Best climbing guide (book) quotes

Hi England,

I'm glad you like the guide and I sincerely apologize for the short saddle stitch (staple) binding.
That has always been a problem since twenty-six sheets of paper is a bit too much for saddle stitching. I know that the center page, which, unfortunately inludes the park map, is the first to fall out, followed in suit by the next center-most pages.
In fact, my last printer went out of business and I am searching for a new one. The printers I have received quotes from so far have all told me that their stapler can't handle that much paper.
I'd love to go with a perfect binding, but that would raise the low price even further and I'm glad to say that in close to fifteen years, I've only had to raise the price by twenty-five cents.
I'm thinking of doing the collating, folding and stapling myself with a manual stapler, but we'll see what pans out.

Tom Hanson wrote:From Roper's original Yosemite guide: "On either end of the social spectrum there lies a leisure class"

Tom,
To keep the guide on the inexpensive side, you could use a coil-binding (NOT a comb-bind... those suck!) It would end up being more durable than the saddle-stitch, and far less expensive than perfect-binding (at least in small-ish batches.) Just a thought from someone who used to work in the print industry. :)

In the discussion of clean climbing ...

"The granite, like even the best of women, can only take the occasional pounding"

Desperate Grace - A book of Climbs by Rex Green and Dennis Turville.

The North Carolina Selected climbs guidebook is full of great quotes. My favorite (that I remember), in reference to a "5.8+" called Air Show-

"Steep and sustained with multiple cruxes, this may not be the best way to warm up. One false move high on the route and you may end up a bottle rocket with report."

Jive and Jump with the Miraculous Hump, Enchanted Rock.

"Bear with these opening bizarrities until you can grab the hump at the top. Finish wth fun exposure. Pee off the pedestal behind." -The Dome Drivers Manual

From "Schist Another Guide." one of the early guide books to Rumney.

Ament quoting Dylan in High Over Boulder: "They say that every man must need protection. They say that every man must fall. Yet I swear I see my reflection someplace so high above the wall"
Whenever I post to MP, another Dylan line often applies to me: "You're an idiot babe, it's a wonder you can even breath." Get up to speed with Blood on the Tracks, man.
Thanks to Pat for helping connect Dylan to climbing - brilliant!
Peace out.

Don't know if it's been posted yet.. but in the williams guide for the traps:

"In the 60's sex was safe and climbing was dangerous"

something along those lines.. don't have the guide with me

In the new guidebook to the Gunks, entitled THE GUNKS, the disclaimer states that the book "contains information that is nothing more than a compilation of opinions about climbing the rock climbs in the Black Hills Needles."... classic.

Todd Swain's description of Sandstone Samurai(?) on the Black Velvet Wall-" Bring small wireds- not that you'll get any in!"

And another from the uberclassic Cheap Way To Fly...'Sport climbing is only glorified toproping...the only difference is the poise needed to clip the bolt' (or something like that).

R.J. Secor's Guide to the High Sierra:

Describing a series of holds and jams necessary to climb those peaks:

"evangelical hammerlock".

On ratings (paraphrase):

"It could be that these ratings mean nothing. A 4th class route may have a 5.6 jam crack."

Another Erickson description worth noting: Perilous Journey, then considered 5.11-. The intro goes: "A hyper-modern horror. Don't bother taking a rope." The route description reads, in its entirety: "Whimper directly upward."

For even more entertainment, check out any of Dave Pagel's works regarding the North Shore of Lake Superior.

From the old Thomas Kelley guide to North Carolina, the description for Breaking Rocks is Hard to Do (5.9+) at Moore's Wall: "Start in a very deep flaring alcove. Hating life, thrash up the alcove until it becomes a crack."

From the Dixie Cragger's Atlas (TN), The Cobb (5.4) at Sunset: "Remember when you were a kid and you fell off your skateboard at 30 mph? Wear long pants."

JL

I don't know if any of the following quotes are from guidebooks, but I've found them quite humerous.

"Sport climbing is neither"

"Friends don't let friends climb slabs"

"Place thy protection well, lest the ground rise up and smite thee"

"Climbing, it's kind of like having fun, only different"

"There was once a young climber named McPott,
who tied an insecure figure-eight knot.
He screamed as he fell, a maniacal yell,
my God, I'll be hardly a spot!"

"Live fast, die young, and leave a smoking crater"

"Have fun or get hurt bad"

Lizard Head ... is the most difficult of Colorado summits to reach. In fact the rottenness of its 400' tower makes safety too much a matter of luck for comfort. Returning visitors have formed the opinion that the peak has become noticeably rottener and more dangerous. Our advice ... when you reach the base, take [a] picture and go home. ...Robert Ormes in the Guide to the Colorado Mountains, Seventh Edition, 1979

"If you do not accept full responsibility for your own actions, do not use this guide. Climbing is inherently dangerous. You will probably get hurt or die."

"There is an unspoken rule in Boulder that you have to be from here to be allowed to make fun of Boulder's funky goings-on. Which leads us to somewhat of a paradox. Very few people who live in Boulder are from Boulder, most having moved here from a state that everyone used to call 'paradise'. Nowadays, we call it California."

"A word of caution [on The Fiend]. In the fall of 1993, local hardman and all-around nice guy Mike Downing dislocated his knee cap on the crux back-step-Egyptian-knee-drop-auto-fellatio move. His partners evacuated him to where the ambulance dudes and dudettes could get him morphine.

For the remainder of the day, Mike didn't even know what time it was and probably forgot the bear sighting earlier that morning. The moral of the story is watch out for weird moves and bears and bring your own drugs so you won't have to wait for the rescue crew."

Classic Boulder Climbs
Knapp & Stevens, 1999

From Handren's Red Rocks guide book:

"He [Joe Herbst] was viewed as a human cam unit. 'Why do I need protection, when my body is securely locked into the crack?', he would say as he was 50 feet above his last tottering tube chock in a beastly flare."

From Peter Croft's "The Good, The Great, and the Awesome":

"My wagging companion and I once encountered a woman on horseback in the back country. We stepped off the trail to let her, her horse, and the pack laden ass that was bringing up her rear go by. Despite our good manners and a friendly hello, she glared down on us from her mount like an angry Charlton Heston in the Ten Commandments. Now you might say that because she so blatantly disapproved of my dog while parking her wide end on a far bigger animal that she was being a little self righteous, but you'd be wrong. I say she was being super self righteous (and I hope she falls off her horse)!"

from todd goss' book on southern utah...section about hazards of climbing in the desert

the mice and especially their poop carry the hanta virus..."try not to breathe".