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Ksolem
Trad climber
Monrovia, California
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Topic Author's Original Post - Nov 11, 2010 - 09:26pm PT
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Lately I’ve been on a quest for information about the early days of climbing at The Needles, the California ones that is. I’m looking for anything I can find which predates the well documented ascents of Sidewalk Magic by Dan McHale and Joe Brown in 1969, the South Face of The Hermit by McHale and Becky the same year and the South Face of The Warlock by McHale, Becky and Heath in 1970.
So the other day I was hanging out at The Ponderosa Lodge chatting with retired Tulare Sherriff Dale Doty. Sherriff Doty told me that he had climbed some in “The Needlerock” around 1965, and that a fellow named Chris St. Croix was climbing there then and giving climbing classes. Sherriff Doty went on to say “there were no more than 15 routes out there then.” That sounds like a lot to me.
(I have also been told that spec ops forces came up from China Lake to train there before then...)
He also said that Mr. St. Croix had a sporting goods and gear shop in Visalia at the time. So my question for the forum is does anyone know or know of Mr. St. Croix? If you have some info you don’t want to put on the public forum, please be so kind as to email me via my profile here.
Thanks one and all,
Kris Solem
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Ksolem
Trad climber
Monrovia, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 12, 2010 - 12:48am PT
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Bump with eye candy....
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ec
climber
ca
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Nov 12, 2010 - 12:56am PT
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'met Chis once. I think he is the same guy who reportedly got bedsores belaying Porter on Tangerine Trip. I think David Hickey (D H) may know how to contact him. David posts here on occasion.
 ec
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Radish
Trad climber
SeKi, California
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Nov 12, 2010 - 01:49am PT
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Chris used to own an outdoor store in Visalia called "The Rucksack" some years back....80's. His brother joined him in the store later. JP was on the first ascent of Tangerine Trip with Charlie Porter. I bought some of Chris's climbing gear way back and it was vintage then. He told of climbing out at the Castle Rocks, doing the first ascent of the North Face of the Fin and tales from the Needles. Don't know what happened to him since the early ninties. His brother JP moved to Virginia Beach in the late nineties.
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Radish
Trad climber
SeKi, California
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Nov 12, 2010 - 02:06am PT
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Bump
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Ksolem
Trad climber
Monrovia, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 12, 2010 - 01:17pm PT
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Thanks everyone!
I've followed up on all your leads plus some I got via email...
I'm going to sleuth this one out for sure.
Here's a view I had to work for:
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ec
climber
ca
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Nov 12, 2010 - 03:06pm PT
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Nice! The first time I climbed the Magician we did it from the true bottom of the thing. I recall the view.
ec
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Fat Dad
Trad climber
Los Angeles, CA
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Nov 12, 2010 - 05:34pm PT
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Sigh...summer is very far away.
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Ksolem
Trad climber
Monrovia, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 12, 2010 - 06:28pm PT
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Sigh...summer is very far away.
NWS for Ponderosa, CA.
11-13 / 11-18-2010
Perfect weather for those Dome Rock testpiece face climbs. It doesn' get any better than this. Just sayin'...
Saturday: Sunny, with a high near 51. Northeast wind 5 to 8 mph becoming west southwest.
Saturday Night: Clear, with a low around 28. Northeast wind between 5 and 8 mph.
Sunday: Sunny, with a high near 53. Northeast wind 7 to 9 mph becoming west southwest.
Sunday Night: Mostly clear, with a low around 31. Calm wind becoming east northeast between 6 and 9 mph.
Monday: Sunny, with a high near 57.
Monday Night: Clear, with a low around 32.
Tuesday: Sunny, with a high near 54.
Tuesday Night: Clear, with a low around 32.
Wednesday: Sunny, with a high near 54.
Wednesday Night: Mostly clear, with a low around 31.
Thursday: Sunny, with a high near 51.
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Ksolem
Trad climber
Monrovia, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 12, 2010 - 11:04pm PT
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bump with a new photo.
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ec
climber
ca
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Nov 14, 2010 - 11:34am PT
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Yeah!
That just made a great desktop pic @ work...
