Watch Your Cornhole!

The War On Gravity continues! All right, so I haven't put up anything in several weeks, but thats because the climbing season has been kickin' right along. Its hard to believe its almost March already. Well, long story short, the weather's been good and the climbing has been sick - it's been an unbelievable February. I'll let the photos do most of the talking:

I finally got the chance to lead the classic Green Gully in Pine Creek. Long and sustained WI 4 equals mean forearm and calf burn towards the top.

Eric Skinner on a seriously fat Blue Gully right next door to Green.

Gas station Aviators represent at the Unnamed Wall. Yeah Baby.

Blaine Heavner swingin' in the sunshine on The Fat One, WI 3 in Hyalite.

President's Day weekend saw myself and buddies Ben, Pete, and Jeff skiing yet again into Black Canyon Lake deep in the Beartooths. And while this time around I came armed with skis and food that wasn't all Snickers bars, I couldn't help but wonder what the hell I was thinking. We were chasing some ice lines on the north side of Mt. Rearguard that we had spied on our last trip in, and as I lifted my way-too-heavy pack, I knew that we were probably in for another rough weekend.

First Ascent? Who knows, who cares... But we're calling it Watch Your Cornhole anyways.

After skiing up the long, easy trail in beautiful conditions - great snow, packed out trail, bluebird skies - I thought we might be in for a surprise with the weather for the weekend. Wrong. Skiing up and over the steep glacial moraine into the Black Canyon is like entering a different world. Apparently, that world is constantly miserable in the winter. Looking down-canyon for the rest of the weekend you could see clear skies and sunshine, just out of reach. For the next two nights we would be pounded relentlessly by 0 degree temps, snow, and steady wind gusts of 40+ mph.

The beard says it all... Ben Smith freezing his nuts off with massive Beartooth Mountain in the background.

No one really wanted to get out of the tent on Saturday morning, but after some determined effort Smith and I began the long slog up a typically brutal Beartooth gully/scree field toward the base of the route. Jeff and Pete took off to check out the first line, which coincidentally had been soloed the week before by Stan Price in an 11 hour car-to-car push (he's got legs, and he knows how to use them). Damned impressive.

Roping up at the base, we realized we were in for some heavy duty punishment. Every time we had to use our hands for just about anything, they were pretty much already numb. At the top of the first pitch I enjoyed one of the worst bouts of the screaming barfies I've ever had. When Smith arrived at the belay, he sat there for about 10 minutes tucked into the fetal position while his hands went through the excruciating re-warming process. We both admitted that if we could have, we probably would have actually cried.

Not much besides rock, ice, and very cold hands and feet. Smith working up a sweet case of the screaming barfies on the second pitch of Watch Your Cornhole.

We finally topped out the ice line in a boulder field not too far from the summit of Mt. Rearguard. With the wind still whipping, we began the descent, which like the climb itself ended up taking forever. Struggling with finding good v-threads, tangled ropes, and my dumb ass dropping my belay device into the void earlier in the climb meant that we hit the base of the route just as night was falling.

The morning of the hike out, we opened the tent door to find boots, food, and cookstoves covered under about 6 inches of fresh snow that had blown into the vestibule. Pete Dronkers doing some rescue digging.

With headlamps out and the snow and wind blowing hard, we descended the 1000+ feet to the tent. Unfortunately, Ben was dealing with some cold toes that he was never able to fully rewarm, leading to some minor frostbite (who needs those big toenails, anyways?). Sitting in the tent listening to some tunes courtesy of Pete's speakers that he had hiked in, we decided that if the route didn't have a name, we should probably call it something along the lines of Watch Your Cornhole - mostly because four of us dudes had somehow decided that shivering closely in a tent on the backside of a mountain called Rearguard was a good way to spend Valentines Day. Just another example of when keepin' it real goes wrong...

Smith more than happy to be heading for the truck after a gnarly Beartooth sufferfest.

