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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Dec 19, 2014 - 05:27pm PT
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Rgold,
Have you ever climbed in the European Alps?
I can assure you there is plenty of very unsafe adventure to be had, even on trad routes with a rusty piton here or there and a bolted belay or two.
Anyway,why such disdain for climbing in the Alps? Your posts (in this thread and others) read is if you're holding your nose while writing them.
Yes, I've climbed in the Alps, but not for a long time at this point. However, I'm well aware of the adventurous nature of a lot of European climbs, including bolted ones done ground-up with serious runouts on very difficult ground, as in the Ratikon and on the South Face of the Marmolata for example. I never held by nose about European climbing in general and am sorry if you got that erroneous impression.
If you read my comments, they refer specifically to plaisir climbing, not to climbing in the alps in general, and surely you must be aware that there is substantial controversy in Europe about that phenomenon, controversy that has reached all the way to UIAA publications. http://theuiaa.org/upload_area/files/1/to_bolt_or_not_to_bolt.pdf. You don't have to be from the US to think the plaisir concept might be an unfortunate development.
Even in the supposed epicenter of trad climbing that is the California Sierra Nevada granite batholith, routes that require a rappel have bolted belays.
Well, you said "supposed," not me. In any case, I tarred that general locale with the same brush as one used for the Piz Badile, so again I can only suggest you read what I wrote with a little more care.
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jgill
Boulder climber
Colorado
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Dec 19, 2014 - 05:34pm PT
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That was state-of-the-art when I started climbing in the early 1950s, although Joe Brown and a few others had started a movement to modernize the sport . . . and broaden the scope of participation.
Time and succeeding generations change all things, including ethical perspective.
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Hummerchine
Trad climber
East Wenatchee, WA
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Dec 22, 2014 - 10:57am PT
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Priceless Werner!
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jstan
climber
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Dec 22, 2014 - 11:35am PT
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I once spent some time in Cortina d'Ampezzo and went over to see the Tre Cima. We walked under the overhanging face of the Piccola.
High above us I could see the cut end of a rope swinging in the wind driven rain out in open space.
Thinking a rappel will always get you out of trouble
is dangerous.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Dec 22, 2014 - 11:53am PT
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I think all the great gear and the confusing example of sport and gym climbing have combined to create an illusion of safety for trad climbing which does not really agree with reality. It has also enabled folks who obviously would never have come anywhere near the activity when that book was written to raise the banner of safety in an attempt to eliminate risks from the trad environment.
As usual, rgold states what I think, but more elegantly than I could. While I've taken enough leader falls to demonstrate that a leader can fall and live to tell the tale, I recognize the role luck played in my survival.
The first climbing books I read were of pre-1960 British vintage, where pitons were considered cheating or worse, climbers wore nails, or else plimsolls for friction, and the shoulder belay was orthodox. The books were replete with pre-WWII pictures of leaders edging up Eagle's Nest Direct or some terrifying lead in Wales or on Yorkshire grit, bereft of protection.
Fortunately, when I actually went climbing, I learned that belaying a leader with nylon rope was not that bad - for the leader, anyway - as long as there was nothing to hit in the fall. My earliest roped climbing, though, was at Little Table Mountain and at Pinnacles. Both places had lots of protruding knobs that made even a short fall like a trip down a king-sized cheese grater, so I didn't take a leader fall until I'd been climbing almost three years. Amazingly, when I fell and suffered damage only to my ego, I learned to keep calm and became a much better leader.
But I still sometimes take leader falls. I try to keep the risk minimal, however, since I learned that my current, 63-year-old body doesn't absorb sudden stops the way it did 40 years ago, so maybe I'm back to my attitude when I first started climbing: some leaders can fall, but it better not be me!
John
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Mungeclimber
Trad climber
Nothing creative to say
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Dec 22, 2014 - 01:10pm PT
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I would like to take some more falls, but I'm not willing to do it intentionally. LOL
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Dec 22, 2014 - 01:29pm PT
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Sometimes falling is not all that good an idea.
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guyman
Social climber
Moorpark, CA.
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Dec 22, 2014 - 01:46pm PT
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One of the climbs I love to do is: The Mechanics Route at Tahquitz, 5.8RRRR
1937 Glen Dawson and Dick Jones (RIP) ....
When I climb that one Im always amazed that this was climbed so long ago, with only a few KBs and a hemp rope.
Falling was not an option.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Dec 22, 2014 - 01:55pm PT
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guyman, I'm not sure they even had knifeblades on the FA. Plus, they climbed in tennis shoes using manila ropes. Those guys knew how to climb!
John
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guyman
Social climber
Moorpark, CA.
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Dec 22, 2014 - 03:40pm PT
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JE... you might be correct, When we interviewed Glen for the Stoney vid, he said something about pounding a few pins for direct aid....
But the big long run up the, overhanging, 5.8 holes with zero pro....
my god, "the Leader must not fall"..."or you will take the belayer" ....
those were real men.
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jgill
Boulder climber
Colorado
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Dec 22, 2014 - 09:50pm PT
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. . . pre-1960 British vintage, where pitons were considered cheating or worse, climbers wore nails . . .
Interestingly, John, several years ago Joe Brown told me he had a lot of trouble adjusting to rubber cleated soles - especially on wet rock! Nails had a purpose.
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Chris Cunningham
Trad climber
San Francisco
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Topic Author's Reply - Dec 23, 2014 - 12:50am PT
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Here is the only hard gear in the book; the biner on the gentleman's waist.
This would be tube socks and a brightly manufactured, skin-tight yet stretchy pants material just 40 years later."The Orthodox climber does not care for Romance" pg. 7 "Rock for Climbing" C. Douglas Milner, 1950
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i'm gumby dammit
Sport climber
da ow
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Dec 23, 2014 - 01:52am PT
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1. nailed boots are aid
2. Think bolts next to perfectly good cracks, etc. blah blah etc. Why can't the awesome elitist trad climbers just leave the draws in the bag? Then all those nasty bolts won't be an issue.
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