UKC

Word is Kenton Cool, Matt Helliker and Nick Bullock have shot up this and back down again...sounds like there's alot of fun to be had at the moment!

In reply to Vip1r:
...in true British style...back for last orders!!!

In reply to Vip1r:

Fun may be over soon, looks like from Sunday it will seriously again on the whole MB frontier ridge, including the French side of the Jorasses.

In reply to Luca Signorelli:

Questa è una vergogna il mio amico

In reply to Vip1r:

Beh, forse più che una vergogna è un peccato!

More than a shame it's a pity!!

In reply to Luca Signorelli:
Hi Luca, do you have the latest on the weather as I'm heading out on monday for a few days ice climbing?
ps sorry for the hijack Vip1r, KC won't mind!!

In reply to liz j:

Which area?

In reply to Luca Signorelli: Sono d'accordo! Ha ha!

no worries, Liz, i know he won't-have fun next week as i intedn to next month

In reply to Luca Signorelli:

Starting out from Chamonix but can go in all directions really!! Mainly interested in how much snow Cogne is going to get dumped on it. Cheers

In reply to liz j:

Forecast is snow being thicker near the main watershed and the French frontier, so western Vda, MB area, eastern Vanoise and western Gran Paradiso will be more affected, as (probably) eastern Valais near the Italian border.

Snowline will be above 700m, but it doesn't look like it will be a major snowdump as the one of last week (which barely touched Cogne)

In reply to Luca Signorelli:
Cheers for that Luca

Anyway, maybe Kenton will share his experiences on here soon, sounds like a great effort!!

In reply to Kenton Cool - Dream Guides:

Nice one, looks ace!

In reply to Kenton Cool - Dream Guides:

Cool images, and very cool soundtrack!

How much did it take for the descent?

In reply to Kenton Cool - Dream Guides: What did you do with your skis?

In reply to Simon4:

If you look carefully, the guy who was leading carried all 3 sets in his teeth (to keep his hands free).....

...or perhaps they left them at the bottom of the route?

In reply to Removed User: It was a serious question. It is not easy climbing seriously technical routes carrying even relatively light skis, while if you don't carry them up the route you have 2 problems :

1) retrieving the skis from their highpoint afterwards
2) descending another route without the skis if you needed them for the approach

In reply to Simon4:
Hi Guys
To fill you in we skied to the base and bivied there. The idea was to climb it bottom to top, then rap back down using the anchors put in when Jon Griffiths rapped the face to take photos of Ueli Steck after his solo. So we climbed pretty light leaving all bivy kit and skis at the bottom. On the way up we saw no fixed anchors and no sign of Ueli's v threads so when we topped out it was a decsion to rap the face ourselves or to drop into Italy. As it was dark and the face non too appealing, we dropped into Italy. It proved to be a very long way down. We walked all night in knee deep snow, often breakable crust (deep joy) to arrive at the road head at about 7.30am totally spent, with not 1€ between us to buy a coffee (bugger). The descent in the dark took about 12hrs, with 2 hrs sitting in the snow cos we were bloody tired. 5'm also not 100% sure we came down the best way!
Today we returned to the base (on skis again) to pick up the skis and all bivy kit that we had left, this too proved near Epic as we left too late and ended up skiing to Cham in total darkness (with no head torch for Matt and myself DOH). It proved to be a fitting end to a great adventure. I speak for all 3 of us by saying the route was perhaps a mere minor point in a much bigger game.

In reply to Kenton Cool - Dream Guides:

Good to see that you had fun and are as organised as I am!

That kind of "tired" is a special kind of "tired" though.

In reply to Kenton Cool - Dream Guides:

Good job, beautiful route. Descent sounds epic

In reply to Simon4: You ask friends to retrieve your gear and/or to position skis on the other side for you.

Ueli Steck- 2 hrs 20
Bullock, Cool + Helliker- 15 hrs 30

too many cakes lads!

In reply to Jon Bracey:
Poof!! get back to wearing Pink Lycra and racing skis up hill you gardener

In reply to Kenton Cool - Dream Guides: Nice film guys- you can keep the hike down in ski boots! Begs the question as to who is wandering round the valley with twenty-odd bits of shiny ab-tat...?

In reply to vscott: Yup, we were trying to work out last night who would be malicious enough to cut all the tat. Most of the raps we did were of V-threads so you really would have to actively cut it all out. Mind you I suppose it takes the grade of the climb down knowing you can rap off at any point...

In reply to Jon Bracey:
Jon that's not fair to compare those guys to a good climber on a public forum!