The next morning we high-tailed it out of there, dreaming of warm trucks and non-dehydrated food. And sure enough, as soon as we had descended into the main canyon, the wind died down and the sun came out. Don't get me wrong, both of the ice lines up on Rearguard are really cool climbs, especially if you could somehow score some good weather (probably in the Spring). They're both quality multi-pitch ice lines in the WI 3 range in some of the most stunning alpine settings the Beartooths have to offer. All I ask is that someone slaps me if I talk about going back there anytime soon...

Eric sweating it out on the steep stuff - The Good Lookin' One, WI 5, Unnamed Wall in Hyalite.

Dan's second lead on ice - Jeff's Right, WI 3, Unnamed Wall.

Toproping some free hanging daggers on Jeff's Left.

Ice Climbing Update 1/30/09

This is how you access the crapper at the Hyalite Trailhead parking lot.

How do a couple of Forest Service outhouses come to resemble shelled-out buildings in Kosovo, you ask? Close range shotguns, that's how! Montana kids don't mess around when it comes to vandalism. The funny thing is, this one is the better of the two. I walked into the other one several weeks ago only to find the windows and vents blasted out, the walls charred black from smoke, and burned chunks of wood, ashes, and used quarts of motor oil littering the floor.

And while someone was nice enough to add fresh branches as a make-shift vent cover, the back window has been gunned down in cold blood, so your cheeks will still be subject to a frosty morning wake up. However, the tantalizing reward of freshly stocked t.p. awaits those willing to crawl for it. Laugh now, but this bit of info may save your shorts if your morning coffee/gas station breakfast won't wait, and you're not the type of person to leave a Cleveland Steamer on the hood of your buddy's car (not that I would ever consider or suggest doing that...).

Anyways, here are some more photos of recent climbing and backcountry adventures:

Like a monkey ready to be shot into space - Blaine on his first ice lead at the left side of Genesis I.

Not a cloud in the sky. Just another bluebird day up Hyalite Canyon.

In a slight change of pace from the usual day trips up Hyalite, last weekend saw myself and new friend Pete Dronkers on a fairly brutal 10 mile slog into the rugged backcountry of the Beartooth Mountains. Our goal was a winter summit of the impressive 12,346 ft. Beartooth Mountain. Sounds good, right?

Well, never really being into doing things the easy way, I decided to spice up the adventure by leaving all of my food for the weekend at home in Belgrade, 4 hours away. Realizing my error just after midnight on Friday, I drove the ten miles from the trailhead back into the nearest civilization - Red Lodge, MT. Cruising through town, I noticed a suspicious lack of open food markets and gas stations. The nice lady working at the casino I stopped into kindly informed me that it was more or less physically impossible to purchase food at that hour - anywhere.

Pete trudging through a tough boulder field before Black Canyon Lake.

While she was giving me the bad news, I spotted a vending machine over her shoulder that was beginning to look like my only option for sustenance that weekend. I started feeding the machine dollar bills, and it returned the favor by tossing me copious amounts of Snickers bars. Apparently impressed by my tenacity to aquire food (or more likely floored by my stupidity), she took pity on me, unlocked the machine, and gave me several packages of Reeses and Twizzlers.

Leaving the casino with my precious booty (6 Snickers, 3 Reeses, and 2 Twizzlers), I went on a semi-desperate hunt for bar food in Red Lodge's finest establishments. I struck out several times, but I finally lucked out when I got the drunk bartender at the Blue Ribbon to cook me a frozen pizza. After watching her slam several shots and 2 beers while the pie was cooking, I paid her for the 'za and a flask of Canadian Mist, and was off into the wilderness.

Home sweet home - camped out beneath the massive Beartooth Mountain. The peak is just barely disguised by clouds, and the impressive spire on the right is the aptly named Bear's Tooth.

Pete had been kind enough to lend me his snowshoes, and I followed his ski tracks up the Lake Fork of Rock Creek in the 'Tooths. After having my ass handed to me by ten miles and a couple thousand feet of elevation gain, we made camp on the glacial moraine below the peak. That evening I ate a dinner that would have made the average hippie in line at the Good Food Store in Missoula vomit, and we drank some whiskey as our clear skies finally vanished while daylight faded and snowfall moved in.

