Was tearin' apart the sanctum a few weeks back in search of a (still) never located "misplaced item" (we've come to the conclusion that it was most probably "lifted"). In our hunt we ran across a few lengths, trimmed from a full rope, of old style 'Goldline' twisted nylon climbing rope:
Same rope coiled and settin' on the top edge of the cliff in that lower photo
If a wire strand cable had a hot time with a bungee cord one night after a few drinks in the local bar, the resultant offspring would most assuredly resemble a Goldline rope. Picked this particular rope up from REI back in the early days. Think it was $25 cost (may be wrong). One of those items that you are subsequently glad to have had experience with and no more. Twisted three-strand construction with handling similar to aforesaid wire strand cable. Nearly just as stiff. Unless you used a figure-eight device for rappel/belay you were assured to be working with a jammed rope at some point. When rappelling, usually in some hairy spot where ya' couldn't unweight the rope. Useless with a sticht-plate device of the day. Elongation was somewhere between superior performance kernmantle rope and said bungee cord - weighted more toward the bungee cord spectrum of the scale. You had to be at least 15 feet off the deck to avoid a ground fall when tied in. A (now'days dreaded) double bowline knot was your best option for direct tie-in. A figure-eight knot was best clipped with a locking 'biner, particularly if ya' took any falls of significant force. Hauled that rope back home several times to work out an overly cinched figure-eight knot in the vise when frozen fingers wouldn't work it out at the crag. To be fair, that rope was intended more for glacier travel and general mountaineering. This was well before we had attained "astute expert" status (i.e.: fu*ked up and scared the sh*t out of ourselves a lot). Hey - looked just like the rope those guys were usin' in the book.
After retiring it for good we used the rope to tension a large elm tree we were sawing down next to a buddy's driveway. Maybe 80ft let, anchored from near tree top to the bumper of a '66 Ford Bronco. Bet we edged the Bronco am additional 40ft before we got sufficient tension between the rope and the tree.
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"Lookers need looked at"
- Festus Haggen
A few of us were settin' around a buddy's living room. We're minutes into a first viewing of climber/author John Long's 80's classic 'Art of Leading' climbing video loaded in the VHS player. The bud's sister-in-law happens to drop by. She's built and quite the looker and knew it, so quite naturally had to pop into the living room full of guys to say hi and let the boys get an eyeful. "Hi - watcha' watchin'?" We're now all lookin' her up and down, down and up and back down again. She's glancin' at the tv screen to see what we're viewing. There's some superimposed text on the screen, "Blood of Christ" (a so named 5.12 rock climb out at California's Joshua Tree NP) which she reads aloud, say's nice seein' ya' then turns and walks out of the room. We're all now checkin' out the rear perspective until she disappears around the doorway. Back to the screen for us.
A short bit later I overheard her say to the bud's wife, "It's nice to see those guys in there watching religious programming."
For us it was.
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"Most horrible of all sights are the little unpainted wooden houses remote from travelled
ways, usually squatted upon some damp, grassy slope or leaning against some gigantic
outcropping of rock. Two hundred years and more they have leaned or squatted
there, while the vines have crawled and the trees have swelled and spread. They are
almost hidden now in lawless luxuriances of green and guardian shrouds of shadow;
but the small-paned windows still stare shockingly, as if blinking through a lethal stupor
which wards off madness by dulling the memory of unutterable things.
- H.P. Lovecraft, 'The Picture In The House'
Used to go on many a lone hike (or with the pooch), sometimes quite deep into the local backwoods, to check out some unknown area, either after researching geologic and topo mapping, or otherwise rumored by others, to be site of a spectacular cliff or gigantic boulders never touched by the grip of rock climbers.
One such trip, after considerable distance and much bushwhacking, inadvertently stumbled across a small chinked log cabin.The cabin appeared pretty ancient. The wood dark and weathered. Weathered wood shake gable roof. Wooden porch with roof in need of some bracing. Two square windows. Torn and faded shades drawn. The surrounding property was completely overgrown with thick brush and vines. The dense forest was darn near suffocating the place. There wasn't a cut road nor trail in to be found. Someone was in there - a wisp of smoke was curling from the stone masonry chimney. Pretty fu*k'n creepy place. Did I just see the shade move? Didn't take much prompting to decide to keep moving along.
Another mile or two and came to a pretty decent boulder field buried in the woods. After checking 'em out, kept moving ahead, veering east, to bushwhack the flank of the river gorge the steep 800ft elevation down to the railroad and easier hiking back to the vehicle. Will admit that we were a bit apprehensive about backtracking past the cabin.
The following weekend hiked back in with a buddy to show him the new "find". One hundred percent positive we followed the exact same route as bushwhacked the previous week. When we came to the area I approximated the cabin to be located, there was no cabin. Wouldn't be hard to bypass it if only a few seconds off route, the woods were that thick. We did come across an old foundation, about the same dimension as the cabin. Tumbledown stone chimney. Completely overgrown with thick brush and vines and darn near suffocated by the dense forest. We looked about and discovered two aged, weathered and now indecipherable flagstone grave markers. Never mentioned the cabin to our buddy.
Not the cabin "of sayeth", but one of a few of relic homesteads we've encountered while stumblin' about the local woodlands. A young "wonder dog Ben" is the critter.
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Ben would hike or chase MTB's for miles. Never tired. We always figured an extra 1/10th mile per mile traveled for his effort. He would constantly be darting left and right, in and out of brush, thickets and bracken. A twenty mile run was no big deal. He'd definitely sleep good that night. He was medium sized and possessed a smooth, sleek gait resembling a racehorse. Definitely built to run for long distance.
He tunneled under the fence once and escaped from the back yard. Searched hi and lo for 'em. Always expecting to find him flattened along the road somewhere in our pursuit. About the middle of the third day of his flight we sort of gave in to the fact that he was gone for good. Next morning got up early figuring to drive around for one last search. Opened the front door to depart and there he is settin' on the porch, dusted like a chimney sweep, waiting' to be let into the house. He knew he was in big trouble. Pissed off with relief, gave 'em a good boot in the ass as he passed thru the doorway. He yelped and ran down the basement stairs. After gobbling down two large bowls of dog food and a bowl and a half of water, we didn't see 'em for another full day and a half thru which he slept non stop in the basement.
A few months later was driven'. Don't know why but made a turn down a back alley located about two blocks from the homestead. Happened to glance over into a back yard and there's a pooch chained to a dog house with a litter of pups running about. Every one of the pups looked just like him.
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