! FUUUUUCCCCCCCKKKKKKK!!!! IM PUUUUUUMMMMPPPPPED!!! Sheesh...

9) Be strong... I mean mentally and phsically. No need for all that cross-fit horseshit, there's more to life than working out, everyday, every minute of every day, until you puke I mean (I grew up to believe puking was to be avoided, but then again, I GREW UP).

Yet a little preparation goes a long way, specific preparation. Recently I read an article about Erwan Le Corre and his Natural Movement approach to fitness. In short, gyms suck as you can't apply any of what you learn in a gym, better to train outside in nature to simulate Cro Magnon type activities.

Like dry-tooling...

Trail-running, bouldering, river-swimming, canoeing, grappling, fishing, all natural activities. Since I'm going to dry-tool I train by, yes, you guessed it, dry-tooling, my cave is all set up for it. I do pull-ups on a board not on a bar as there are never any metal bars to pull-up on the routes I climb. When it gets cold out I open the garage door and train in the cold, I wear climbing clothes and gloves, I freeze my ass off because when I climb I'm going to freeze my ass off. I lifted weights last year, a lot... I gained about 12 lbs., looked buff, I didn't climb very well. This year I am 173 pounds (79 kilos), lean... Climbing is about movement, since I am an adult I have adult responsibilities so this precludes spending three months in Canmore very autumn, I need to come out banging. I keep it simple, pushups, sit-ups, pull-ups, running, bouldering, dry-tooling, I'm too old to do shit that pisses me off...

10) Have some humility. There are routes I've done dozens of times, maybe over a hundred times that I can/will no longer do. There is merit in having done these routes I assume, which is why I came to master them over time, now that they have slipped away I adjust to that.

During one down period I told Susanne, "I'm not the man I was".

No, but you you are a different man, and no less of a man for that being true.

People get in a rut, human nature I suppose. We have our favorites, I enjoy certain climbs a good deal, anyone who has ever seen me do every variant of Eliminator Left Hand can observe this about me. As Yvonne Chouinard intoned, Every climb has its time, the road to enlightenment is rife with fine routes, some to be done once others repeatedly, there are always other routes to do and today may not be your day, nor tomorrow, nor this season. Trying hard and failing has merit, seeing others succeed as well can be enjoyed.

I avoid popular climbing culture not because the climbing portrayed has no merit but mostly because the culture of self-absorbed, wealthy white folks out enjoying luxury vacations in Calymnos or Patagonia or Nepal is all rather soul-less, the intent is to create envy I suppose but after a time I merely feel phsically sickened.

Mind you I don't deny anyone a grand holiday, I certainly take mine when I can, but the portrayed perpetual leisure lifestyle looks rather fabricated with all the perfect white teeth, the flat in Cahmonix and those stilted faux-benevolent stints at the Khumbu climbing school teaching Sherpas to ice-climb, for whom is this really intended?

SUMMARY
Winter is fast approaching, well, autumn is anyway. Days-off matter, make good use of them, don't waste yours, nor mine...

Leaders!

Okay, this is more for me than anyone reading this. The leader of the route/the day/the philosophical movement that is dry-tooling has the responsibility to, well, LEAD!

Dry-tooling has really taken a beating lately, receiving almost no press here in the USA, furthermore many "big-name" climbers (i.e., douche-bags) have spoken out against dry, whankers!

With that said this season I have been very encouraged by the interest people have had in getting in touch and training, everyone seems really stoked!

So, no yelling, cussing, berating the belayer, make sure everyone climbs!

ALLEZ!!!

Me and Bobby Kennedy

"There is a beginning to the voyage and an end to the voyage, and this beginning and ending is part of the natural order of things." -Edward M Kennedy-

I want to preface this piece by unequivocally stating I did not know Teddy Kennedy, I never met the man but I did admire his dedication to public service although the Chappaquidick episode was inexcusable, the actions of a coward and drunk. With that said I also being a two-fisted Irishman I appreciate his lust for woman and the bottle, a Catholic by birth I am certain there is no God but should there be one then teddy will now have to atone I suppose providing God is not unduly occupied with the various wars and genocidal on-goings.

I did however, once meet Bobby Kennedy, I even shook his hand. A first grader at Our Lady of Sorrows Catholic elementary school Bobby paid a quick visit as he campaigned for president on the way to his date with destiny in the form of an insane Sirhan Sirhan. The nuns brought us outside briskly, lined us up, Bobby rolled up got out and started pumping the flesh. I held my small 1st-grader hand out resplendent in gray slacks and blue wool blazer when voila' Bobby grabbed my hand and gave it a big squeeze. I recall a big horsey smile, a great shock of reddish-brown hair, then he was moving off down the line, gone...

Then this asshole Sirhan Sirhan shot him, no doubt asserting his second-ammendmant rights that seems to include blowing away your classmates, coworkers, random salsa dancers, your kids and most recently yourself.   

Of course all manner of right-wing fruit-cakes from Anne Colter to Rush Limbaugh will sorely miss the last Kennedy brother, who else to blame for two decades of colossal mismanagement of a great nation and its resources if not one senator rather than two Bushes, "the great" Ronald Reagan and that fatso Clinton.

But I digress, autumn always put me in a reflective pose, the long weekend has hints of summer but most certainly autumn, the days refuse to make up their minds.

Recently I received the Patagonia fall "alpine" catalog, I was relieved to see that despite nearly 10% plus national unemployment and knowing that over one million children in this country will return to school this autumn effectively homeless, to see that certain well-heeled yuppie white people are still out there impeccably attired enjoying any number of luxury vacations climbing and skiing, their perfect white teeth grimacing for the camera. Supposedly I am to "believe" in these activities of these folks, even donate to support them, hmmm...

