Showcas spire tyrolean
Showcas spire tyrolean
I am planning on climbing the Showcase spire but haven't setup a tyrolean before. I was wondering if anyone here has climbed it, or has experience with setting up tyroleans and would be so kind to give me some advice.
My main questions are:
*how do you put enough tension on the rope without having to leave any gear behind? (my current assumption is that the 'tyrolean leader' rebuilds the system when he gets across thus allowing the 'seconder' to clean)
*what is available on top of the spire to put the rope through so that you don't leave any gear? Or do you have to leave slings behind?
I would appreciate any information/feedback that you can give me:
slambrec (at) sfu.ca
My main questions are:
*how do you put enough tension on the rope without having to leave any gear behind? (my current assumption is that the 'tyrolean leader' rebuilds the system when he gets across thus allowing the 'seconder' to clean)
*what is available on top of the spire to put the rope through so that you don't leave any gear? Or do you have to leave slings behind?
I would appreciate any information/feedback that you can give me:
slambrec (at) sfu.ca
-
gnarnaphobe
- Senior Member
- Posts: 279
- Joined: Mon Aug 09, 2010 3:54 pm
- Location: Squamish
I havent actually been to the spire yet, but i've asked alot of people the same question.
As far as I understand thus far, you need to rap in from the opposite side of the spire, and use the rap rope for the tyro by leading to the top of the spire on another rope (hauling both ends of the rap rope to the top of the spire) and then (if there's chains or rings) run your rope through and tie the ends together (creating a tension) and then rotate your circuit of rope until your knots are @ the other side.
I dont think that you'll be able to create that much tension, you'll probably have to pull yourself across from the center point of your rope span.
Then after your tyrolean ride, you can untie yuor knot and pull the rope.
Be sure to check what time the last chair lift is, when we went and hit spankys wall last month they only let us up load @ 11am, by the time you get to horseman hut its damn close to 12, and last chair was @ 2, leaving a very small window of oppertunaty for approach and climbing.
My suggestion would be to camp up there and hit spankys wall and the spire, which is what i'll be doing next time for sure.
Hopefulllly my information can help you out
-Luke
As far as I understand thus far, you need to rap in from the opposite side of the spire, and use the rap rope for the tyro by leading to the top of the spire on another rope (hauling both ends of the rap rope to the top of the spire) and then (if there's chains or rings) run your rope through and tie the ends together (creating a tension) and then rotate your circuit of rope until your knots are @ the other side.
I dont think that you'll be able to create that much tension, you'll probably have to pull yourself across from the center point of your rope span.
Then after your tyrolean ride, you can untie yuor knot and pull the rope.
Be sure to check what time the last chair lift is, when we went and hit spankys wall last month they only let us up load @ 11am, by the time you get to horseman hut its damn close to 12, and last chair was @ 2, leaving a very small window of oppertunaty for approach and climbing.
My suggestion would be to camp up there and hit spankys wall and the spire, which is what i'll be doing next time for sure.
Hopefulllly my information can help you out
-Luke
Hey Stefan,
I climbed the spire with a buddy on August 2nd. Here is how we climbed the route.
1) There is a set of three anchor bolts on the ridge, directly beside the top concrete pad for the Showcase T-bar. We set up an equalized anchor on these bolts, and tied the end of one rope to this anchor. We then rapped down into the gap on the single strand.
2) Using a second rope, we climbed the spire (we did the easy 5.9 route). The second person climbing had the original rap rope from the ridge tied to their harness and brought it up top.
3) At the top of the spire, you will find three bolts. There is a chain/rap ring setup between two of the bolts, and there is an equalized sling between all three bolts.
4) At the top, we did the following. We fed the rope that is tied to the ridge through both the sling and rap anchor setup (call it paranoia...). Next we tied the ends of the two ropes together (being very careful that there weren't any unintended knots). Next we tensioned up the rope spanning the gap.
5) The first person tied the loose rope end to their harness, and crossed the gap on the tensioned rope. Once across, he pulled as much loose slack in on the second rope as possible, then set up a second tensioning system.
6) Once the rope was secured, the person on the spire disassembled the tensioning system on the spire. Now the person on the ridge tensioned up the new system (so now the rope is tied securely to the ridge, passes through the chains and sling on the spire, is knotted on the way back to the ridge, and is tensioned on the ridge.
7) Now the second person crosses. We were using pulleys to make our lives easier, so were very careful to make sure the pulley was placed on the rope that didn't have the knot halfway across!
Once across, we took apart the tensioning setup and pulled the ropes, not leaving any gear behind.
A few general notes and lessons learned:
- Summer skiing was no longer in operation when we climbed it. Which meant we hiked from the Rendezvous restaurant to the top of 7th Heaven, then around the Horstman Glacier. Time is tight; we took the Whistler Gondola up at about 11AM, then took the Peak to Peak across before beginning our hike. We returned at the top of the Solar Coaster chair at 5:05PM, and the last ride down is at 5:15PM. On the 2nd, the chairs actually opened at 10AM. So, to give yourself more time, I'd recommend taking the chairs up Blackcomb instead of our scenic route, and board the Wizard at 10AM. The last thing you want is to have to rush your Tyrolean.
