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July 29, 2021

Hi Folks,

So after a couple of weeks of my schedule and the weather not meshing, I finally got out on some rock this morning with the Boss, Brad White. It was an absolutely a beautiful morning on Whitehorse, yet there was absolutely no one anywhere on the cliff from what we could see from 10:30-noon! It's difficult to imagine a perfect morning like this and no one on the big cliff, but that's what it was!

Brad hadn't done Chris Graham & Bob Ahearn's new route Kettle Call, so that was on the list. I had done it with Jeff Lea a few weeks ago and thought it was quite nice, as long as you feel good about 50' of unprotected 5.6 climbing on pitch 1. If you're solid on 5.7 slab, you should be fine. Fortunately the second pitch is reasonably well protected. That said I would bring a spare .75 and .25 Camelot for the P2 crack. You may use up your singles on the anchor at the top of P1.

http://www.neclimbs.com/wmr_pix/20210729/Kettle_1.jpg
http://www.neclimbs.com/wmr_pix/20210729/Kettle_2.jpg
http://www.neclimbs.com/wmr_pix/20210729/Kettle_3.jpg
The early part of this week featured dry weather but absolutely horrible air quality from the fires out west and Canada. It was bad enough that several folks I know decided not to do bike rides out of health concerns. Then it rained Tuesday night, go figure... But oh my goodness, check out the weather prognosis down below. It's pretty doggone crazy, with tons of rain, possible flash floods, high winds and even possible wind chills in the single digits in the upper elevations tonight! WTF is going on?

I was playing music up in central Maine from last Friday through Monday. I'd never been in that part of Maine before and it was interesting. There were numerous small towns along the way and the countryside was very beautiful. I played a concert in Madison on Friday, had Saturday off and then a concert and club gig in Greenville on Moosehead Lake on Sunday. We were supposed to play outside on Sunday, but it rained and we moved inside a seaplane hanger. There were probably 100 people there and we had a visit from Senator Angus King. Apparently he's a big fan of the Denny Breau who I play with. It was neat to meet him.

http://www.neclimbs.com/wmr_pix/20210729/Angus.jpg

I did get in a little sightseeing on the drive between Madison and Greenville, spotting a large wind turbine farm, and also got in a nice road bike ride around Moosehead. It was great to get away for a bit and I dug it all.

http://www.neclimbs.com/wmr_pix/20210729/turbines.jpg

The tick that got me last week left a pretty annoying bite that's only just now finally going away. My Dr says it wasn't infected, but it sure had me worried for a bit. Damn things are BAD! It has me taking even more precautions now. You should too...

Ice Conditions Report:

Selected Ice Conditions effective March 21, 2024
I can't actually say that there is nothing out there that can't be climbed. That would be foolish. But for the average, or a little above average climber, that's probably correct. That said, I did hear that there is climbable ice on Parasol in Dixville Notch. Not sure how that will be after we get a foot of heavy wet snow on Saturday. Regardless, here's a few pix I took today just to document things.
	Huntington Ravine	AVALANCHE
	Repentance	OUT
	Standard Route	OUT
	Dracula	OUT
For the full current conditions report, CLICK HERE

RUMNEY CRAGGIN' CLASSIC:
It's back folks! This year it will be September 17-19, 2021 and is being sponsored by CAMP Technical Adventure Equipment. It looks to be a great weekend and there is limited space so get your tickets NOW.

https://americanalpineclub.org/rumney-cc

PEREGRINE CLOSING NOTIFICATION FROM CHRIS MARTIN:
All seasonal climbing closures put in effect in Spring 2021 for NH Peregrine Falcon nest sites (see list below) have been lifted. Climb on! This season, I especially want to acknowledge direct involvement by Bob Hall, Lee Hansche, Torie Kidd, and Andy Casler in management efforts at specific sites. And thanks again to all for your support of Peregrine Falcon management here in NH!

Please continue to send me updates when you encounter falcons at any of the areas where you climb. I look forward to working with you in the 2022 falcon nesting season.

Chris Martin
Senior Biologist, NH Audubon

INSTANT BUG REPORT: 2
Ticks are still out and about in numbers, but other annoying buggies not so much. Even the moth population has declined. Just sayin'.

SOME LOCAL/NATIONAL PANDEMIC THOUGHTS:

Yes Virginia, the numbers of infections are absolutely going up everywhere, including in New Hampshire and New England overall. In the past week we've seen an increase from ~60 new cases last Thursday to 101 today making a 7 day average of 69! With only 58% of our state's population fully vaccinated, this is not really surprising. The majority of cases are occurring in Belknap and Rockingham counties, which of course are much more populous than up here in the hinterlands. However, considering how tourist driven we are there are cases occurring up here.

I have friends in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Miami, New York and Miami. All of these are seeing fairly significant increases in infections mostly due to the Delta variant. In all of these places, and others as well, over 95% of the hospitalizations and deaths are in the unvaccinated population. Thus almost all of these are totally preventable by getting vaccinated. What else is there to say? If you are fully vaccinated, you may get the virus, but it is HIGHLY UNLIKELY that you will be in the hospital or die. It's as simple as that. However, if you get COVID it is quite possible that you could transmit it to an unvaccinated person. And if they get it, it's quite likely that they will get very sick. Why take the risk when you can just get the shot? There is a reason why polio, measles, mumps and other diseases are so rare. Just think about it...

New Hampshire:
1 new death reported
101 new cases reported
528 Active cases
26 patients are currently hospitalized
1,387 total deaths

United States:
Confirmed: 34,723,917
Deaths: 612,020

Global:
Confirmed: 196,414,175
Deaths: 4,194,057

The Johns Hopkins COVID-19 tracking map:

https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/us-map

I find JHU's Daily COVID-19 Data in Motion report to be very informative. It shares critical data on COVID-19 from the last 24 hours in a short 1 minute animated video format.

https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/covid-19-daily-video

OUR ONLY WAY OUT IS IF YOU GET VACCINATED, WHERE RECOMMENDED PLEASE STILL WEAR A MASK, WASH YOUR HANDS!

REMEMBER - WE ARE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER

VALLEY CYCLING:
The trails everywhere are in good condition. Just get out there and ride...

Mobile Version Of NEClimbs:
Up on one of the Mount Washington Valley's finest crags and want to know what that climb you're looking at is? Or maybe you're on your way up from Boston and want to check out the Ice Report for your upcoming weekend plans. Or more likely, you're at work just want to daydream about your next adventure. Well if you have a smart phone handy, you can get to NEClimbs from anywhere you have cell service. While it doesn't offer every single feature of the site and it's not an "app", in mobile form, it does do a whole lot and is very useful. Here is the live link to the mobile version of NEClimbs:

http://www.neclimbs.com/mobile

Check it out and if you have issues on your specific phone, please feel free to let me know.

NEClimbs & White Mountain Report On Facebook:
Join us and LIKE us on Facebook. I'll try and post interesting pix every Thursday and the latest Ice Report in the season, tho certainly not the whole Report. Here's where you can check it out:

http://www.facebook.com/NEClimbs/

Remember - climb hard, ride the steep stuff, stay safe and above all BE NICE,

Al Hospers
The White Mountain Report
North Conway, New Hampshire

Vy can't ve chust climb !

John Salathé

NEClimbs on Facebook

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