With temps at or below 0 degrees F, we woke up the next day to about a foot of fresh snow. Pete and I both agreed to leave the final push up the peak for another day with friendlier avalanche conditions, and packed up and headed out. We were definitely a little bummed not to have bagged the peak, but also stoked to have made it that far back into an unbelievable area. With so many massive rock walls, big peaks, and a few big ice-climbing objectives, this area is chock full of unreal climbing opportunities. I'll be headed back as soon as I get the chance, hopefully with a little more food next time.

Frozen Black Canyon Lake and a few of its surrounding behemoths. I'm pretty sure this place would even make Andre the Giant feel small and insignificant.


Pete beneath a 1000+ ft. high sheer granite wall.


Another one of many big spires and rock faces in the Beartooths.

Ice Climbing Update 1/12/09

Ben Smith launching onto The Scepter.

Okay, so now that I've finally sold out completely to the domineering forces of technology and personally joined the March of the Internet, I'm actually going to try to update this blog thing semi-regularly. I figure if I can hit a post a week, I should win a prize or a cookie or something, cause that's pretty good for me. So here we go:

This week in Sports! It was a productive climbing week, as I was able to hit several new routes (for me) that I'd been wanting to do for a while now. After finally getting over the holiday slump, I was able to get my friend Blaine out for a couple days mid-week. We started out with a nice warm up day of top-roping at Genesis I.

Fat Pillars At Genesis I.

The day after that, Blaine and I decided to go back and finish up Twin Falls, which was a little too crowded the last time we were there. After what ended up being an awful Bataan-death-march-style slog through waist deep (and sometimes deeper) snow, we finally hit the climb and I got the chance to lead the right side (50+m, WI 3) of Twin.

Blaine, doing his best Vanna White, showcases the view from the top of Twin Falls.

Saturday saw myself and buddies Ben Smith and Eric Skinner waking up at the god-forsaken time of 5:30 a.m. in a somewhat futile effort to beat the Hyalite weekend crowd. Arriving at the parking lot just before dawn was breaking, we were floored to see at least seven cars and 15+ people gearing up at the trail head. It seems that in regard to the Hyalite road, if you plow it, they will come.

We quickly grabbed our packs and started hoofing it, but even though we raced ahead of the pack, we still didn't manage to beat a group of three who were halfway up Mummy Cooler II when we got there. This left us with no choice, and we geared up to tackle The Scepter (30+m, WI 5), the steep, sustained, and intimidating pillar to the left of Mummy.

Ben, after ten long years of lookin' at it and wondering, sends The Scepter.

The crowds kept coming, so we bumped back over to Mummy Cooler II (45m, WI 3+). This was actually a pretty fun climb, and definitely more challenging for me after wearing out my arms on Scepter. After being made fun of for my apparently-too-slow-for-her lead and being called "old school" for using leashes by a young upstart punk of a girl from Missoula (yes, I'm slightly bitter), it was time to start heading home.

On the walk out we decided to hit a little top-roping at the Amphitheater Corner Climbs. Eric hit up a short lead, and Ben and I finished off what was left of our forearms climbing on some mixed and overhanging pillars.

All muscles are on fire at the Amphitheater.

Sunday morning came and we were driving up the canyon yet again, this time headed for a mixed line we'd been hearing about called The Thrill is Gone (35m, M4, WI4). After a short approach, Smith racked up ice screws and rock gear to head up a route that looked thin and difficult enough from the ground, and ended up being a total ass-kicker. This was an awesome route that lived up to its reputation - tough but pretty well protected, really fun rock chimney and thin ice.

This is a lot harder than it looks - Smith puttin' up an impressive lead on The Thrill is Gone.

After this we headed over to Elevator Shaft (75m, WI 3). This was a fun route, but severely beat out ice meant it was probably not nearly as good as it probably is earlier in the season. It's a good moderate route, though, and nicely capped off a great weekend of climbing.

Really fat but kind of beaten out ice at this point in the season - Elevator Shaft is still a fun climb.

Eric getting hit with a little wind and snow on Elevator Shaft.

My Case for the Highlander Pot

The immortal MacLeod scouting sketchy Class V whitewater.