 

Death sans Transfiguration

A rather bad summer for big-name climbers, Tom Kelley phoned us Monday to say Craig Luebben had been killed attempting the Torment-Forbidden traverse in the North Cascades, I have climbed extensively in the NCs but not this one, more of a mountaineering outing, but I will say that a heat wave was afoot in the Pacific Northwest at the time so it does not surprise me that the glaciers there are rather unstable, likely a factor in the demise of Johnny Copp and Micah Dash in China as well. John bachar has also died in a solo climbing accident, what can you say? Bachar was the Master until Michael Reardon came along, the new Sensei, there was also Derek Hersey here in CO, Jimmy Jewel in the UK. They are all of course now deceased which leads into the question of how safe is solo rock-climbing the answer being not very, in fairness Michael reardon was caught by a rogue wave, a not unexpected vent in the North Atlantic particularly given the yachting race being held off the coast at the time was a shambles due to the immense seas. Bachar had been injured some year back in an auto accident, was getting older and honestly I am here to tell you that as you age you slow down, he was either going to retire or get killed. 

I used to do a great deal of solo climbing something I almost never do now. There is still some high-ball bouldering and the odd mixed route that I know well but always I do these routes with friends there in the context of a day of roped climbing. Last winter I was in Chamonix so I climbed Serac Gulley on the Triangle, a 185 meter ice route that is normally straight forward only the route had nearly sublimated away entirely so was really pieces of an ice route with eerie sections of dry-tooling to put the bits together, fun but that was enough of that for a while particularly when I was climbing leash-less without tethers (or a rope) and half the ice fell off the crux vertical section while I was climbing it.

Years ago inspired by the antics of Peter Croft I did a solo enchainment of rock routes in Eldorado Canyon, I started with Bastille Crack (5.7), the did Werksup (5.9), then climbed AntHill Direct (5.9+) then finished on Wind Arete (with the 5.8 variant), all with a thunder-shower in the middle and done by 1PM. I wore my old Boreal Aces and didn't take a rope, of course I am known as an ice-climber but yes, I used to rock climb too. I met Luebben about that time in 1992-3, he was still mooning over Liz Grenard at the time, smoked a good deal of pot and climbed frantically. I went out climbing with him a few times but I don't think we could bear one another so I then went to seeing him around now and again. I tried to get him out ice-climbing at one point but he deferred, something about Derek Hersey's girlfriend being in town.

I read his blurb on total climbing today to see he had "retired" and was mostly interested in skiing now, he has/had a four-year old daughter who looks very, very cute. Next week I am taking my little girl up Montana State University so she can start college, sad but sadder in the light of knowing Craig will now miss all of his upcoming family life and they will miss him sorely.

To be blunt, climbing is pretty fucking stupid, trying to climb as a living totally insane. I would stop but "retiring" looks to be even more hazardous so I may have to trust in Allah, an alert belayer and a sturdy helmet. Maybe it's just me but in recent years the bodies have really been piling up, Sue Nott, Harry Berger both folks I have been in the Ouray competition with and then these recent deaths. Last month I just out-of-the-blue ceased being able to climb Cat Eye at Rotary Park a problem I had done weekly over the past 15 years or so, frustrated I phoned Susanne on my global.

"It's John Bachar", she said, "He's gotten into your head."

By that she meant the demise of the Master imposed a new mortality on us all if he could fall and be killed we were all vulnerable. Heavy rains had left a coat of fine sand on the Cat Eye exit, one day I went up there five times while some top-ropers sat stock-still in silent audience, I finally pulled the plug and went home.

Autumn is coming, the air is cooling, snow is a month or two away. I train for one more season, already look for a partner for the Bozeman Ice Festival open, a thinly guised excuse to motor up to Booze-mon in my Mini Cooper, see my little girl, and eat a good Buffalo Steak at Fascist Ted's.

Oh, and send a bunch of ice and mixed routes. No way am I retiring, too dangerous...

2009-2010 Winter Season

Early AM on a Sunday, now generally the only day I have for my bouldering session. I now have a new position at the University of Colorado Denver School of medicine in the department of Neurology, my employer Randahl Cohrs is interested in Varicella Zoster Virus the causative agent of Chicken Pox and Shingles, it is a sweet job but requires a daily commute to D-town so I have less time now. I am already thinking about the 2009-2010 season, what it might entail, although now employed full-time I have a faculty posting so I have 4 weeks plus vacation each year with all the holidays too, this opens up some travel opportunities that before did not exist as I have a salary more than adequate. Of course I have Ouray 2010 as a goal, probably no qualifier again this year as the sponsoring entities do not want this as then non-sponsored nobodies tend to eliminate the sponsored “athletes” who then miss the final on Saturday. This omission of the preliminary has been attributed to volunteer burnout but if 45 people sign-up and each pay $40 to be in the preliminary you would have $1800 in which to compensate judges, belayers and so forth so I don’t see the issue as such. In the last four years I have done 10 different winter climbing competitions, I enjoyed all of these immensely except for Bozeman 2008 when I got paired with the illustrious Jim “The Spud” Earle who hadn’t tied into a rope in two years, it was amusing to watch him flail on some of the dry-tool routes but I took a no-score rather than end up 15th behind the legally blind-amputee breast-cancer survivor climbing squad, I do possess humility but sometimes you just have to throw in the towel. I may do Bozeman as an open entrant this year so I can visit Simone my daughter in Bozeman who will be a freshman at Montana Sate University, I will of course bring my own partner to avoid the inevitable Joe Josephson voodoo manipulations of teams and starting assignations, Joe is a great guy but utterly from another era, doesn’t understand modern mixed/ice and cannot help but meddle to have the comp’ come out the way his dated sensibilities dictate, anyway the organizers of this event are too concerned with turning a profit with their clinics so people are herded around like cattle from clinics to coma-inducing slideshows. There are actually some very good routes in Hyalite both ice and mixed although mild/dry autumns the last two years have meant lean conditions and on Saturday last year the routes were in sorry shape as the Chinook blew big-time, all this after a brutally freezing day on Thursday. I hope Festiglace du Quebec returns in 2010, hopefully Eric Leclerc will return safe and sound from Afghanistan those fuck-head Jihadists having missed him and his mates with their roadside bombs and mortars. Otherwise I might like to do Europe again, I was invited to Gorzderette last winter by Stephan Husson but could not go this year for sure I will go if asked. Also I would like to do the Lake City, Colorado Comp’ if that is happening, I really think this event has potential. I doubt I will do the Ice World Cup as this would involve dealing with the American Alpine Club an organization I loathe with their fossilized thinking and geezer-hierarchy, if I do I will join the Italian Alpine Club and compete as an Italian, I can't bear the thought of handing the AAC my money so they can give it to some drip like Kelly "Mangina" Cordes for his summer vacation. So I train and dream, dream of winter and those freezing, adrenaline-drenched moments, for now trying to stay strong and not eat so much ice cream and drink so much beer. This spring has been terrifically wet so hopefully this will translate into much seepage this winter, Rocky Mountain National Park was poor this past winter, there is much potential there if only the moisture would occur, maybe this is the year. Finding people to go will be another issue, always a problem here in Colorado where everyone is a climber but no one actually goes climbing, that would require effort I suppose.