Now I recall meeting Chris and JP at different times, decades apart.
ec
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Nov 14, 2010 - 11:53am PT
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Ks,
RR and I went up there about January/February of 1971. The Needles were supposed to be a “secret area” maybe of Chouinard. The trip was part of a week-long tour mostly all about avoiding weather that nonetheless was chasing us all the way down to Idyllwild and JT and then all the way past the Needles to Calaveras Dome. I remember mostly hiking to the base of the Open Book (Tahquitz) with a foot of snow on the trail, only the first 75 feet visible of the much-fabled cliff. We only escaped the storms when we went out wandering past Kelso, Kelbaker Road and that area trying to find what RR thought was yet another YC secret area, Granite Mountain etc. It was also about RR sorting stuff out in his head back then.
Anyway, at that time, Royal thought that YC had been up there to the Needles a little recently but that Beckey had been there in the sixties. We didn’t even get out of the van; although totally impressed with the possibilities, it was raining and I had flu. We never went back.
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Rockin' Gal
Trad climber
Boulder
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Nov 15, 2010 - 02:30pm PT
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Kris,
When's that new guidebook coming out? People keep asking me!
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Ksolem
Trad climber
Monrovia, California
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 15, 2010 - 03:16pm PT
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Peter - Thanks. I'm going to attempt to email you via the site here with a question...
The first documented ascent, for which I have seen contemporaneous notes and photographs was in 1969 when Dan McHale (then of LA, now making his fabulous McHale packs in Seattle) and "The American" Joe Brown (also of LA)Climbed the spine of the formation with the lookout. This had been called "The Whale's Back" but McHale called The Magician and that stuck. They called their route Sidewalk Magic. Then in November 69 McHale and Becky did the classic South Face of Hermit Spire, visible from the Needles trail to the north on Fish Creek Ridge. In 1970 Beckey, Mchale and Mike Heath did the South Face of The Warlock. According to McHale it was Becky and Heath who came up with most of the formation’s names, Witch, Sorcerer, Warlock etc…
I’ve heard many interesting tales, mostly over beers at The Ponderosa, about earlier activities there including winter training exercises for spec ops forces for work in high mountain ranges.
Rockin Gal.. We’re working on it hard. Quality on this project is job one, so it is taking some time so don’t hold yer breath but it'll get out before long. A big part of the picture, which adds tremendously to the scope of the project, is anchor and bolt replacement. Many of the great classics there – routes which should be on any good climber's list – are really not safe anymore and I cannot recommend them without first restoring them.
EC, If you liked that pic try this one. Too bad I wasn’t recording sound…
(I’ve posted it before but if you like Needles flyby’s have at it.)
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Levy
Big Wall climber
So Cal
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Nov 17, 2010 - 12:57pm PT
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Bump for more info to appear somehow.
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Fat Dad
Trad climber
Los Angeles, CA
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Nov 17, 2010 - 03:03pm PT
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You're working on a new guide? I guess that's pretty inevitable.
I know a few new things have been put up since the Moser guide, but is there that much new content, or just updating the older stuff?
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Levy
Big Wall climber
So Cal
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Nov 17, 2010 - 03:25pm PT
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Fatty - Many new routes have been done at the Needles since the Vernon/ Moser/ Paul guide was published. Routes such as: Tradewinds, Red Dog & Salsa, Goosebumps, Cookies On Sunday, Groovalistic & more have been done. Besides the old book has many errors. Ankles Away was rated 5.12b but it is only 5.11c.
The bolt replacement Kris speaks of is really needed. When I did Liquid Sky, on the Magician, the bolts were horrifying to just look at. One of the belays are two 1/4" bolts 10 or 12 feet apart from each other on a ramp. Terrorvision has a bolt so loose you can pull it out of its hole by hand. Dulldrills has at least two bolts that were only drilled for half their length and stick out far from the rock. Replacing these 25+ year old bolts is very much needes before somebody has an epic up there.
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bringmedeath
climber
la la land
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Nov 17, 2010 - 03:32pm PT
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Wow, that last photo is way rad! Thanks for posting that!
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rhyang
climber
SJC
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Nov 17, 2010 - 03:35pm PT
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Hoping to climb here next summer ! Love the stories too.
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