New and Experienced Climbers over 50 #34

If you use a digital tool to lose weight to complement your athleticism you are:

 an e-lite athlete.   

Hey, let's hear it for those desert iguanas! Your SoCal badasses apparently populated Fiji, way biid*!

Stories on NPR, NYTimes, elsewhere. 

*back in iguana days

I was at the Needles (CA) when those guys were putting up Titanic. Charlie Crist and I rolled into the campground late on a Friday night, threw down a tarp, got in our bags and crashed. Little did we know that Ron Carson, Brett Mauer, and Tony Yaniro were camped back in the boulders. I should mention that Charlie did two tours in Nam in the bad years of ’68-‘69, saw heavy combat as a squad leader, and had his demons from that. One thing was for sure, he didn’t react well to being awakened by gunfire.

At first light Tony walked out to the back of the campground a started shooting some sort of semi-automatic rifle. Bam..! Bam Bam Bam..! Bam Bam..! I watched, peeking out from my bag, as 6 feet three inches and 180 pounds of awesomely ripped Charlie Crist, wearing nothing but a red speedo, emerged from his bag and ran straight toward the gunfire, disappearing into the shadowless early morning haze. The shooting stopped. Then Charlie came walking back, patches of dirt on his bare skin. He sat down on the tarp, shaking, and rocking back and forth.

Maybe a minute passed before the shooter came walking towards us. Trying to hide, looking out from the hood of my bag, I was astonished to see a shirtless, dirt smeared Tony Yaniro. He was not carrying the rifle. He walked up, stood looking down at Charlie, and spoke.

“You shouldn’t have done that. What were you thinking?” I decided that Charlie must have tackled him from behind, by surprise. But I didn't see it, so I don't know that for a fact.

Charlie stood up. He towered over the much shorter Tony Yaniro, who was beginning to realize that he might have a problem on his hands. Charlie spoke.

“What were you thinking, shooting a gun at first light in a campground?”

Tony tried to explain that this wasn’t really an official campground. Charlie was having none of it.

“What are you, f’ing stupid? You need the Forest Service to tell you what is and what isn’t a campground? There are people camping over there in that tent, and over there in that van. What is the matter with you? Are you that f’ing stupid?” By then Charlie was trembling and breaking a sweat, and Tony realized he was dealing with a berserker who might just tear him limb from limb. Without turning away, Tony backed off slowly and retreated to his camp.

Charlie sat down on his bag and rocked back and forth, muttering under his breath. I got up and set about making coffee. Then Tony came walking back over, all cleaned up, wearing a nice shirt. He addressed Charlie from a safe distance.

“I’ve been thinking about what you said. You’re right. I won’t be doing any more shooting around here anymore. I’m sorry to have upset you.”

In an instant Charlie relaxed. Just like that, it was over. He let out a big exhale and looked up, smiling. “You’re Tony Yaniro, aren’t you?”

We drank coffee and chatted about their project. Tony asked what we planned to climb that day. I answered, “Don Juan Wall.” Tony joked that it was called that because “You Don Wanna Lead it.” That afternoon, when I pulled the big reach-around-the-corner move at the top of the 5th and final pitch, I heard Tony whooping at me from the summit of the Warlock, two formations to the east. Later that night at the campfire Charlie and Tony were telling stories like they’d been friends for years. 

Here's a pic of The Warlock in some weather. Titanic goes up the reddish and gold shaded face in the shade. A spectacular 5.10 called The Howling (FA Herb Laeger) goes up the blunt arete left of Titanic.

Two things - the good old days were really competitive and everyone did care that everyone else knew what they were doing/had done.  It just never went past that for most.  Some people like Lynn, Bachar and Long, they pursued a living from what they did climbing, but most just wanted to hang with friends and climb.

I watched Tony Yaniro grow up.  At 14 he was already stronger than almost everyone else and trained harder.  Driven is a good word for him.  He was a really nice guy and pretty quiet but lived to climb. One of the first hardish routes he put up was Gates of Delirium at Suicide, a hard 11 thin face problem.  At the time Tony didn't really use his feet well and just sort of campused up the hand holds.  We have no idea how that was even possible.  He used to solo the bottom of The Pirate to the black knob and then solo back down.  That section is 12d.  By then he could use his feet well.  The people who were serious climbers back then were almost all really good. 

What a  wild story Kris. I hope your friend Charlie has had a good life. No one should have to go through that stuff but then again many young men desire it. 

Nick Goldsmith wrote:

What a  wild story Kris. I hope your friend Charlie has had a good life. No one should have to go through that stuff but then again many young men desire it. 

Nick… I’ll jump in here and let you know Charlie did have a good life. He and his Wife moved to Bosie in the mid 90s and started an Art gallery that I think was pretty successful- perhaps OLH - knows it. Him and Kris were really tight committed partners and did some very wacky X rated climbs.
Sadly Charlie took his own life about 10 years ago-I think- a truly sad ending for someone who was so alive in the Mountains.

RIP 

So sorry to hear that. 

Nick Goldsmith wrote:

What a  wild story Kris. I hope your friend Charlie has had a good life. No one should have to go through that stuff but then again many young men desire it. 

Yeah, Charlie went in all gung ho, a strapping young farm boy from Idaho looking for glory. And he re-upped. But sometime during his second tour things went very badly after being deployed into areas where we weren't supposed to be: Laos, Cambodia, Ho Chi Minh Trail... I'll just say his attitude got adjusted and leave it at that. I think he had a good life. He found a wonderful wife, was an accomplished artist, and did a lot of pro photography, mostly for art galleries and architects. Large format stuff. He was a solid climber. He was several years my senior, and has been gone for a few years now.

edit: Guy got it right....