Off Season

Officially I am off-season now, winter is over and for now there will be no alpine season. I begin a new job 1 June so there is much to do in terms of mental preparation. Really, I can use a break from full-time training and climbing to let my body recover, I have had some lower back issues plus my elbows are always one set of pull-ups away from tendinitis. July and August are typically too hot to do much, I use these for weight-training or general conditioning but by late August I start to anticipate the autumn ice and begin to prepare more. This summer plan to do more with re-structuring my indoor dry-tooling wall so I can train more effectively, be less bored, I suppose...

This is an interesting video, watch for the clip where my belayer fails to push up some rope causing me to fight for the clip. Later as I reach the ice he fails to leave a belly in the rope which puts back-pressure on me, I have to pull rope out to relieve this drag wasting more energy. Would I have made the route without this energy being expended? I actually sent this one earlier in the year when it was leaner and harder so probably, I just mention this to illustrate how a belayer who is bored/inattentive/disinterested can screw with you, I was profoundly frustrated by this failure, my tenth lap that day.

What a great place! Let's FUCK IT UP!!!

I took an hour or two of yesterday to get out crimp some stone, a long winter of cranking in my home dry-tool cave leaves me a little loopy at times. From my home Land of the Overhangs is a about 10 minutes, I pull in for a little early-season. Having forgot my pads I head straight down for some inadvertant high-ball, what greets me there underneath the big overhang is sickening. Some assholes have built a fire ring right under the big overhang, not satisfied with this desecration they have broken all the bushes off in a thirty foot radius and burned them in the fire. Ah, there's more... Several 64oz. New Belgium returnable beer jugs have been left as well as other sundry trash, they have courteously thrown their Mickey's 40s away nearby so I get to pick up the green broken glass using a pair of zip-off pants legs also abandoned as gloves. After sending my routes I lug this pile of rubbish out and up.

Note: If you are reading this and these are your NB bottles please get in touch if you would like them back, getting them out of your rectum afterwards might be a problem though...

I find this a cruel cosmic prank given that I was just at the Larimer County meeting April 7 to discuss the fate of trail work at Rotary Park, there I had stood up and stated in no uncertain terms that I knew much of the destruction around the RP boulders was the direct result of climbers breaking brush, pruning and blazing trail to facilitate a more "tame" setting for their "climbing". This assertion was not terribly well received, at the meeting there was much talk about "hikers" and other incidental riff-raff being largely responsible for RP having become a complete tip. I first climbed at RP in 1992, have lived here in LaPorte since 1993 so what goes on at RP and the other bouldering areas has been the subject of keen interest for me.

In short, climber activity is a certain culprit in the profound degradation that plagues areas like Rotary Park, people using these areas for climbing simply have no respect for the land, the climbing, the boulders themselves. Having pimped-out the Rotary Park for a variety of commercial ends like magazine articles, guidebooks, and the Horsetooth Hang many "activists" move on to greener pastures (i.e., Boulder), not me though, I'm stuck here, this is my home.

For example when I brought up at the meeeting that the slopes around and below RP were the site of many nesting songbirds, a yellow-breasted chat nests there as well as spotted towhees, rock wrens, there was more than one smirk in the room. Most visitors are concerned mainly with not getting poked by a plum bush on their 400th attempt on Moon Arete or avoiding having their expensive yoga-bra hung-up on a mountain mahogany whilst sitting there looking soooo hot beneath Meditation.

Mind you I am not saying climbers set this fire, but these were not children partying here, few teenagers hang around outside New Belgium with their returnable beer jugs waiting for a likely patron to head in and score them a refill of Fat Tire. There is plenty of new chalk at LOTO, someone is climbing here which is fine, there is about 150 feet of shoreline left here so once it falls into the reservoir that's it and destroying the brush holding said shoreline in place is a pretty good way to accelerate the process to oblivion.

To call these activities VANDALISM is a good start, that way you can't say you are some sort of hero/activist clearing plum bushes from around the boulders so you and your pals can top-rope in safety problems you should probably either climb unroped or just stay the fuck off of. Rotary Park isn't a gym, no one comes by to vacum up after you, your tape, cigarette butts, plastic water bottles, your dog's shit, all this stuff is your responsibility, as they say your mom no longer works here.

The new plan of course seems to be to build yet another gargantuan trail down to the reservoir through RP, ostensibly to divert all the riff-raff away from the boulders. This will create a dog swim/party beach so wasted sorority girls in their flip-flops can readily stagger down to the water their doughy neo-con fascist boyfriends in tow, what an innovative solution to the problem of Rotary Park being converted into a suburban bouldering ghetto that is.

We have a saying around my house, anyone first arriving in Colorado faced with such natural beauty has a similar reaction, "What a great place! Let's FUCK IT UP!!!" This isn't limited to climbers who cut trails, place gobs of shiny bolts, and let their mutts defecate everywhere, where the buffalo once roamed we have Super Target, bloated mega-menopause mansions and garden-variety sphincters blasting down every road and lane in Hummers, Suburbans and F350s on the phone fairly shrieking "I'M BUSY GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY WAY!!!".

No Rotary Park is an island, the same slacker/trustafarian/gym-rat mentality has despoiled many areas, Hueco Tanks, Mount Evans, Rocky Mountain National Park, my all time favorites being the lard-asses too lazy to carry their pads up and down the trail so they leave them stashed in situ, howz about I leave my broken down '68 Ford Galaxy in your front yard "stashed" as it were hommies, huh? How would you like that?