- We had pulleys and definitely appreciated having them.
- There was definitely some rope sag, which required us to use prussic to work our way back up onto the ridge. Make sure you're prepared for that.
- The climb is fantastic!! The view from the top is unreal!
- If you've never done a Tyrolean, try setting one up in a park. Just find a couple of trees and see if you can set up the system safely.
I hope all of this helps. Here is a picture from that day... (the first person across took this picture from a little ways up the ridge.
I climbed the spire with a buddy on August 2nd. Here is how we climbed the route.
1) There is a set of three anchor bolts on the ridge, directly beside the top concrete pad for the Showcase T-bar. We set up an equalized anchor on these bolts, and tied the end of one rope to this anchor. We then rapped down into the gap on the single strand.
2) Using a second rope, we climbed the spire (we did the easy 5.9 route). The second person climbing had the original rap rope from the ridge tied to their harness and brought it up top.
3) At the top of the spire, you will find three bolts. There is a chain/rap ring setup between two of the bolts, and there is an equalized sling between all three bolts.
4) At the top, we did the following. We fed the rope that is tied to the ridge through both the sling and rap anchor setup (call it paranoia...). Next we tied the ends of the two ropes together (being very careful that there weren't any unintended knots). Next we tensioned up the rope spanning the gap.
5) The first person tied the loose rope end to their harness, and crossed the gap on the tensioned rope. Once across, he pulled as much loose slack in on the second rope as possible, then set up a second tensioning system.
6) Once the rope was secured, the person on the spire disassembled the tensioning system on the spire. Now the person on the ridge tensioned up the new system (so now the rope is tied securely to the ridge, passes through the chains and sling on the spire, is knotted on the way back to the ridge, and is tensioned on the ridge.
7) Now the second person crosses. We were using pulleys to make our lives easier, so were very careful to make sure the pulley was placed on the rope that didn't have the knot halfway across!
Once across, we took apart the tensioning setup and pulled the ropes, not leaving any gear behind.A few general notes and lessons learned:
- Summer skiing was no longer in operation when we climbed it. Which meant we hiked from the Rendezvous restaurant to the top of 7th Heaven, then around the Horstman Glacier. Time is tight; we took the Whistler Gondola up at about 11AM, then took the Peak to Peak across before beginning our hike. We returned at the top of the Solar Coaster chair at 5:05PM, and the last ride down is at 5:15PM. On the 2nd, the chairs actually opened at 10AM. So, to give yourself more time, I'd recommend taking the chairs up Blackcomb instead of our scenic route, and board the Wizard at 10AM. The last thing you want is to have to rush your Tyrolean.
- We had pulleys and definitely appreciated having them.
- There was definitely some rope sag, which required us to use prussic to work our way back up onto the ridge. Make sure you're prepared for that.
- The climb is fantastic!! The view from the top is unreal!
- If you've never done a Tyrolean, try setting one up in a park. Just find a couple of trees and see if you can set up the system safely.
I hope all of this helps. Here is a picture from that day... (the first person across took this picture from a little ways up the ridge.
We climbed the spire on Saturday.
Some feedback: we took the wizard chairlift and then the next one straight after (forgot the name of that lift) since the 7th Heaven chairlift was already closed. We got the first lift up and started hiking at 10:14 AM. We hiked up to the top of 7th Heaven chairlift (there were cars there for a glacier school, not sure where&how those permits work but worth looking into!) and arrived at the top of Horstman glacier (the point were you rap down from to start climbing) at 11:32 AM. Bring decent hiking shoes/boots for this part (there was still snow and ice).
Like Marty, we also took the trad route up, it's easy but fun (but don't go up there for those 1,5 pitches! we split them up to reduce rope drag and belayed just before you turn around the corner after the slab.).
Using Marty's info and some knot&rope handling skills, the tyrolean went smooth and was a great experience. We were done at 3pm and hiked down, had a beer and cruised the peak-to-peak before calling it a day.
Some feedback: we took the wizard chairlift and then the next one straight after (forgot the name of that lift) since the 7th Heaven chairlift was already closed. We got the first lift up and started hiking at 10:14 AM. We hiked up to the top of 7th Heaven chairlift (there were cars there for a glacier school, not sure where&how those permits work but worth looking into!) and arrived at the top of Horstman glacier (the point were you rap down from to start climbing) at 11:32 AM. Bring decent hiking shoes/boots for this part (there was still snow and ice).
Like Marty, we also took the trad route up, it's easy but fun (but don't go up there for those 1,5 pitches! we split them up to reduce rope drag and belayed just before you turn around the corner after the slab.).
Using Marty's info and some knot&rope handling skills, the tyrolean went smooth and was a great experience. We were done at 3pm and hiked down, had a beer and cruised the peak-to-peak before calling it a day.
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