Climbing Narcissist » climbingnarc.com

Not Much News, Mostly Just Notes – 12/19/2008

Narc — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 13:55:46 +0000

Hard for any news this week to seem all that impressive compared to what that one guy did, so here are some links to check out:

Steph Davis has an informative post about how she lives an inexpensive lifestyle in order to climb full time
Another interesting lifestyle post is this post on the Crag Baby blog about transitioning from the working world to a more nomadic climbing lifestyle
Everything you could ever hope to know about the art of heel hooking
It’s not too late to enter the Pitches With Pros contest brought to you by Mammut. You have until 1/11/09 to buy raffle tickets for a chance to climb with one of the following climbers: Dean Lords, Dean Potter, Steph Davis, Will Mayo or Sean Jones. Proceeds benefit the Big City Mountaineers charity.

Pitches With Pros

Via Mountains & Water, Northwest Mountain School, The Adventure Blog, Koan Bouldering and many others is this New York Times article about climbing legend Fred Beckey. Definitely worth checking out.
The question was posted recently here on the forum and Peter Beal gives some thoughts on what has been going on at 8a.nu lately. Namely, what is up with all the Top 10 lists and controversial topics.
Speaking of the Climbingnarc.com forums, I made some changes to them that should fix past problems that kept people from posting. If you have something off topic you want to discuss, that is the place to do it. You don’t need to register or anything, so fritter your day away.

Also worth noting from a site perspective is the new feature of threaded comments. You can now respond directly to each comment and the magic of the interweb will keep things organized. This should help keep things more orderly around here…or not.

Not Much News, Mostly Just Notes – 12/19/2008 from Climbing Narcissist

Become a fan of ClimbingNarc.com on Facebook

Muir Valley

Narc — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 12:26:39 +0000

Muir Valley, for those that don’t know, is a sport climbing area in Kentucky’s Red River Gorge. However, calling it a sub-area of the RRG is somewhat misleading as it is actually an entire destination unto itself. Spread over 400 acres of beautiful land and home to over 250 routes (and growing), it has quickly become one of the most popular places for climbers to visit since it opened a few years back.

How did Muir Valley come to be you might ask? How did climbers become so fortunate as to have 400 acres on which to develop some of the better routes at the Red? It is all thanks to the land owners Rick & Liz Weber. Despite common climber/private landowner problems like crapping, cussing, dogs, and a sometimes familiar sense of entitlement from climbers, they have always strived to make Muir Valley a safe, fun place for people to climb at…almost entirely at their own expense.

The road to Muir Valley recently needed some maintenance to protect the majority of safe drivers from a select few who made the single lane road their rally race playground. In fact, one of the neighbor’s of Muir Valley was struck by a car while riding his horse! The Weber’s quickly took action by closing the area for a brief period to revamp the road…at their own expense presumably. Fortunately the work went quickly and Muir Valley is now re-opened.

With this recent news in mind, and climbingnarc.com money burning a hole in our pockets, Mrs. Narc and I sent off a $100 donation to the Friends Of Muir Valley to show our appreciation as well. If you are someone that has frequented Muir Valley over the years, consider making a small donation to FOMV to show your appreciation. And while you’re at it, check out the newly redesigned Red River Gorge Climber’s Coalition website, and help out with a donation to preserve access to the 750 acre Pendergrass-Murray Recreational Preserve.

Remember, any ad revenue donated by ads located throughout this site will continue to be donated to causes such as this. If you know of causes that could use donations in increments of $100 (along with some publicity) please let me know. It doesn’t just have to be the Red River Gorge either.

Speaking of the Red. If you are in the greater Red River Gorge area next week, keep an eye out for this guy. Ask him how he can help you improve your trip packing methods!

Muir Valley from Climbing Narcissist

Become a fan of ClimbingNarc.com on Facebook

A Bit Of Housekeeping

Narc — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 13:40:06 +0000

It’s been a few weeks since I made some changes to the site here and I wanted to take a moment to inform you of some of the changes. Besides the new look, here are a few other features that may interest you:

Categories

With over 280 categories, the breadth of content at Climbingnarc.com is growing literally every day. With a new and improved toolbar, browsing categories has never been easier. You can browse through the dropdown menus that appear when you place your mouse cursor over a Category like Climbers or Climbing Areas. (I realize it is annoying that the menus are too long to fit on the screen without scrolling, and I will try to fix it when I get time/knowledge.)

The Climbing Areas menu will display a high level State/Country view of areas that can be drilled down further into specific areas. See the example at right for California that expands to reveal 9 different Californian climbing areas that you can select from.

Selecting an area will bring up a new page with brief excerpts from any posts that match the category you selected. See the below page for posts that relate to the Buttermilks.

Archives

Sidebar

The improved Archives page now lists the last 30 posts for you to browse through.

A small News & Notes section will feature small news briefs not suitable for longer posts.The box below News & Notes features Recent Posts, Popular Posts, Recent Comments and a 4th and yet to be determined subject.

And finally, below this is a rotating section of videos for your perusal.