Much of this is about having respect for the resource, if you're too much of a lame-ass to carry your rope, pad or whatever up and down the hill en-route to making your latest video then, please just stay home, go to the Spot, shave yourself, whatever. I'm not likely to come to the premier of your new bouldering video, I don't read climbing magazines so your latest test-piece does not concern me, I'm simply not impressed.

All I seek is the chance to go boulder in relative solitude amid the shade of a Squawbush, listen to a bird-song not your dumb-ass dog barking at me ("Oh, he's friendly!", really?). I don't wish to boulder in squalor for all time, I want my son to be able to climb here, maybe even his son or daughter.

Rotary Park, Land of the Overhangs, these are great places, so don't fuck them up...

Beating the Level

My son has an Xbox360, it is a remarkable machine that permits us to play a variety of games. As You winnow through the various games you may "beat the level" or acheive a chekc-point, often times this takes a fair amount of perseverence as you get rubbed out again and again. I had switched over to Bear-back, meaning no heel-plate so had gone back to try some of my earlier sends sans eperon one route Quasimodo had gone fairly quickly but another Svengali, both in the Belfry at Vail had resisted my efforts, I had made it to the ice on several frustrating occasions only to get spit off, dang!

Some cold weather blew in last week, Vail seemed feasible again, we were surprised to see just how well the place was holding up. I had gone with Cormac and Adam the place being quite a scene with climbers flying off ice routes making a a racket in general, we retreated to the Belfry. There I noticed immediately a slender dagger had formed on Svengali, although a bit sun-rotted and poorly adhered it occurred to me that if I could make the ice maybe the route would go. Adam led up the pencil sank a couple screws up there for me, I put the draws up and the rope in the draws, then it was show-time.

I ripped through the dry-tooling so fast I hardly noticed, up and out walk feet on inner edge, then a decent move left to right over left Yaniro (figure 4), scrum the foot against the ceiling, grab the left tool up high rock, rock, then WHAMMO out to the lip to an occult divit.

Which I promptly missed. But the pick held long enough for me to crane out and look to see where the hold in fact was, 3 cm to the right so I jumped the tool into the hole, made it. Then left over right Yaniro kick the left front point into the slender dagger while in the Yaniro thus stabilized reach back for the other tool, pirate this tool with grip over my right shoulder, unload the Yaniro and gently kick into the dagger. Now hold breath swing at ice tool sticks, just.

No need to rush now, I won't have the steam for another try so I finesse my way up the hollow icicles pick my shots, take my time I clip one of the screws Adam placed but the route sucks me off up left up a fragile curtain so I twist one in, clip, life begins anew.

So that's that, I beat the level, all those futile attempts to try and climb a whole new way. Two years ago I ran into Jeff Lowe at the Ouray party, he could just stay vertical if he leaned against the counter. "I missed the leashless revolution" he told me staring off into the near distance, his MS having visibly ravaged him. I had first met him in 1995, the year everyone was repeating Octopussy, he was with then wife Terri Eble, still vital, powerful, at the height of his powers. he had watched me do Octopussy wanted to know what sequence I was using, I told him so he went promptly up there and sent the thing handily.

Well I'm not about to miss any revolutions, leashless, spurless or otherwise, if it involves ice tools I am all over it. The Bear-back thing is an immense amount of work until suddenly it becomes the norm then the norm becomes easy, you have beat the level.

Some time after my worse day climbing this winter (one of them) I took this photo, I had just patched up my Fusion tools for another go, was glueing the sole edges of my Dragon Boots back on, a sunny day on my deck I took this photo of my gear.

The gear is me really, battered, patched back up, ready for more.

I need sometimes to remember that mixed is alpinism you need to wait for that alignment of factors, I trained for weeks after my failures, the ice grew there, spring came. I plan to go back but maybe not to that climb this spring, ice cannot be squandered.

Neptune Show March 12

I will be giving my first slide presentation in 10 years at Neptune Mountaineering at 8PM Thursday March 12, this is in Boulder, Colorado. Paying attendees will receive a raffle ticket for the end-of-evening give-away for a three-pack of Ice-Holdz, these are sweet modular holds for indoor ice-climbing and dry-tooling, I would certainly relish having these Holdz on my wall so whomever wins this is going to be one lucky dog!

The show is entitled My Life as an Ice-Climber: From the Bronze Age to the Ice World Cup, I will attempt to discuss in one-hour my personal experience with the evolution of ice-climbing from my early efforts in the 1970s using primitive wood-handled tools on up through my current interests in competition winter climbing and Bear-Back mixed, obviously this is an enormous amount of ground (and ice) to cover so this one promises to be an insightful ride.

Topics to be covered include 1) How climate change is affecting the winter-climbing game; 2) The role of competition climbing in defining the ethical parameters of winter climbing; 3) The myth of "real" climbing (gravity will always whup-yo-ass); 4) The Mixed Euro-scene and why THEY are so good; 5) Indoor Mixed and the future of the winter game.

Attendees are encouraged to stay after the presentation and air their personal views on spurs, leashes, bolts, competitions, rock n' roll accompanied mixed climbing performances and whatever else burns yer butt. Profanity will not be tolerated but otherwise have-at!

You can bring beer so come early and socialize. ALLEZ!!!

Photos: Left; RCC competing in the 2009 Ouray Ice Festival, the shooter is Rob Fullerton. Right; Rob Cotter on Les Droites North Face, Mont Blanc Massif, 1988. The shooter (was) the late Mark Bebie.

Neptune Show: aftermath...

I had exactly 19 people come to my show, that is 19 paying attendees. "They all came to see you!" Susanne assured me, I am really not sure whether to be depressed or elated. I showed 100 slides, there was some hassle with the connector in that I had neglected to bring mine and the one there was incompatible, so off to the Mac store uptown to buy a $19 connector ( I later packaged this one back up and returned this for a refund, I'm sure come one will get excellent use from buying this later.)

