About Clip-ups.
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captain static
- Posts: 2438
- Joined: Mon Oct 07, 2002 6:05 pm
My biggest peeve out of the choices is arbitrary anchor with steered line coming in a close second. I like to get to the top or to an obvious end/stance. Probably the traddie coming out in me. Though it is not a thing of the Red I love multi-pitch sport/mixed. Climbing such out west gives you a different perspective on bolt spacing as well as on mank. This is where sport climbing comes closer to trad where you are relying on your skilz/head not to fall.
"Be responsible for your actions and sensitive to the concerns of other visitors and land managers. ... Your reward is the opportunity to climb in one of the most beautiful areas in this part of the country." John H. Bronaugh
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the lurkist
- Posts: 2240
- Joined: Wed Nov 13, 2002 2:07 pm
I did read your post RRO, and it is profound. Time well spent.
As for me, I had the epiphany about climbing recently while I was visiting Minnesota. We traveled to the far Southwestern corner of the state to see the Laura Ingalls Wilder homestead in Walnut Grove, MN. (I am such a huge fan of the Little House series).
While there we visited a tiny Blue Mounds State Park (http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/state_parks/ ... index.html)
It is the last uncultivated native prairie in the west, maintaining native grasses and other plants because of the quartzite out croppings that dot the area and held the plow at bay.
Predictably, we did not visit Blue Mounds SP to see native grasses, but to see the climbing / bouldering on these short bluffs.
(an aside- it is telling regarding the Minnesota SP system and tourism agencies in the state that they go out of their way to advertise Blue Mounds SP as a climbing attraction. These cliffs would scarcely get a second look by our standards but the MN folks recognize their tourism draw. We have the best cliffs in the world and does the Kentucky SP system capitalize on this? Fucking Kentucky....)
Anyhoo, my point is, here are short barely climbable cliffs and folks come from around the area (and sometimes Kentucky) to climb on them. And they are psyched.
My epiphany is this- any cliff is good. Short, tall, choss, heap, stellar, unbroken sweeping overhanging 110 ft of 1/4 pad ripples, etc....)
It is all good.
I I were living next to a 30' slab road cut, I would climb it.
As I get older I appreciate more and more evidence that there is a benevolent god. I think that cliffs are a gift from god and are evidence of his/her existence.
Call me a sentimental old fool....
As for me, I had the epiphany about climbing recently while I was visiting Minnesota. We traveled to the far Southwestern corner of the state to see the Laura Ingalls Wilder homestead in Walnut Grove, MN. (I am such a huge fan of the Little House series).
While there we visited a tiny Blue Mounds State Park (http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/state_parks/ ... index.html)
It is the last uncultivated native prairie in the west, maintaining native grasses and other plants because of the quartzite out croppings that dot the area and held the plow at bay.
Predictably, we did not visit Blue Mounds SP to see native grasses, but to see the climbing / bouldering on these short bluffs.
(an aside- it is telling regarding the Minnesota SP system and tourism agencies in the state that they go out of their way to advertise Blue Mounds SP as a climbing attraction. These cliffs would scarcely get a second look by our standards but the MN folks recognize their tourism draw. We have the best cliffs in the world and does the Kentucky SP system capitalize on this? Fucking Kentucky....)
Anyhoo, my point is, here are short barely climbable cliffs and folks come from around the area (and sometimes Kentucky) to climb on them. And they are psyched.
My epiphany is this- any cliff is good. Short, tall, choss, heap, stellar, unbroken sweeping overhanging 110 ft of 1/4 pad ripples, etc....)
It is all good.
I I were living next to a 30' slab road cut, I would climb it.
As I get older I appreciate more and more evidence that there is a benevolent god. I think that cliffs are a gift from god and are evidence of his/her existence.
Call me a sentimental old fool....
"It really is all good ! My thinking only occasionally calls it differently..."
Normie
Normie
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the lurkist
- Posts: 2240
- Joined: Wed Nov 13, 2002 2:07 pm
As a further testimonial, I refer you to the foreword in our own Ray Ellington's guide (first edition), written by noted atheist and philosopher Bill Ramsey. Bill notes that while he often has scoffed at anyone professing to have recognition of a higher spiritual power, he himself, while reaching around a blind corner on a route in the Red, and finding a perfect split finger bowling ball hold replete with a thumb catch that fit HIS hand perfectly, gave Bill pause that perhaps the only purpose of the existence of such a perfect hold that seemingly could have only been created with his hand in mind suggested the existence of a God that cared about Bill.
Shocker for poor Bill.
Shocker for poor Bill.
"It really is all good ! My thinking only occasionally calls it differently..."
Normie
Normie
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the lurkist
- Posts: 2240
- Joined: Wed Nov 13, 2002 2:07 pm