Commenting

You may have noticed that the comments section looks a bit different. There is now an image associated with each comment that defaults to random slices of rock from around the country (1st person to identify the location of them all wins a prize?) If you would like to have your own image displayed, it is quite easy (and free). Simply go to Gravatar.com where you can create an account that ties your preferred image to your email address across all blogsites that utilize gravatars.

And finally, a few other page of note that I either fixed or added:

Links – Previously broken but now fixed. Want your link added, let me know
Pictures – Including pictures from ABS Nationals OpenFinals that I somehow never got around to talking about.
Random – Located in the very top menu, the Random link will take you to a random post in the Archives. Pretty interesting to see what you might stumble across.

If you ever notice any problems, just leave a comment or contact me via my contact page.

Stay tuned in the coming weeks for more chances to win free stuff!

A Bit Of Housekeeping from Climbing Narcissist

Become a fan of ClimbingNarc.com on Facebook

Keep Up The Support Update

Narc — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 07:31:21 +0000

Thanks to everyone that has used Climbingnarc.com to place their order with any one of our retail affiliates. Just that easily you have helped to raise money for climbing access and you probably bought some cool stuff. I encourage everyone to do the same.

Here’s how it works: If you are going to make a purchase from one of the below retailers, first click the link from Climbingnarc.com and then shop like you normally would when you get to the store. It will automatically register your sale as long as you make your purchase within a certain number of days (and don’t clear your cookies). It doesn’t cost you anything extra to do this!

These links are always located in the bottom right of the sidebar as well

Also, revenue generated by clicking on google ads that I am not allowed to mention but are usually located in the right sidebar continues to be accrued and donated as well. More information on how this money is being donated, and how it could directly benefit you is coming soon.

Keep Up The Support Update from Climbing Narcissist

Become a fan of ClimbingNarc.com on Facebook

FrontRangeBouldering.com Interview

Narc — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 15:52:29 +0000

I was recently interviewed by the great Colorado based website FrontRangeBouldering.com. So if you can’t get enough of what I have to say here, you can head over to FRB and check out the interview. Thanks to Mike Brooks at FRB for the opportunity!

One thing that I noticed during the interview process was how few pictures I have of me climbing. I have 0 pictures of me from my month long road trip in 2001, and I have probably less than 10 total photos from all the climbing I did prior to late 2006. At least I have my spraysheet to remind me that I actually did something…

Also, a quick reminder that Sunday is the last day to submit your 2008 Climbingnarc.com Tournament of All Things Climbing bracket. The response so far has been really great. Thanks to everyone who took the time to fill one out! Check back for voting on Monday. Feel free to share your picks for the final 4 (i.e. – the winner of each “region”) below…

FrontRangeBouldering.com Interview from Climbing Narcissist

Become a fan of ClimbingNarc.com on Facebook

Keep Up The Support

Narc — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 01:16:17 +0000

Thanks to whomever used Climbingnarc.com to place their order with Moosejaw. Just that easily you have helped to raise $5 for climbing access and you probably bought some cool stuff. I encourage others to do the same. If you are going to make a purchase from one of the below retailers, consider first clicking the link from Climbingnarc.com and it will automatically register your sale. I recently added REI (and REI-Outlet) to the mix and while their terms are not as generous as the others it is still worthwhile.

I am also continuing to donate the revenue from the Adsense ads and I should be receiving monies for donation from them early next month.

Keep Up The Support from Climbing Narcissist

Become a fan of ClimbingNarc.com on Facebook

Keep Up The Support Update

Climbingnarc.com Forums

Narc — Sat, 09 Feb 2008 21:16:56 +0000

With the 1 year milestone approaching, I have been thinking of ways to improve this site and get you more involved. To that end I have created the Climbingnarc.com Forums. Right now it is broken into two sections:

Spray-a-thon – Talk about whatever you want. Share any links or news that you find interesting as well.
Trips – Share stories and pictures on any recent road trips. Ask questions about upcoming trips.

To start off, someone could help us out by giving us an update on snow and weather conditions in the frontrange. We are leaving for Boulder on Thursday and we aren’t sure what to pack for our hikes.

I encourage you to register, but it isn’t required at this time.

Climbingnarc.com Forums from Climbing Narcissist

Become a fan of ClimbingNarc.com on Facebook

Another New Design

Narc — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 23:08:54 +0000

After receiving some feedback on my new design from last week, I decided to head in another direction yet again. I actually like this layout as it offers a unique way of presenting content. The area you are reading now will be reserved for quick bits of new and information and the area above and to the right will be for more in depth posts. Below this “News & Notes” area I will be posting a different video each week. Many more updates and fixes to come in the coming days.

Another New Design from Climbing Narcissist

Become a fan of ClimbingNarc.com on Facebook

New Design

Narc — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 12:47:12 +0000

Ever since I switched to a WordPress blog I was never really happy with the template that I had chosen. Then I came across the redesigned Allclimbing.com and realized that this was the sort of template that I had been wanting all along. I will probably make some more tweaks but this is more or less the final product. Let me know what you think while I am gone in the Gunks dodging rain drops until Sunday.

New Design from Climbing Narcissist

Become a fan of ClimbingNarc.com on Facebook