The show went well, I was ruthless in selecting slides and staying on message, next time I would like to have more video footage, no small feat given it has been hard to find partners this winter let alone anyone to film. The show is in the box though and may reappear next autumn in some incarnation.

My own impression was that 1) Ice/mixed climbing is at a nadir here in the US, popular interest has diminished greatly in winter climbing, the major climbing publications rarely cover this subject (except to pronounce this type of climbing dead, of course.) 2) There are too many people/athletes/personalities/whatevers touring and giving shows these days, people have slide-show brain-freeze plus the well-reported on climbers (i.e., the ones in the Patagonia catalogs garner the Lion's-share of notoriety. 3) As some one once told me, Americans go to McDonalds because they don't like surprises, they want their Big Mac the exact same way every time, so doing a very different type of show (as opposed to travelogue, slides/music, etc.) isn't going to go over big.

So what's next? I really can't decide if I had a good season or an awful one, I covered very little new ground in terms of routes or areas visited, no truly hard sends, on the other hand I felt like I climbed well, in particular getting a handle on bare-back technique which will come in handy next winter for competitions, if I do any that is. With that said I had some nice days on the hill, did not sustain any injuries, pulled off a few good sends and did not embarrass myself at Ouray, could I have climbed better?

Yes, absolutely, one can always improve of this I am certain...

What I Have Been Up To

First of all thank any and all of you who have been fans, followed my writing, befriended me, given me beer, listened to my ale-soaked ramblings, mercie beaucoup...

What I have been up to is working, trying not to get divorced, climbing, training, skiing and raising my kids, although not necessarily in that order. The work has been sporadic, the climbing dismal, the skiing better, raising my kids a challenge (but rewarding), the divorce business, well, horrific...

Enough grousing, I will be at Neptune Mountaineering in Boulder March 12, Thursday evening, courtesy of Ice-Holdz. By way of acknowledgment Terri and Jay have been very supportive, their Ice-Holdz product is not only innovative but awesome for indoor mixed training, many a dark evening or bleak winter day I have found solace in cranking around the woody nailing succulent slabs of plastic, some good tunes, a glass of ale and off you go, stretching, situps, pushups, love-grass...

Late winter here, there is snow to ski on, ice to climb, I have been active at Vail but rather stalled on a project, doing two short but spicy mixed roofs back-to-back bear-back. I have done one of the problems Quasimodo bear-backseveral weeks back but my attempts to climb it several days ago ended in stalemate at the dagger, it was my tenth lap and was too wasted to get a good stick, shit!

The other route has seen varying degrees of success, I have made the ice twice. Myabe that is completion in itself, to climb as well as you can, as hard as you can, I'm not sure anymore. People try to justify their leisure by placing artificial parameters around what they view as accomplishments, we got to here so that means what we have done on our holiday is relevant, nay, important. To each his or her own I say.

I had started the day well, one bloke was struggling on his ice route, taking quite a while, I was fresh up the hill so I walked over, went up Esmerelda solo even though it is only an M5 or M6 right now, but you would be pretty busted up if you fell off this so there is merit in having the presence of mind to not fall off, to climb well in the process too.

Then Quasimodo refused entrance as a further warm-up route spat me off twice. I switched to the current project but could not make the dynamic throw, when I finally did make the stick I had fought back on after a slip, I made the ice but blew a heel-hook badly instead of dropping another Yaniro the final moments were ugly to say the least. Frustration built, I am a human being, a mere man, I let my self-control go, lost focus.

Each attempt started with the best intentions then fizzled out, a slip here, there, finally I just lost steam, no more gas in the tank so to speak. From 9 to 4 I banged away, valiantly, fruitlessly, I had resolved tp die in battle, so I did. I went through a curtain head-first putting my Stunt helmet to the test, I bashed my shin, threw my one tool at a second lodged in the roof, I cut my scalp on a tree branch on the way down.

Humility, bad...

People pronounce "ice is dead", "mixed is dead", they are the ones dead, from within. They gave up when the leash, or the spur or whatever went out of fashion now The Game offers no further incentive, they want to leave and take the marbles with them if they won't play nobody else will.

Good and bad days, at the crag as in all things, sometimes the "bad" day teaches you the most, a foundation upon which to build further accomplishments, if you are not failing perhaps you are not improving? So I had a "bad" day, got beat-down, if there is value in that then I will maybe cruise the project next try? Always there is another day, walk away with maybe a few cuts and bruises, come again leaner, fresh with the craving, no need to get angry, just get even.

And then some...

Bear-Back

Yes I know it's spelled Bare-back, I was just thinking about what a "bear" it is to climb roof routes without the spur! But what fun, too. I got thinking about bare-back climbing after the 2009 Ouray Ice Festival, I kept thinking afterwards "Shit! I could have won that thing!" if only I had trained-up bareback beforehand, more Monday-morning quarter-backing I suppose.

Yet it got me thinking about bear-back, the first day out I went without the spur but brought them in the pack, just-in-case. Day two I left the spurs behind in the car, by day three I had taken the heel-plates off so only the three bolts remained, I was hooked on a now more potent blend of The Junk, than ever. Suddenly routes I had sent many times with the spur now seemed utterly questionable, clipping became an act of pure gravity-defiance, I am happy to report that I have sent exactly two routes in twice as many outings.

Maybe though that is not the point, conceivably the climb-well movement needs for mixed to come in line. I say this because this winter when I watched friends climb with spurs, spurring tools, bat-hanging hands-free I thought, "that IS aid-climbing", to some extent anyway. Finally seeing it done in a fluid manner by the likes of stephanie Moreau, Jeff Mercier and Evgeny Krivosheitsev last winter made me take notice, this was the way forward.

After all leash-less just happened and their are plenty of hold-outs out there, I see them on every outing blasting away at some hapless flow.

The Cult of Incompetence

As of late I find it hilarious to be accused of engaging in "that there dry-tooling" to the detriment of "real climbing". Not too long ago a consortium of "alpinists" decried dry-tooling as being without risk, akin even to masturbation (one can only ponder furtively the homoerotic implications inherent for the author of this latter assertion). Tempers seem to have cooled somewhat (ah, the silver lining of Viagra and thinning hair), still very now and again some twerp echoes such sentiment, dogma always develops a following, does it not?

