Rope Testing

Here’s a report from Black Diamond on what happens to ropes with frayed ends.

• Ropes, like all climbing gear, don’t last forever—the ends of your rope take a beating—be wary of super frayed, worn, puffed out, beat up tattered cords. Yes, ropes aren’t cheap, but they’re also your lifeline—literally—so take care of them.
• When the ends of your cord get all beat and tattered from dogging up routes, cut the ends off, or a buy a new rope.
  • I always cut equal lengths off BOTH ends so the middle mark is always in the middle.
  • Be sure to mark the new length on BOTH ends so you and your partners know what you’re dealing with.
  • And while you’re at it—tie a knot in one end—too often you hear of someone being lowered off the end of their rope—definitely not cool.

Man On Wire

Just watched the movie “Man On Wire” which is the story of the man who walked on a wire between the two World Trade Center Towers in 1974. It’s the ultimate slack line movie; combining scenes of how they sneaked into the Towers to set up their gear (including hiding under a tarp for about 6 hours to avoid guards) with video of him practicing his wire walking.

Climbing Castle Rock In Antartica

Here’s a photo essay of a climb up Castle Rock with a great view of Mt Erebus – the volcanic plume is visible in photo below.

Yoga Master Does Figure 4

Lisa figure 4ed a way to do one of the slab routes. I tried to imitate her without getting injured. Hilarity ensued.

Homer’s Monday 1/4/2010

As you can imagine, there is no more running water at Homer’s. The middle icicle has filled in. The slab to the right has more ice at the bottom and less at the top. The slab – shown below - would still be a fun mixed climb.

 

Men Of Route Setters Calendar

I know it’s too late for Christmas, but I just found this calendar for sale. There is a video of the route setters being photographed for this calendar at the link above, but it is pretty spicy.

Cliff Dwelling In Mali

 If you watched the video below – of a French woman free soloing the Bandiagara cliffs in Mali – you might be interested to learn more about the way the Dogon villagers live. In the video, it shows abandoned “pygmy” houses and skeletons. Apparently that’s because they moved to Burkina Faso according to this article. More here.

Here’s a Dogon dama dance. (Man, if I had those stilts, I’d be able to reach a lot higher on those cliff routes.)

Dry Tooling Minnesota Style

This is supposed to be in Minnesota. Anyone know where this is?

VE Saturday

Lisa and I climbed with Raoul today and he told some great stories of his days climbing in the British Isles. Mike and Ward were there doing some super secret, super hard climbs. Liz was there getting an aerobic workout on the treadmill. She is about two weeks away from climbing again. That’s good progress.

Lisa did her famous “Figure 4” technique on one of the slab routes. It looked a lot like the video below only she didn’t fall. Ask her to show you how she does this the next time you see her.

Amazing! Watch this.

It is not just climbing but a whole cultural experience. But don't try this no rope stuff, I am against it.

There are pygmy skulls and pygmy cliff houses and jazz trumpets and stilt dancing.

Best Job In The World Is Inherently Dangerous

Just like climbing, apparently the “best job in the world” is inherently dangerous. The guy who won the contest to be a caretaker on an island paradise off the coast of Australia, was stung by a jellyfish and almost died. Here’s his blog.

First Ascent & First Concert

First ascent of the 4000 foot East Face of the Central Tower of Paine in the Patagonia region of Chile. And this is the first concert from there. (About 2.5 minutes.)

Skin Products For Climbers

This young woman climber has a new company making

“…natural skin-care and muscle-relief products aimed at rock climbers who suffer bloody hands and calluses..”

Here’s an article about her and her products. (It says she is sponsored by Evolv climbing shoes but I can’t find her name on their web site.)

I personally would struggle to use a product called “Brazenly Bold Body Cream” but it’s probably good stuff.

Weird

One of my goals for 2009 was to do 3 pull ups and I never could. Well, I just did it. If you want to know the details, you will have to call me and ask.

Setting Goals For 2010

OK, I am not a big believer in setting resolutions for the year. Because I always end up with something kinda lame brain like:

Get smarter

Be a good person

Do a kind deed for others

Pick up my clothes

Sort out the bottles from the cans

Figure out if 2010 should be pronounced “two thousand ten” or “twenty ten.” (I like the shorter version. So I’ll use that one. Look at me, I already finished one resolution for 2010!)

Don’t ramble on and on

But it certainly seems to help to set goals for climbing. I thought this post had a good process for setting climbing goals. A summary below but lots of details here.

“Write down 2-3 climbs you’d like to do THIS SEASON. These are going to be called performance goals. …You can also set training goals and process goals…. Set Short-Term Goals. Your whole season should not be built around doing just one project route. You should plan on ticking off 2-3 short-term goals per month…. Create Goals for Each Workout or Day of Climbing.”