Fixed rope on Dragontail (RMNP)

In response to Roy Leggett's post in the Conditions section regarding the subject fixed rope: "Nope, not us (CMS). Fixed ropes...on dragontail.....on M2. C'mon now. You should make more educated assumptions in the future."

Hmmm... well let's see... educated assumptions... of what possible value would a fixed rope be to someone who only climbed the route once? What guide service has the exclusive guiding concession in RMNP and guides the route on a regular basis? Not to bust balls here, but I think mine was a pretty reasonable guess (and was stated as such).

I am fully prepared to believe what you say Roy, but I don't think I was being unreasonable or out of line.

While I have had generally positive associations and encounters with CMS guides and am often in a position to recommend the school, there have been a couple of notable exceptions. Please don't add to that exception list.

Hopefully next time one of your folks is up there they'll clean the line. I would have done so except I didn't want to mess you guys up (not implying at all that a CMS guide couldn't solo and re-fix M2, just that they might not have the gear with them if they were expecting the line to be there).

Peace.

You can see the "fixed line" here on the left of the picture.

My guess is that it was left by someone going down.

Kevin,

In my earlier post, I didn't mean to imply that you had left it either. I was just trying to start a discussion.

Also, I thought that your guess was a reasonable, educated guess. A fixed line makes me think someone wants to go up or down more than once. CMS is an obvious guess.

Since the route has been getting so many ski descents, I wouldn't be surprised if quite a few people have been rapping into the couloir. I'm not sure why someone would leave a fixed line unless they didn't have enough rope to rappel and retrieve. Was the line a really short length of rope?

The solution seems simple enough, someone should clean it.

Fixed line in Dragontail? What's next? Fixed line up the third flatiron? Clean it, pack it out, and trash it. I will if it's still there on Sunday.

Scott Bower wrote:Kevin, In my earlier post, I didn't mean to imply that you had left it either.... Since the route has been getting so many ski descents, I wouldn't be surprised if quite a few people have been rapping into the couloir.

No offense taken - just realized that my post could potentially have been taken that way.

The rappel/ski thing occurred to me after my post, but like you, I don't know why someone would leave it. It's a fairly long section of rope, but not more than 25m I don't believe.

I certainly support its removal - sorry that I didn't.

Kevin,
My response was just a reaction to the personal libel. As for the "notable exceptions"....most of those also originated with publicly stated "guess' and assumptions" on this website. I appreciate your concern though.... and I'm glad to hear that you're keeping a list.

Seems "libel" would be something more like "Those CMS jerks put a fixed line in on Dragonstail" not "I would ***GUESS*** it's CMS since they guide it a lot."

"Nope not us" would have been a fine, clear and adequate response. Instead you went on to accuse me of making wild and baseless accusations and libeling CMS.

I APOLOGIZE if my GUESS was wrong and stand corrected. Thank you for setting the record straight.

But take it how you want. I believe that your tone is an exception to CMS guide conduct/attitude (like the few other negative examples that I've witnessed).

Scott Edlin wrote:Fixed line in Dragontail? What's next? Fixed line up the third flatiron? Clean it, pack it out, and trash it. I will if it's still there on Sunday.

The rope was removed on Saturday just before noon. Last seen, it was headed down-slope-at-speed in the company of two skiers.

Smaller Fish wrote: The rope was removed on Saturday just before noon. Last seen, it was headed down-slope-at-speed in the company of two skiers.

Good! Let's not set a bad precedent here. As far as I know (correct me if I'm wrong) fixed lines haven't been left up in RMNP since the cables route was removed from Longs North Face.