Ice climbing has always intrigued me, the idea of ephemeral ice lines that appeared mysteriously around valley bends is a seductive one, the thin, white hand and wrist beckoning with unheard pleasures. I have marched all over the bloody place seeking that streak of white coursing down a dark face, now is no different only that now the smears daggers and curtains that do not touch down are now fair game. Yes, there are usually bolts, anyone who believes bolts remove risk is either hallucinating or has never been mixed climbing.

Indeed, I have witnessed every manner of trauma self-inflicted, fatal and otherwise at the mixed crag, the imagination of participants in either injuring or offing themselves is truly sobering. One could in fact not only break bones but certainly cut fingers right off, put out an eye? No problem you are in the right place! Vail in fact has been the site of any number of spectacular accidents, the strenuous climbing, chossy limestone and half-assed bolting can make for some fairly hairy outings, famous names and nobodies alike have met disaster there. For that reason I treat the place with respect, after all is not gravity always having a grand day out?

Things will fall down, climbers go boom judgement operates under a thick haze of marijuana smoke, belayers doze. My favorite are the breed of "new" ice climbers, the manikan-perfect blokes who blast away with shiny tools dislodging a season's worth of chunks and shards in a matter of minutes so forever lost in a world of self-adjulation to ever yell ICE, what a gaggle of colossal whankers.

But I digress, ah yes real ice climbers, what exactly was it they were climbing anyway? Waterfalls? Oh, there's a worthy objective, climbing waterfalls makes curing the global malaria pandemic seem a trifle. Alpine faces? How about in the Alps? Nepal? Between which marriages did you perform this particular feat, one and two? After two you say? Sometime prior to wife #3, yes? Right-on, you da' man, my daughter's going to college next fall, how's your cat?

So, it's all drivel, Lionel Terray alone was man enough to label his remarkable conquests "useless" (Le Conquerants de l'inuitile, L. Terray 1961.*), everyone clings to their climbs, only they seem to have done anything interesting or relevent.

Then there is what I refer to as the "Cult of Incompetence". Open any climbing catalog or magazine these days and there they'll be, the confessionals regarding all manner of absolutely stupid climbing mishaps. Oh sure, accidents happen, but why purportedly "famous" climbing personalities now write reams on the topic of their boggling ineptitude is wholly beyond the pale. No crawl down the Ogre here, just a bunch of well-to-do over-achieving yuppies falling off trade routes or having epic retreats off stuff that if they had been born with the sense God gave buttered-toast they would have never ventured up onto.

Shackleton had to go to Antarctica, get stuck in the pack ice then sail a dingy half-way around the southern hemisphere to gain notoriety, now ever fool who gets his foot stuck in a gopher hole, chews his own leg off subsequently goes on Oprah to plug his million-dollar foundation devoted to preventing the criminally stupid from getting jammed in rodent rodent burrows. ("Give generously, so much is at stake!") Of course whole bestselling books are devoted to idiots out wandering on glaciers, falling in a crevasse then going to pieces immediately before axing their mate in a panicked attempt to save their own pathetic life, indeed some individuals whole careers seem based on precipitating such catastrophes so as to keep their publisher freshly provisioned with such claptrap.

Maybe I am old-school, that old Mountain Magazine understated way of recounting things, which in fact was equally disingenuous. No, I am certain it is the soccer-mom telling their kid that even though they scored 3 goals on their own team they played great so let's go buy you a new car. That kid now is 20 or 30 something, well-endowed financially owing to dad's having down-sized countless workers who now though nearly destitute can still appreciate the "lifestyle choices " of the rich, that kid is now a "climbing athlete", so when they blow a clip land on their head and chip a nail watch for the 600 word essay in the upcoming Patagonia catalog on how they overcame their adversity to finally go back up and send that darn M5.

Look, adventure should be just that, but if scoring goals on your own team is your forte maybe you should take up pottery. My own approach is pretty simple in that no climb no where no how is worth any trauma worse than a skinned knuckle. So despite the assertions of the Cialis sect, you break your leg up at the crag at 4Pm on a 10 degree F day and you will be very sorry at least until they come back for you or you die.

Keys to success? Use a stick clip/never take a grounder, don't climb with dopes, know when to call it quits, likely you will get another chance. I am never even remotely concerned about expressing my doubts over a route's condition, the hour, my own abilities, or my misgivings over my partner's conduct. Life is sweet, strawberry sweet, like a big-snow-day. When winter ends there is always sun, flowers, lithesome young women in diminishing attire, bouldering, it is all truly good.

So, what to get out of day on the hill? Well, climbing of course. What I send, the grade or reputation of a route concerns me less than my own sense of "how well did I climb?" First I always warm up, my rig's a little old but that don't mean she's slow, just the same I like to start on something well within my ability warm the block. This may involve several such routes or a few laps on the same route once the draws and screws are in. I eschew top-roping, leading and making clips is what's important. I once heard that a fighter must first throw 5000-10,000 jabs before he or she can reliably throw a jab in an actual fight so making clips, lots of clips, matters.

I may therefore date a particular route but assiduously avoid marriage, no one route is worth all your time. I've watched guys spend whole seasons lapping the same route, why? Mainly because people prefer to stay in their comfort zone, human nature I suppose. I have my favorites, but I try and push somewhat, if I am not scaring the shit out of myself or getting utterly pumped the day is perhaps not all it could have been.

So then there is either the "send" or the project option. Send being "this thing is going down", project meaning "this thing is going down but maybe not today". Projects can of course take days, weeks or years, conditions matter whenever ice is involved, some routes need the right ice build-up to become truly feasible. Which now brings up the issue of what constitutes being "in".

One route near my home, BladeRunner in Rocky Mountain Park comes to mind, put up in the mid-90s during a heavy ice year the route seemed never to re-form, I would gaze wistfully up at a lonely retreat 'biner squeaking in the wind on bolt #2 and wonder, when? Then one year I regarded the menacing streaked rock and fragile icicles lustfully, why not now? Over the last three seasons I have climbed this route a number of times with varying degrees of ice, this past autumn a sudden warm spell in November meant virtually no ice including the absence of a key dagger, a new route was born. Off-World, unfinished sequel Harrison Ford maybe should have made, total-dry except for a few giddy sticks at the top and some of those were turf.

