After arriving in Bishop and hoping to get a walk-in permit to North Fork of Big Pine (our reserved permit went dead the day prior.....my fault : P), we found Dave Kiene standing in line as well for his permit. I soon found out that the trailhead to both south and north forks were full. Dave came to our rescue and let us "leech" onto his permit. Thanks Dave!!! Before heading off to Temple Crag, we stopped into the Looney Bean for some morning "energy". The trailhead parking was full of backcountry users. Dave also introduced us to several people in his group, including <A HREF="http://www.summitpost.org/mountains/user_link.pl/user_id/8971">Samantha</a>. We got a late start but made up for it by arriving at Third Lake around 12:30. Got situated on our beach front property and headed up to the base of Temple to stash gear and kick steps in the snow to the start of Moon Goddess Arete (worked well). The snow has moderate coverage around the base of Temple Crag (but melting fast). Got an 7AM start on MGA and simuled the first 6 pitches to the first tower. From that point on, we swapped leads. I forgot how fun the first tower traverse was! Nice wild exposure straight down the Mendenhall Couloir with views over to Sun Ribbon Arete!!! The climbing was very obvious and not really that hard. Deb took the crux pitch (as seen in Radek's photo of <A HREF="http://www.summitpost.org/mountains/photo_link.pl/p/photo_id__106714__object_id__780__type__mountain__mountain_id__780__route_id____user_id____order_by____limit__">Pitch #8</a>). And she climbed it masterfully with nice elegance (good job Babe!). Around pitch #11, we were running low on energy but pushed past the last bit of challenging climbing. My watch took a dump on me so we had no real finish time but the sun was just getting ready to set as we walked off to Contact Pass. The rappel into Contact Pass took a while before we located the rap slings but made it to them on fumes. The descent in the snow in Contact was nice but Debbi was feeling the overall fatigue of the day. By the time we hit some of the scree slopes while heading back down to Third Lake, we definitely had enough and wanted to be at the bivy site ASAP! Finally having arrived at the tent, we managed to grab some water (we ran out of water around Pitch #10) and muster up some vittles, we hit the sack exhausted. Next day, we boogied out to Bishop for some pizza at the 'Pizza Factory' (pesto/garlic/spinach....yum!). I'll be posting a TR soon and some more route recommendations. BTW, we found a #2 (yellow) Metolius 4-cam on pitch 5 but couldn't get it out. Anyone ambious enough will get some free "Booty" from the Goddess! ; )

I saw you guys waving from the top

HAAA! That's too funny Rob....because I did! How did your trip go? Did you hang out with Dave most of the time? Where was your bivy site?

BTW, I got a call from <A HREF="http://www.summitpost.org/mountains/user_link.pl/user_id/2692">Jack McBroom (aka wallspeck)</a> yesterday....while he was on the West Rib of Denali (@ 17,000ft)!!! The deep snow conditions have slowed their progress. Hopefully, he can call again and let us all know of thier progress

Did the East Face of Whitney last weekend. Super fun, but had our first mini-epic. Got nighted on the way back down to Upper Boy Scout and bivied at Iceberg Lake. Those emergency space blankets are pretty handy. A cold night, but nothing worse. All in all, a great time!

<i>got a call from Jack McBroom (aka wallspeck) yesterday....while he was on the West Rib of Denali </i>

I thought he was planning to climb Cassin Ridge. Do you know what happened?

<i>How did your trip go? Did you hang out with Dave most of the time? Where was your bivy site?</i>

Dave, I went with five other people (some south SF bay locals) up to what they call Gayley Camp (basically an area below Mt. Gayley near the Palisade Glacier on the more solid part of the moraine).

We camped around 4000' in the valley somewhere after driving from the bay area, and then started up the next morning. Somewhere while postholing up from Sam Mack meadow between 11500 and 12000' with a heavy pack I started feeling the altitude really get to me, and by the time we got to high camp I pretty much had AMS. Kicking myself for not sleeping closer to the trailhead the first night the way I usually do (these folks had no trouble - well, one did but he decided to climb anyway).

So I decided to bag the next day's climbing and try to recover. Saw Dave Kiene and his group heading up to Sill, then decided to go for a stroll on the glacier and have a look at the couloirs, schrunds, etc. Came back and napped, chatted with the neighbors, etc. It was a very relaxed afternoon.

The rest of my account is <a href="http://www.summitpost.org/show/mread.pl?f_id=22&t_id=17820&page=2">here</A>. Did manage to get a little snow climbing and scrambling in, so I can't complain.

Jim, I bet that was Rick or Scott ... never seen Arun have problems, Dee was cruising, and Al was feeling about the same as me Sat nite but decided to head up anyway.

Yeah....Jack changed his plans a month prior.

Oh, wow! Just got another call from him about 10 minutes ago! He said they bailed off the West Rib and descended to 14,000ft. They're beat and gathering themselves after floundering through super deep snow and dangerous avy conditions.

Getting out to the Wichitas to climb Mount Lincoln and investigate Phantom Mountain and Bat Cave Mountain tomorrow. Writeup on the last two for attm's Mount Lincoln page to follow. Things are looking up. 1000th reply.

we had headlamps...I also had a raging headache and nausea from the altitude, so we figured it was better to stay put and bivy than risk doing something stupid in the dark...a valuable lesson...

Now that's weird. I've heard that you lose about 1000' of acclimatization for every day you spend at low elevation (though I'm sure it's a nonlinear function).

Dave, glad to help out! I'm glad you two had a successful climb. The weather was simply ideal this weekend. i got your note, btw.

Rob, It was great to have finally met you!