Sad ending. That war did nobody any good.

Phil: Twenty strokes of ink to make a crystal clear point. Impressive.

Kris: That’s a great story, thanks for posting. I’m glad to hear your impression that Charlie seemed to do well for what sounds like a long time to come.

Thx Brad, brought down Tammany Hall. Doing the steep and deep tomorrow if you want to join.

C Miller wrote:

Tony Yaniro at the base of Equinox. Photo by Randy Leavitt (1982).

Good god.    

philip bone wrote:

Thx Brad, brought down Tammany Hall. Doing the steep and deep tomorrow if you want to join.

In Red Rocks now and for a few days. Lucky enough to have Vicki along since we’re on our winter van trip. Home in a week??

wendy weiss wrote:

Sad ending. That war did nobody any good.

Thank you Kristian et al. for that story and f/u.

Very few wars do anyone any good (WWII did a lot of good).

"Only those who have never been to war want to go to war".

Jan Mc wrote:

Two things - the good old days were really competitive and everyone did care that everyone else knew what they were doing/had done.  It just never went past that for most.  Some people like Lynn, Bachar and Long, they pursued a living from what they did climbing, but most just wanted to hang with friends and climb.

I watched Tony Yaniro grow up.  At 14 he was already stronger than almost everyone else and trained harder.  Driven is a good word for him.  He was a really nice guy and pretty quiet but lived to climb. One of the first hardish routes he put up was Gates of Delirium at Suicide, a hard 11 thin face problem.  At the time Tony didn't really use his feet well and just sort of campused up the hand holds.  We have no idea how that was even possible.  He used to solo the bottom of The Pirate to the black knob and then solo back down.  That section is 12d.  By then he could use his feet well.  The people who were serious climbers back then were almost all really good. 

This is all spot on.  I had the good fortune of climbing with Tony a bit in his early days.  I remember an interesting conversation where Tony announced he was going to get famous… I believe it was Waugh who said “what do you want to do that for, you will ruin everything”   The end of the SPCA. 

There is this little town in northern California called Angwin. Its in Napa County. You can find it on a map. Without GPS, its hard to find, tucked away up on a mountain ridge, far, far away from the granite world of the Sierra. Its a 7th Day Adventist college town. I was in the grocery store there doing some work - a cool place with a unique, meatless product set. Anyway, I was chatting with the store manager there. We were just shooting the shit and he asked me how I came to be in California. I mentioned I came for the rock climbing.

The guy stands back, looks me up and down, and then says,

"Do you know Tony Yaniro?" I was surprised to get that question, there in that tiny town far removed from any climbing scene. There were no gyms, no videos, almost nothing of awareness about the sport among the general population, much less this out of the way place. 

Turned out, Yaniro had worked in the store while he was going to college there. Guy had all sorts of stories about Yaniro hanging from shelves, door jams, the underside of the roof, lol. The manager had a bit of a man crush on Yaniro and he positively glowed when he talked about him.

There, I told it. My one and only Yaniro story.

Totally one of those small world things.

The very definition of insanity: I’m going to plant another vegetable garden. This time I’m going to hang newer, better rubber snakes. Will be adding military caliber wire enclosures. And if I can properly inspire Tony, he can perch himself outside with a pellet gun and get some aggression out. I want a garden that would make Jan jealous.  Theoretically.  

I think I’ve been put off by this black rubber tubing that is not bendable or flexible to irrigate plants. Maybe they’ve come out with a new kind of hose that I can actually work with?

I think I can add a shade cloth to exposed areas if I structure it right. Sure as I do though a wind will come along and blow everything into the next neighborhood. Periodically, we collect all the crap that has flown into our yard and swap it back. You can just never predict when the next big wind will come along.

all I want is a real tomato.

I’ve had some success with my ranunculus this year, so that’s a hopeful sign. 

Thank you for the Nugget reference for interview w Tony Yaniro.  I listened to the first half.  Pretty cool that he's still up and doing his thing.  :-)  Thank you for the story, Cherokee.  

In fact, thank you all for all the stories.  

The Kennedy assassination files are supposed to have been released- I'll be interested to see if anything revelatory comes from this. My curiosity is not related to anything conspiratorial...I fairly doubt there's anything that's noteworthy...but maybe we'll be surprised by something. Regardless, I'm sure the conspiracy thinkers will continue to rage in their fever dream thinking.

Edit to below: Happy to eat my words on this as needed…it wouldn’t be the first time!

apogee wrote:

The Kennedy assassination files are supposed to have been released- I'll be interested to see if anything revelatory comes from this. My curiosity is not related to anything conspiratorial...I fairly doubt there's anything that's noteworthy...but maybe we'll be surprised by something. Regardless, I'm sure the conspiracy thinkers will continue to rage in their fever dream thinking.

Any time someone calls me a "conspiracy theorist"' I always default to the "official" story to see if it passes the laugh test.  This one doesn't.   Do you really think that Oswald went AWOL from the Marine Reserves, defected to Russia, married a Russian, and then the US let him and his wife back into the country without spending any time in jail without something funny going on?  This was at the height of the Cold War - the Cuban Missile Crisis kind of Cold War!   Sure, could have happened lol.  Maybe he was just a swell guy. 

 Who was he working for?  I am waiting for his tax returns, which have never been released.   I'm guessing that we will get a bunch of pages with everything useful blacked out.