So here's the planet getting warmer the Rocky Mountains where I live steadily drying up becoming desertified, don't even bring up the western Alps as I'm likely to cry, what solution is there but to dry-tool the classics?

How to Dry-Tool

HOW TO DRY-TOOL
I will not deal with the semantics of "real" as opposed to mixed climbing here, just listen up...

Officially it is now winter, I checked. This means mixed season, so if you have a mixed crag near your home or are tripping, you are lucky indeed, here is what you will need and how to do it.

KIT

1) Fruit Boots.

2) Leash-less tools

3)Helmet

4)Harness

5) Rope

6) Belay device

7) Quick-draws

8) Ice Screws

9) Belay Jacket

10) Clothing

11) Food and drink

12) Tool kit

13) Squid and paint-pole

Look, put your $ into your fruit boots and tools, I see so many blokes out wearing $1K worth of clothes while they could have spent that dough on what is actually going to get them up the climb. No need to stroll around looking like you just toppled out of a The North Face catalog (FUCK THEM, anyway, fascists!), no one is going to see you anyway. I go out in a $40 army-surplus sweater and a pair of camo' snowboarding trousers, just get on with it!

I climb in Kayland mixed boots, the Ice Dragon is King, even the old Ice Comps are still good. For tools I am a hard-core Fusion Fan, whatever dry-tools hardest, that's my concern. There is a Fusion 2 coming out, I am very anxious to take this tool for a spin. Otherwise I have a Cassin Cream-Ale harness which none of you has heard of, a Cassin Stunt helmet, a hodgepodge of quick-draws, I dry-tool in batting gloves.

Both my ropes are Sterling, a Nano and an Evolution, Sterling has been very supportive this winter, I'd be lying if I said these were not the best ropes I have ever used. I never use anything other than a 70 meter length and an 80 meter would be preferable, otherwise the risk of being lowered off the end of your rope is too great.

Without a doubt the Trango Squid is the most amazing bit of climbing equipment, NEVER climb up after a first clip, YOU WILL BREAL YOUR ANKLE!!! Always start with the rope clipped into the first draw, at least. A Grigri is the safest thing to use for winter although a guy or gal good with a plate is hard to beat (Ladies, or is it a hard-man is good to beat?)

I typically carry a spare set of picks, a wrench for my Fusion tools (a 14mm beauty I got in a tiny hardware store in Chamonix), Allen keys, wrenches for my bolt-on crampons, or just tighten all that shit at home and leave the heavy tools behind. My Belay jacket is a freebie from Climashield, two of the sketchiest people I have ever met, but the belay coats they provided were really nice indeed, I have a huge, ancient Wild Things Hollifil coat that is the best ever, when it is really cold this thing is the bee's knees. At the 2006 Festiglace event I wore this thing the whole weekend, without it I would have died, some of the competitors became frostbitten and I injured my feet due to frost.

I eat and drink as much as I can carry, hot tea, water in an insulated bottle, sandwiches, chocolate bars, anything that sustains, fuel for the furnace. Single Malt Scotch or Love-grass, whatever you prefer, motivation on short notice. I would never dry-tool without eye-wear, a mouth guard is probably indicated. I always have a first-aid kit, headlamp, lighter (for starting warming camp-fires), a cell-phone/MP3 player, white-tape, lip-balm for your face and lubricating recalcitrant fruit-boot zippers, sun screen.

The one thing I don't skimp on is dry socks and gloves, I prefer plenty of spares so my extremities stay warm, if there is any snow on the route wet gloves will ensue, without a fire you cannot warm/dry them although tucking them into your clothes will work sometimes. For socks I look for high-quality wool ski socks at end of winter sales, I dry-tool in leather-palmed batting gloves which I treat with Nikwax. Expensive gloves like the OR Alibi suck, don't waste your money, get some gold gloves and a decent bottle of single malt, enjoy life don't spend money on crap that is just going to let you down.

ALLEZ!!!
Go to the crag. Get there early unless the temperatures are extreme, otherwise I prefer always an early start, dry-tooling is time-consuming so allow plenty of time. Make sure everybody is on time, there's nothing worse than going to pick someone up and having to watch some hung-over asshole pack. Have a plan in mind for the crag that day, if you don't have a precise idea of conditions be fluid, better to climb all day on easier stuff than to stomp around looking at routes you either can't do or are not really formed. Don't posture, show-off or melt, just climb.

With a two-man team leader gets rigged, climbing togs, harness, helmet, fruit boots, draws, screw, put on dry shirt(s) when you arrive after approach layer on big coat and tuck tools inside coat to keep warm (otherwise they will suck heat from your hands). Put both boots on THEN lace them so your feet have a chance to warm the boots before you crank them down. Sit on a foam pad when doing this, I wrap my Fruit Boots up in this like burrito for carrying.

Meanwhile second man is feathering-out rope well out of the way of dirt, running water, or possible stone-fall. either put first clip up with stick or inserts rope into #1 draw with Squid depending on if route is equipped or if at Vail some bitch came and stole your draws as they are too much a coward to confront you. Second suits up with warm clothes, helmet on, way out of the fall-line, phone off.

Leader has coat on until last possible moment then, ties in, checks knot, checks belayer's plate/Grigri, rechecks knot, belayer takes up, "On-belay?", Belay on?" "Climbing!", "Climb!" None of this, Mo-Fo fashizzle-holmes-doo-daa sskritcha-skritcha coming from some lily-white guy from Indiana who couldn't possibly be more white trying to act like rappers even though they are afraid of black people anyway, just stick with the tried and true so people around you have a fucking clue as to what you mean.

Climb. I like to warn the belayer I am "Clipping" because after 30 seconds of belaying many people will have lapsed into a reverie regarding their finances/dick/ fucked-up parents/vagina/spouse/girlfriend/job/girlfriend's vagina/transcripts/boyfriend's dick/parent's finances and so on and it's good not to get shorted as like a wet dog-nose in your ass during coitus it tends to break my rhythm.