In reply to Jon Griffith: It might surprise you given the reputation the French have to bolt everything, but there are French climbers around the Chamonix valley who are totally against any equipment. They take every equipment away even bolts, fixed ropes, tat, etc...

In reply to francoisecall:
or maybe we just didn't see them!!

In reply to Kenton Cool - Dream Guides:

Another likely explanation is that the threads got buried. The Great Couloir of the Grandes Jorasses (and the Shroud) are infamous for rapidly changing ice conditions, as it's subject to quite extreme melting/refreezing cycles, and temperatures there may vary quite steeply, much more than other north faces.

In reply to Kenton Cool - Dream Guides:

Jonathan Griffith without the s please Mister Denton Gool.

Cheers

Mick ' one of those anal internet pedants who is always misspelling' Ryan

In reply to Kenton Cool - Dream Guides: Sounds a bit like my ascent of the Coutourier Couloir - left the Argentierre Hut at 1:00 a.m, got to the Couvercle hut at 2:00 a.m. You can either conclude we traversed the Aiguille Verte in 1 hour - or you can conclude something quite different!

(We did have some money for beers when we got to the Couvercle though)

In reply to Mick Ryan - UKClimbing.com:


...and speaking of the Grandes Jorasses...

I've been asked to report here that, in case you're planning to climb the NF (unlikely given the weather, but...), there's a line of evident snow pikes/flags on the big serac below Pt. Walker on the Italian side, along the normal route - these are NOT been put there to mark the descent line!!!! They're being used to monitor the serac movement - ignore them and follow the normal descent...

In reply to Luca Signorelli: Saw them on the way down and decided they must have been for that. You do not want to follow them as they lead to the serac!!

In reply to Vip1r: When are the Brits going to do something hard? All these routes are 30 years old....

In reply to johnr2:

They are -- in the Greater Ranges; where have you been for the last 30 years?

And just for good measure, I gather that the Colton-MacIntyre was soloed by a young Brit last autumn.

In reply to johnr2: I wouldn't call the Colton Macintyre "easy"! It is graded VI/6 and you don't find many ice lines like it.

In reply to Solaris: I asssume the chap's a troll. Bulllock made the first free ascent of the ten year old Omega http://www.climbing.com/news/hotflashes/omegaffa/ and recently repeated Renault's 1992 route La Lyre http://www.thebmc.co.uk/News.aspx?id=2916 .

In reply to John2: Yes, i believe he is too (or talentless and jealous!)

Me? I don't climb anymore, too old and with a hip replacement. I remember the days when the British were right up there on the international scene. The Brits don't seem to do those new big hard routes anymore. Maybe I'm wrong, but the really hard stuff seems to be getting done by the Swiss, French, Spanish and Russians. I never said the CM was easy, but it's a long long way from the cutting edge.

In reply to johnr2: The Brits are doing hard new routes but they are reported on this forum.

In reply to francoisecall: What do you mean?

In reply to johnr2:


As far as mountaineering goes, “cutting edge” is not a fixed, well defined quantity (like “hardest” or “most difficult”). You must have a reference point – “cutting edge” or “hardest” in comparison to what? Right now the real competition is on the Andes and Himalaya, but there are several routes opened more than 20 years ago in the Mt. Blanc area that have still a fearsome/fierce reputation, and are infrequently repeated by talented climbed (maybe not famous, but talented still), or in few cases, are still awaiting their second ascent. Few names: Frenesye Pascale and the Hypergoulotte on the south face of Mt. Blanc, Directe de L’Amitie, Gousseault, Groucho Marx, Phantom Direct or Ypercouloir on the Grandes Jorasses, Coracrazion on the NF of the Greuvetta (a scary route if ever was one), or relatively venerable stuff like the Lesueur line on the NF of the Drus (first climbed in 1958!). Even the Bonatti-Gobbi at the Grand Pilier D’Angle (a route that was not technically extreme even when it was first opened in 1957) is still considered “something”

All these routes maybe are not exactly “cutting edge” if you consider the single climbing moves, but if you can repeat them in fast, good style, you definitely belong to a gifted minority.

In reply to Luca Signorelli:
surely the young spider is "cutting edge" compared to your list? When that level of difficulty is taken to the Himalayas routes will be climbed way beyond anything that currently exists.

In reply to frost:

You know, the difficulty is not the only thing that makes a route interesting and worth repeating.

In reply to johnr2:


I think that Francoise meant that people are repeating them but it may not be being reported on here, or perhaps you are just not reading the news items. Certainly there are Brits operating at the highest levels in the Alps and the greater ranges. Nick Bullock et al.

