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dee ee
Mountain climber
citizen of planet Earth
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Aug 23, 2008 - 08:01pm PT
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"Fairest of Al" is a 2 pitch variation put up by myself, Alan Roberts (The Voice of the Crags), and Todd Gordon. I'm not sure if it connects easily to "Fairest of All."
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LongAgo
Trad climber
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Aug 23, 2008 - 08:16pm PT
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Steve,
Fairest seemed pretty great at the time, but no I don't think it is the best route on the dome, nor do I think we thought it was the best at the time, though the keen adventure we had on it (and some of my bumbling) makes it a very "memorable" adventure. As Mike says, the name came from Mike's rambling night time mind going from mirror mirror to the next phrase, not so much an assessment of the route quality itself.
Looking back now, I'd say Lucky Streaks is a superior FA in my mind, but then I raved about FA Piece de Résistance and some subsequent parties were not so impressed claiming what I thought of as the great crux pitch was a bit flakey. I probably got so jazzed with the feeling of some new routes, I came back a bit oblivious to their true nature.
More generally, I find it hard to assign stars to routes or compare them for inherent quality as so much of climbing for me is tied up in how routes read and feel, the history and ghosts, who I'm with and the unpredictable events of the day rather than the rock itself. Certainly other very good routes on the dome, for me, include: Great Pumpkin, Roseanne, Peter Peter, Mr. Kamps, Unh-Huh to name a few.
Tom Higgins
LongAgo
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Aug 23, 2008 - 08:24pm PT
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That was a great thread! Thanks for the link.
And thanks for the response Tom. "What's in a name?" as Shakespeare once quipped. I always like to ask...
I had the pleasure of climbing in Tucson where we had loads of stone but no basket of plums like Fairview to sample. Enviable possibilities to say the least!
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bob
climber
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Aug 25, 2008 - 10:59am PT
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You can link Fairest of Al to Fairest of All using the Separation Anxiety dike. Actually tons of cool linkups using that dike are available.
Bob J.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Oct 30, 2009 - 02:54pm PT
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Classical Bump!
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wstmrnclmr
Trad climber
Bolinas, CA
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Aug 22, 2011 - 07:01pm PT
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Did this route last week. Thought it was great. The second pitch is scary and I think, the crux of the climb as it is a run-out traverse on slab....All bolts have been replaced. The right facing crack pitch before the roof is beautiful, great gold polished rock. The topos I've seen are not very accurate as to route finding so one needs to be careful. The route requires a lot of different trad skills as the climbing is varied. Highly recommended.......Pictures at some point but we had to use a disposable film camera as the batteries were dead in the digital.
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tom Carter
Social climber
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Aug 23, 2011 - 02:43am PT
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Michael Irwin
I've wondered how your doing!
Spoke with Vern the other day and also talked with Bob H in the Meadows.
Didn't you take me up Fairest on the 3rd ascent?
Tom Carter
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scuffy b
climber
dissected alluvial deposits, late Pleistocene
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Aug 23, 2011 - 12:18pm PT
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Hey Tom,
early repeat history is sorta murky.
I have always believed that Bob and I did the 2nd, with Bob placing the
2nd bolt on the crux lead. This is where Tom had dropped his drill, and he
agreed that Bob should place a bolt.
A couple guys from Stanford or thereabouts did a repeat with a bivy below
those bolts, on the gym-towel-sized ledge described by Tom in his AAJ
article. Roger somebody, friend of Kit Kaiser. I had thought that was the
3rd ascent, and I think it was in 75.
However, John Vawter writes that he did the climb in 74. I suspect it was
the 3rd, because I believe the topo he used was drawn by Bob. I don't
think Bob and I had one at all.
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tom Carter
Social climber
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Aug 23, 2011 - 12:30pm PT
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SM -
Pretty funny about our memories. I was just sharing stories with Harrington and we both filled in information for each other that was ... shall I say say really pertinent?
ie He couldn't remember who the third partner was on Mr Toad's and I didn't remember that we spent the first day together on Sorcerers!!! Yikes!
Fading away. Nice to have friends to keep us on track!
Hope Mike chimes in as I would like to know just for laughs !!
When will our paths cross again??
See you then.
TC
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bhilden
Trad climber
Mountain View, CA
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Aug 23, 2011 - 02:15pm PT
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Stanford guys might have been Roger Gocking and maybe Brian Cox.
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scuffy b
climber
dissected alluvial deposits, late Pleistocene
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Aug 23, 2011 - 02:41pm PT
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Roger Gocking for sure, Thanks, Bruce.
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John Vawter
Social climber
San Diego
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Aug 28, 2011 - 04:05am PT
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We didn't have a topo per se, just a narrative that we copied out of the notebook at Soda Springs. It was mid-August 1974. Someone told us about it after we did the RR and Lucky Streaks. I can't remember whether the AAJ article came before or after we climbed it.
I thought the bolts had been replaced on this route, but I just read a 2009 TR showing manky 1/4 inchers. Are they still up there?
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Michael Irwin
Trad climber
San Leandro
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Oct 20, 2011 - 01:55am PT
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Tom... No we didn't do the third ascent, I only did it once. I haven't been in touch with Bob or Vern, just once in a while with Tom.
Mike
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wstmrnclmr
Trad climber
Bolinas, CA
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Oct 20, 2011 - 02:18am PT
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John Vawter...All bolts are new.
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kunlun_shan
Mountain climber
SF, CA
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Jul 27, 2016 - 08:29pm PT
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bump
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BruceHildenbrand
Social climber
Mountain View/Boulder
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Jul 27, 2016 - 09:39pm PT
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OK. Here are several more stories about Fairest of All. They may have been told in earlier threads. Caveat Emptor.
My partner, Jeff Vance, and I did an ascent of the route in the summer of 1978. We brought along a secret weapon in uber-face climber Matt Cox. Matt was a legend in J-Tree and had been leading 5.11+ face climbs in the Valley on Middle such as Black Primo.
As it turns out, Jeff and I led all the pitches and Matt spent most of the day just sunning himself at the belays. If you know Matt, he always had a killer tan!
A few days after our ascent, Val Licon and a friend went up on the route with a topo we gave them. We asked that they place a pin at the belay for the 5.10c crux pitch as there was only one piton there for the belay when we did it. Val brought the pin, but his partner cleaned it! As a bit of climbing karma, the strap on their day pack broke up near the top and they had to do the descent in EB's.
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