Due to one of my recent sit-down chats over coffee with the Grim Reaper (read: close call), I’ve been thinking about that most negative of subjects: my own mortality. Now, there are infinite volumes of human thought concerning this subject, of which we all put our own personal twists on how each of us feels about our inevitable demise, so I won’t dwell too much on that.

The thing that is hitting home to me after this particular scrape is that no matter what, sooner or later, we’re all going down. Either today, tomorrow, or a ways down the road, one at a time or in groups, outside or in a hospital bed, old or young, healthy or sick, heaven-bound, hell-bound, or simply heading six feet under, quiet and peaceful or kicking and screaming, ready or not, we all gotta go. This will really happen. To you, to me. And there’s no way around it that I’ve found yet.

Mostly, this bums me out. I’ve felt for years now that if I had the chance to live here on this shit-show of a rock we call earth, forever, that I wouldn’t hesitate. For all its horrible imperfections, I love this place. I hate the idea of missing a single moment, let alone the rest of them. So what’s a mortal soul to do, besides just bend over and take it? How do you get the most out of the life you have, and what are ways of prolonging and maximizing our most precious resource - time? Put in a more audacious question: How do you fight death?

These are big questions without any real answers. However, I recently had an idea while sitting around nursing fresh wounds with a mixture of ibuprofen, cheap beer, and a three hour marathon of the old Highlander TV show. This might sound weird and a little morbid at first, hence the excessive buildup. But anyways, here goes:

Since we all have to die, why not have a little fun with it? Here’s my proposal: Let’s bet on it. A group of us (and let’s face it, it will probably be a small group, if any at all, that I can convince to throw down on this) will pony up cash, and the last man standing takes the pot. There can be only one! The buy-in could be anything, but something close to a hundred bucks seems about right. Sound ridiculous? That’s because it is, and that’s why this is a great idea.

There’s more. In keeping with the spirit of the Highlander, every time one of us goes, we’ll have a Quickening. This is where we transfer the person’s infinite power (and cash) to the survivors, and, you guessed it, is an excuse to get belligerent. First and foremost, this will involve a bar. I’m thinking that half of the person’s cash will go to the pot, and the other half will go towards a bottle (or bottles) of booze of their choosing, which the survivors will drink at the bar and proceed to get drunk. At some point the survivors, while drinking at the bar, should probably shout “There can be only one!” very loudly.

Also, in addition to the cash buy-in, each person will choose a personal effect, which could be anything from a piece of gear like a kayak paddle, to a favorite shirt, to a picture of someone you couldn’t stand, to whatever, which will be burned at the Quickening, preferably in the alley behind Charlie B’s. Whatever the object happens to be, it should probably represent the part of you that, in both life and death, could utterly never be dominated.

One more thing. Each person gets to choose a song list that the group has to play at the bar. These could either be songs you like, or songs that you simply want to make the group have to listen to as a form of vengeance from the grave. Either way, I’m sure that we’ll end up listening to plenty of Journey.

This sequence continues until, obviously, there can be only one. The best part about this is that you have to finish the person’s booze that their half of the buy-in got you. So every time there is a Quickening, you get more drunk than the last time. This has the potential to be epic if survivors start hitting their 70’s and upward. The final survivor, after loudly and very awkwardly shouting “There can be only one!”, assumes the title of Highlander and gets all the cash, all the bragging rights, and one hell of a hangover.

So there it is. This is just a rough draft; anyone who’s man enough to be in should come up with variations of these rules and we’ll decide on a final version. Yeah, it’s a little dark, but like all serious things in life, if we can bring death down to our level, it becomes that much easier to deal with. By turning death into a gambling and drinking game, I somehow feel a hell of a lot better about it. Also, if you think about it, it’s a great way for the survivors to remember, and for the rest of us to live forever, or at least until the last guy croaks. More than anything, it’s a really good and funny drinking game, which I like quite a bit.

Morbid? Hell yes. Sacrilegious? Most definitely. But if you decide to grow a pair and feel like betting on your life, then its time to man up and throw down on the Highlander Pot. After all, regardless of whether you decide to ante in or not, eventually... There Will Be Only One! Let me know what you think…