Try to focus on climbing "well", fluid movement always have in mind you are going from point A to B. With that said skip the histrionics, no one nearby is going to give a hoot in Hell you just fell off Lucky for the umpteenth time so don't shriek profanity hurl your tools off the climb and in general act like an enormous toddler. Personally I don't like surprises so when I feel my forearms are reaching critical mass I typically jump, my pride and compliment of tools intact.

Okay belayer, your job is to facilitate the send and catch the leader if/when they fall. PAY ATTENTION!!! Don't even have your phone on your person much less on, a person's life is now your responsibility, watch for the climber to move and for Christ's sake push up plenty of line when they are trying to clip. Leave a belly in the rope, the climber needs to have a somewhat slack line to move effectively, a taut line may cause a nasty swing into the wall rather than permitting the leader to drop and "bonk" activating the impact-absorbing properties of the rope hence making for a softer landing. Slack permits the leader to dyno or swing onto daggers without cramping their style, some slack is good but don't get carried away, belaying is all about making subtle adjustments in the amount of rope one pays out or takes in, so work at it.

No hanging on the rope, if you fail don't flail, lower off with dignity pull the rope for the next guy prepare for your turn belaying. Keep things moving along so everybody stays warm and motivated, 3-5 burns on a route is probably plenty unless some one is really making progress, but make sure all parties concerned are enjoying themselves, don't monopolize the day. Move along to another route to freshen things up, avoid bogging-down on too hard a line, losing momentum.

Eating and drinking is critical, here in Colorado the air is dry even though there is snow and ice so dehydration is never far off. Similarly dry-tooling is strenuous so calories must be consumed to stay warm and ready to climb. You will need to make yourself eat as the adrenalin will suppress appetite, do it.

Wear your helmet, yes there is always the odd retard-out who climbs bare-headed a la Alex Lowe, when they get scalped/concussed/head-stove-in don't wander over and ask me to help clean up, they had it coming, dope. Stay away from and out from under other parties, tools, rocks, chunks of ice, bodies can fly off at any moment so don't get beaned, give people their space. Similarly don't wander up to anyone who is belaying and start asking a bunch of dumb-ass questions, this person is busy. Leave your dog at home, no one likes your dog but you, nor do they like treading in its shit, having it eat their lunch, or having to step around it in crampons.

LES DROITES NORTH FACE

We went  up at the end of August 1988 to do Les Droites North Face. The is no "the" in front of Les Droites, if you desire a "the"up ahead of Les Droites you're not much of an ice climber, everybody knows what that thing is.

That summer I had met up with Mark Bebie rather informally in Chamonix , we had climbed in the Pacific Northwest before. Les Droites would be the second of the two climbs we did in the Mont Blanc Massif together earlier having done Les Grandes Jorasses by Eperon Croz, something of a disappointment owing to then perceivable climate change and a lack of ice. 

Les Droites would be different though as a storm had come through, no one had been up the thing since early summer so sight-unseen we set off up Les Grandes Montets, Dru Coulior looking as always imposing from the telepherique. Mark was too parsimonious to stay at the Argentiere Refuge so we bivouaced, Les Droites North Face looming squat, improbably steep, improbably streaked in what looked like white latex house-paint.

At midnight we set off, I effectively bumped into the gargantuan wall in the black night, a thin vein of ice down which spindrift poured no and again being the only feasible way.

"I better lead for a while", so up I went.

Weeks earlier I had happened upon the Charlet-Moser Pulsar ice tools at Snell's Sports, a tool clearly poised to change the face of ice-climbing in the coming years, I promptly shelled out my 1300 Francs and purchased a set. Following several hours of other-worldly climbing in the ice runnel the face opened up, dawn broke revealing a vast ice field with the sobering headwall spinningly overhead morning-lit in seductive red tones. 

How does that old saw go? "Red sky in morning climbers take warning?" The storm broke as we stuck the first belay in the steep granite crag, there was no obvious route, you could climb anywhere you wanted, if you pulled hard enough. Gradually the storm intensified, I resumed all lead duties briefly spotted the Integrale exit waterfall through a hole in the clouds and made for it. The Goulotte a la Breche had it all, steep ice, a grade V Scottish gulley bit (I half-expected to see frozen bits of missing Brits sticking out of the ice here) finally a swinging traverse over frosted fins of granite with 3000 feet of air, spectacular.

I awoke from our bivouac the Breche astounded I hadn't frozen to death.

The trouble started on the descent down the glacier back to Chamonix, Mark borrowed 35 Francs for the train after having earlier asserted he would rather walk down and save the money, "Cool", I said noting his feet would be shredded for weeks. He would not repay me though, I ran into him on the street in Chamonix some time later a scene ensued as he desisted coughing up my 35 Francs, but I had him cornered so he paid.

At the end of the summer while I was already back at work in Seattle Mark returned bought a keg of beer inviting most of the town's climbers to view his slides, during the course of the show he denounced me roundly, the first in a succession of post-climb traitors.

I was in my large-animal rotation at Washington State University during my senior year in Veterinary College, busy preparing a talk on solar abscess in the horse when Jim Ruch phoned from Seattle, Mark was missing presumed dead on Mount Snowdome in the Canadian Rockies, 10 March 1993 a year to the day after I had solo-climbed this route. 

I was later to speculate that having learned of my ascent Mark was eager to do this one, after all I had climbed this alone, how hard could it be? I was to do more solo-climbing in the future but with my daughter Simone then two, my fervor had cooled a tad, the risks inherent were becoming more palpable. After all, if Marc Twight got whacked, who would care? Me, I was a daddy, a girl needs her daddy, she still does.

Several years back I was struck on the head by a piece of falling ice, I was exiting the canyon after the speed-climbing competition at Ouray in 2006, a sizable piece came down beaned me on the yellow Grivel helmet I was wearing. "Bad karma", pronounced Betta Gobbi, she was cheesed that I hadn't used her new Monster tools in the difficulty final, the damn things pumped me out too fast.

Just some fucking bone-head who couldn't be bothered to yell "ICE!", that's all.