In reply to adnix:
no, but "interesting" and "worth repeating" don't make "cutting edge"

Cutting edge should make you sit bolt upright in your seat with amazement.

For example:

Ueli Steck: Excalibur, Eiger speed record (and many others)

Hansjörg Auer: free solo Attraverso il Pesce in Marmolada

Profit: 3 north faces in 24hrs

Hubers: Brandler Hass solo + 8b at altitude

Russians: West face of K2 + North face Everest + N face of Jannu


...the British arn't doing this stuff (unless i missed it).
All the Brits are doing is a few repeats of old routes and a few new 'filler' lines... with a whole lot of back slapping, trumpeting and celebration.

In reply to johnr2: Most of your list strikes me as attention grabbing stunts rather than anything really new. Fowler and Ramsden won the Piola d'or a few years ago for one of their routes.

'attention grabbing stunts' lol.

Please read the list again.

In reply to MG:
Fowler and Ramsden won the Piola d'or a few years ago for one of their routes.

and a fair few Brits have been nominated in recent years including Parnell, Emmett, Cool, Cartwright and Cross.

the fact that Profit's 3 N faces were filmed for French TV and shown on UK TV nearly 10 years ago does give it a tinge of a publicity stunt despite it being an awesome feat.

In reply to johnr2: A pair of Brits did the FFA of the Desmaison Route on the Grandes Jorasses last winter, so there!

In reply to Nj: Actually that route was done free admittedly with a few falls back in the '70s by a Brit who posts here Gordie Smith and Tobin Sorenson.

In reply to Dane1:

...not to mention that the route was a brand new one (believe me)

In reply to Dane1: Eek ... who calls me Gordie!! Better than Gordo, mind!! (means FAT in Spanish I think, Gordo). BTW We pulled on 6 nuts/pegs apparently (French free?? - though what is the difference between that and torquing??) and it wasn't actually the Goussault, as became apparent a few weeks ago from a great High Def photo of Luca's, that we did (or at least not much of the Goussault). As the only route description that we had was 'NE Face Direct' Tobin insisted that we keep our noses pointed directly at the summit at all times .....

As for Brit climbers not being at the 'cutting edge' ... less attention grabbing efforts are no less fine for all that!! One should climb for oneself and not for publicity. That said, I shall retire to my jungle lair once more.

In reply to Gordon Smith:

I spoke to a few lads I thought I knew in the 70s and was talking about routes done. I did not realise they had done so much, just plodding away on medium grade routes in mediocre conditions instead of sagging it off in the valley. When the conditions changed they were fit, ready for something hard and ran up routes that were cutting edge at the time, and told nobody unless asked. Ask Tut for a glance at his diary, not many wasted days in the alps.

In reply to Gordon Smith:

What, your Mama doesn't call ya Gordie?
Pulling on gear BITD ...geeesus you guys were weak!

I couldn't tell you if I pulled on something 30 years ago let alone exactly how many of them. Always enjoy your write ups Mr. Smith!

In reply to sutty: Hi Sutty-Tut was definitely one of those chaps that did tons that no-one ever knew about. For example, Tut and Jeff Lowe climbed a new route on Indicator Wall (without bothering with a rope!!) that may have been Albatross or Arctic Tern just before Kingy and I went exploring on Indicator Wall in winter 1975 - Tut sent me up there to have a look. Totally unknown, that unroped ascent of Tut's and Jeff's!! Definitely one of those who climbed for himself and his friends, rather than for the public eye.

In reply to Dane1: My cousins used to call me Goggs - standard nickname in Scotland for a Gordon. Never Gordie - that's Ameeerican!! BTW I don't really remember pulling up on anything on that climb ... it's just that we were honest enough(?) to report that we did at the time - apparently. Don't even remember reporting the climb, mind. Seem to remember reading something Tobin wrote about it in Mountain Mag.

I really would love to write up a few more climbs but unlike Tut I never kept a diary....so it's hard to remember. I have 'abused' that climb on the Walker a number of times over the years, however - I used it as a Post Grad student at UC Davis years and years ago in a seminar where we had to talk 'off the bat' about 'The most exciting thing we had ever done' - so I remember it better than most of them. I do keep having 'flash backs' about it now, though ... for example I just remembered a day or two ago about a mangled mars bar that I found jammed in a crack about 40 metres below where we found Goussault's sack - they must have dropped it from their bivi where Goussault collapsed. And I was so hungry I immediately ate it up even though it was years old!! And I didn't share it with Tobin so now I feel really bad about it!