LOCALadk Magazine

30 Fall 2014 LOCALadk So, despite our best effort to find and document "The Poseidon Adventure," we failed. However, I finally satiated my curiosity about this wall and in the process we did do a new route. We named it "Life Aquatic." It is/was not a good route, though it was a great adventure, on an impressive wall, in one my favorite spots on this planet with some good friends. Laywer later sent Mellor an email regarding our efforts. Mellor promptly shot back the following email: The Mellor/Dodd route is steep, airy, and classic, thought by Peter Croft to "make Astroman seem like a pile of yak dung." The Loher/Lawyer choice was clearly a pitiful attempt to walk in the footsteps of earlier masters, but finding themselves woefully inadequate, they skulked rightward and, deservedly, encountered the loose rock and moss that so typically accompanies such cowardice. (Climbing in the Adirondacks is still available in fine bookshops and outfitters.) -Yours Reinhold This route was just one of their 374 first ascents. It took us all day. Not every first ascent takes all day. They only take all day when I am involved. There is more, much more, to making a guidebook than just climbing, especially when you self-publish. These days many of the beautiful guidebooks out there are made by a team of people-- the writer writes copy, hands it off to the publishing team, who then edits, adds graphics/pictures, essentially creating the final product. Lawyer and Haas have done all of this work on their own; graphics, layout, even the distribution. They even had to build a storage unit to hold the 7,000 copies of their book. All of this, plus their field work. Over the years, I have come to appreciate the rock climbing guidebook as essential a piece of equipment to an enjoyable climbing experience as a rope or carabineer is to mitigating a safe passage up a vertical section of rock. A good guidebook serves as a launching pad for many fine adventures. It not only provides a blueprint for a successful climbing experience, helping its intrepid reader to seek out the cliffs, but also provides its user with important information about the history, quality of a particular climb, how safe the climb is, and the difficulty. Jim and Jeremy's guidebook does all of these things perfectly. The Adirondacks is a special place, with some of the finest rock climbing found on the planet. Lawyer and Haas' new guidebook certainly captures this fact and is a worthy tool to be used in planning your own Adirondack climbing adventures. New innovations in Adirondack Rock II 1. Two lighter books rather than one heavy one. 2. The book is in full color with color-coded margins. The coded page margins match the park map. 3. Crag planning tables for each area as well as at the beginning of each chapter. 4. At a glance tables--helps the reader figure out if the climb is protected by fixed gear (solid blue dot) or if the fixed gear needs to be supplemented with trad gear (hollow blue dot). 5. Cliffs by category appendix--top rope areas, all sport areas, crags near water, canoe approach crags, kid friendly cliffs, etc. 6. The covers on each book are quite unique--beautifully rendered illustrations by Jim Lawyer's nephew, Colin o' Connor. They are of a Fleixbind construction that will allow the book to stay open. The covers also have flaps that can be used to mark pages. SARANAC LAKE . MALONE . TICONDEROGA F I N D YO U R PLACE! LIBERAL ARTS . BUSINESS . ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE CRIMINAL JUSTICE . COMPUTER GRAPHICS AND DESIGN FINE ARTS . WILDERNESS RECREATION LEADERSHIP NURSING . RADIOLOGIC TECHNOLOGY . MASSAGE THERAPY w w w. n c c c . e d u

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