Flyboys Rappelling Advice

Hi folks. I'm considering doing Flyboys this year with my climbing partner. Both of us have multi pitch experience and are solid 5.10/5.11 climbers. My question: Can the rappelling on this route be sped up by skipping every other rap anchor using a 70m rope?

Thanks!

Sorry to answer your questions with a different sort of answer, but I would really recommend the bike and/or car drop at the top of the cliff instead of rappelling. Makes for a simple, safe, and easy (and pretty fun on bikes) trip back down to the base of the route. I believe the rappels were set up for a 60m rope, so i'd be surprised if you can skip stations. 

Thanks, Marc. It would just be the two of us coming up from Portland, so taking two cars just for a shuttle is a no go. I've read about the biking option and I'll definitely consider it. I enjoy rappelling so it doesn't seem like the end of the world to have to spend an hour or two rapping on a nice day, but advice on speeding it up would be appreciated.

>RE: Can the rappelling on this route be sped up by skipping every other rap anchor using a 70m rope? 

Not recommended.  Pretty sure trying to skip rappels is part of what got a guy killed on prime rib a few years ago.

As mentioned by Marc, the route was set up for single rappels with a 60/70m rope - I'm confident the proper guide books re-iterate this.  Fly boys has a lot of ledges and sort of wanders.  Any time you save skipping rappels would be lost by the awkwardness introduced *by* skipping those rappels (e.g. having to pull your rope from an awkward angle - causing it to be more likely to get stuck, realizing you don't have enough rope). 

Now  - there might be one or two instances where it is continuously vertical and you can obviously skip one.. but generally I would avoid banking on skipping to save you time.  Just make sure you and your partner are efficient with turnovers and you will be fine.

The thing that will really slow you down on this route is the dozen or so other parties 

Shuttle bikes up. The raps are tedious. We had a 70 and linked a bunch of pitches on the way up, and I dont think it saved much time, It's like a bunch of single pitch routes stacked on top of each other, not like a big wall. They wander, and there's a bunch of moving belays, rope drag was horendous. I don't think we could've skipped any of the ra stations unless we had two ropes

+1 Shuttle bikes. 

Take a tag line and leap frog the raps if you want to save time. 

Rapped it with a 70 last year, I don't recall being able to skip any stations. I was coming up from Portland also (in a hybrid), so getting a bike up there wasn't an option. It took about 2 hours to rap down and was pretty chill. It's rather blocky, so a tagline would probably cause more problems than it solves.

I only thought about this after climbing Flyboys, but you can actually rent bikes in Mazama.

The route wanders so little would be gained by trying to skip raps. Did the raps myself and it's not so bad - i think ~1.5 hours for us.

Rick Atherton wrote:

It's rather blocky, so a tagline would probably cause more problems than it solves.

Leap froging is when two ropes are used independently of each other.  Rope A gets set on odd pitches and the tag line gets set on the even pitches or vise versa.  The leap frog is usually practiced when two teams of two join forces to get off a route quicker but a tag line can be used to split two experienced climbers to get down much quicker and more efficiently. 

This edit for the op: The other great thing about the leap frog rap is when you're both at a rap station with one rope above you and one rope below you then the climber responsible for the rope above you clears all knots (on above rope) and clips one end of above rope to harness and then rappel the rope below you while using your body weight to pull the rope above you. When you arrive at the lower station the rope you're pulling with your body weight will be in perfect position to thread the next station with.  Then the climber above repeats this process as they leap frog below you.  What it really saves you is pulling the rope with your hands for 18 pitches so your grip is more set for the next days climbing.  It's also much faster as you're both rapping and pulling the rope at the same time while doing less work. 

Rappelling is only slightly better than simply jumping off the top.. 

They offer a shuttle service at Goat's Beard iirc. 

But no, you won't be linking raps.

My recollection is that raps could not be skipped - I think there may even have been a bit of a scramble at one point...?

Why not just throw one of these in your pack and skate on down the road?

https://www.pennyskateboards.com/collections/22-skateboards

I would not rap this route. The rap line is directly over another route (Restless Natives) and I know people on this route who were almost hit with rocks falling from the FlyBoys rappel line. There is still quite a bit of loose stuff up there as far as I know. I think Bryan was maybe going to move the rap route but I don't think hes done that yet.

Josh Rappoport wrote:

My recollection is that raps could not be skipped - I think there may even have been a bit of a scramble at one point...?

Why not just throw one of these in your pack and skate on down the road?

https://www.pennyskateboards.com/collections/22-skateboards

Is the road paved the whole way? (asking because i'm a skinny-er tire cyclist, i'd have to rent an MTB)

Mx Amie wrote:

Is the road paved the whole way? (asking because i'm a skinny-er tire cyclist, i'd have to rent an MTB)

No, it's washboard. I rode off in a street bike and it was worse than any tour in Iraq. You'll want the fat tire bikes they rent there. But again, ask about the shuttle service there..

While stashing bikes/a second vehicle is my recommendation, last June it was plenty easy to hitch a ride down from friendly fellow climbers. Even if you have to walk a while it's hella better than rapping. 

I've done the bike shuttle, and I'd much rather do 20ish raps than that terrible road 3 times. It was annoying going up and down in a car and plain painful going down on a mtb, by far the crux of the route. If you like driving do the shuttle, but if you don't mind rapping past gym climbers do the raps.

Well, thanks for all of the advice folks. I'll take it all into consideration when the time comes.

getting back to your original question, i don't think it would work well to try to skip anchors when rapping.  the raps wander, bunch of loose shit, etc.  sometimes shorter raps are faster than long raps.

Shane Bennett wrote:

Hi folks. I'm considering doing Flyboys this year with my climbing partner. Both of us have multi pitch experience and are solid 5.10/5.11 climbers. My question: Can the rappelling on this route be sped up by skipping every other rap anchor using a 70m rope?

Thanks!

Learn how to trad climb so you can climb an actual classic multi pitch. Seriously though, flyboys isn't worth the hype