Mazamas. The Mazamas of Portland, Oregon had a most active year of mountaineering in 1961 under the direction of climbing chairman, Erwin Rieger. When a club adheres to a policy of well-organized, official climbs as do the Mazamas, there is necessarily some limitation on the scope of the climbing program. Class 5 and class 6 rock techniques are seldom used; parties are sometimes larger than optimum in size; and there is considerable repetition in the climbing schedule to afford the perpetual group of new climbers ample chance to climb the 16 major peaks of the Pacific Northwest. During the year the climbing committee scheduled 78 ascents on 36 different peaks, and 1155 individual ascents were completed. Also, 11 more peaks climbed during club outings accounted for an additional 100 ascents.

Two areas with special appeal to the Mazamas have been the Olympic Peninsula and the Cascades of northern Washington. Mountaineers outside the Northwest frequently overlook the hundreds of peaks in these two areas because so many of them are less than 8000 feet high. However, no one who has climbed in these regions will ever minimize the alpine grandeur or the difficulty of these peaks, which provide great vertical walls, serrated glacial ridges, and unimagineable bushwhacking at low elevation.

Among the summer’s climbs was an ascent by James Craig’s party of Bonanza Peak, which is approached from the northern end of Lake Chelan. Frank Head led a group up Mount Daniel, near the Dutch Miller Gap area north of Salmon La Sac on the Cle Elum River. Frank Head also led a one-week outing into the Chilliwack area east of Mount Shuksan, making ascents of Redoubt and Glacier Peak II. The club sponsored an outing to the Minarets near Lake Ediza in the Sierra Nevada, where Mount Ritter, Banner Peak, Volcanic Peak, and Eichorn, Rice, Bedayan, and Dawson Minarets were ascended.

The climbing school program, now in its second decade of operation, exposed 500 individuals to the allure of snow and rock. Even for those who drop out of the school, the acquired training in backpacking, the knowledge of equipment, and an impression of the serious side of mountaineering have a lasting benefit. For those who do complete the training, the advantages are quite obvious. When one observes the untrained groups of independent climbers, one cannot help but notice the lack of technique, the ignorance of safety procedure, and the absence of climbing discipline.

One phase of this year’s climbing program was glacier practice for intermediate climbers in which the individual hangs free in a crevasse from the end of his rope. Then, with the aid of a second rope from above, he ties to a foot loop to remove the oppressive pull at the waist, ties a second foot loop, and ascends by the Bilgeri method. In another session for the intermediates, the school uses a belay machine which requires the belayer to stop a heavy weight with a dynamic belay.

Jack Grauer, Director