Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
ised. Even our own breed, buried in their day-to-day lives and smelling competi-
tion, didn't respond as I expected. Joe Tasker suddenly loomed over me in a bar at
the autumn outdoor trade show held in Harrogate each year.
'How come you guys managed to climb that face so quickly,' he quizzed me, look-
ing stern.
All I could think to say was: 'I guess we chose the sunny side of the mountain
Joe.'
1. We always jumared with a prusik knot above the top jumar in case one jumar detached from the rope. The advantage of this early version was
that it could easily be opened and moved above a knot in the rope. Knots became more frequent the higher we got on the route when it became ne-
cessary to cut out frayed sections of the ropes and then tie the remaining ends together.
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2. Etriers are long slings, usually with three or four loops tied into them in which to stand. They are used in aid climbing; moving from the bottom
loop to the top loop hopefully making it possible to climb higher.
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3. These brilliant innovative protection devices designed by Ray Jardine and brought to the market by Mark Vallance of Wild Country involve
sprung cams. They can be used in parallel or even flared cracks.
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4. RURPs and crack tacks are tiny aid climbing devices developed in Yosemite and the Black Canyon of Colorado. They can be placed in incipient
cracks just well enough to hold your weight but not stop a fall. Skyhooks are even more precarious. They are hooked over tiny flakes, and you hang
your etriers on them and slowly transfer your weight hoping that the hook doesn't pop off.
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5. There was a value in the Polish ropes after all. We started with two thirty-metre jumaring ropes, and both became damaged and frayed. Yet be-
cause they stretched so much, we always seemed to still have two thirty-metre ropes regardless of how much we cut off.
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