The Backside of Beyond

Bardini

The Bardini Foundation Newsletter Winter 2016/2017 Issue

In This Issue

Eastern Sierra

2016

Activities

2016 Contributions - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 2

Brautigan Dome by Allan Bard - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 3

Incoming - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 2

Purpose & Scenes - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 4

The annual donations in 2016 came from fewer donors than the prior year, but do-nation totals were still substantial. Looks like we’re developing a trend toward fewer donors with larger donations. Still, those of you that skipped writing a check last year should make sure you write one this year. And, of course, if you find your name on the donors list on page-2, we expect you’ll be on next year’s list, too! For tax purposes your donation is 100% tax deductible. If you require confirma-tion Bardini will snail mail or email you a letter confirming the date and amount of your donation. Make your check out to: Bardini Foundation, PO Box 1422,

August 5th, 2017

Bardini Foundation’s

20th Anniversary

2016 Donations

Down 27%

Guide Services

In late summer. Bardini Foundation guides led four clients on a loop trip over Pine Creek Pass to the Royce Lakes and then out via Piute Pass. This was followed by a trek into Humphreys Basin with five cli-ents. We lounged around Desolation Lake for a couple days and then two clients opted for an ascent of Mount Humphreys. A couple of weeks later, Tim Villanueva led two day hikes with three clients - one to Morgan Pass, the second to the summit of Chocolate Peak.

Youth Activities

Bardini guides Tim Villanueva and Wes Morrison worked with both Mono and Inyo County kids this past year. In late June a group of 8 Inyo kids were taken on a nature hike in the bristlecone forest in the White Mountains above Bish-op. Later in mid-July a group of Mono youth were taken rock climbing in the Mammoth Lakes area and in late July an Inyo group received rock climbing instruc-tion at South Lake. Tim conducted a snow science workshop at Bishop Park on October 18th. An ava-lanche was simulated on a tilt board fol-lowed by an avalanche beacon workshop. on November 22, equipped with cameras, fishing gear, binoculars, and sunglasses provided by the Foundation, Inyo kids were taken on a nature walk at Millpond Park and as winter approached, hiking clinics on observational skills and bird watching were attended. On December 27 Tim took six Inyo kids rock climbing in the Buttermilk area west of Bishop.

Youth approaching the top at South Lake climbing wall

Yes, it’s been twenty years and Bardini lives!

The Bardini Foundation will celebrate its twentieth anniversary on Saturday, Au-gust 5, 2017 at Mill Creek Station, just 8 miles north of downtown Bishop on Highway 395.

There will be keg beer, wine, and pot-luck cuisine. This opportunity to see people you haven’t seen in ages and enjoy a Bardini party like the ones we used to have on Sierra Street. We have been getting Allan’s slides dig-itized thanks to Ed Hartouni’s generosity and we intend to have a wonderful show for you at Roger Derryberry and Mary Lou Long’s Mill Creek Station theater. Other slides from old Yosemite days and even some from the Karakoram and Mexico may be shown. If you have some

of your favorite Allan Bard slides bring them along. We’ll have a few Carousels, trays, and stack loaders available. Mark your calendar.

Saturday, August 5th, 2017.

2016 Contributions

Individuals

2 The Backside of Beyond Winter 2016/2017 Issue

Benefactor $1000+ Paul Rudder

Angel $500+ Yvon & Melinda Chouinard

Michael Graber

Dave Huntsman Brian Parks

Patron $200+

Rick Saez

Partner $100+

Molly Attell Charles Grobe Peter Hackett Dennis Hennek Glenn Hirayama Lee & Susan Hughes John Moynier Walt Pachucki

Contributor $50+

Kevin Campbell Mary Canada John Eilts Joe Kelsey Robert McElroy Valerie & David Powdrell Sydney Quinn Lorenzo Stowell Thomas Volken

Sustainer $25+ Young Amano Craig Connally Dick Dorworth Marty Roberts

Organizations

Benefactor $2000+ DEW Foundation

Incoming

Thanks to all of you who have kept up the spirit of Allan through the Bardini Foundation. Keep up the great work. Stan Sanderson, Crowley Lake, CA Find enclosed my annual contribution, That was a nice tribute to Allan in #34. Things I recall (there were many—these are just a few: His hearty laugh around the campfire. That amazingly clean white cap of his (did he pack Tide into the backcountry?) How he would listen so attentively to anything you said to him. What a wonderful man. What a great loss to us and his beloved Sierra. Have a great year! Brian Parks, Madison, Wi Please let me have a coffee cup ... Lorenzo Stowell, Lone Pine, CA Always enjoy the newsletter. Especially now that I’m becoming more of an arm-chair adventurer. Tom Volken, San Francisco, CA Thanks for keeping THE SPIRIT alive. Peter Hackett, Ridgway, CO

Another

Remembrance

From the Introduction to the article Redline in Powder Magazine

November 1983

Allan Bard died recently. Most of you have no idea who Bard was because you’re too young or too new to the sport or, if you’ve heard of him, you think he was some gran-ola backcountry telemark retro old guy who had nothing to do with today’s skiing. Fact is, Bard was one of the coolest, sweetest, and most unassuming ski mountaineers you could meet in this or any other lifetime, a legendary storyteller who inspired me and many others to travel the world in search of romance and adventure on skis. Along with partner Tom Carter, he prowled the moun-tains of the planet and brought back tales of skiing high jinks and incredible wonder-ment at all that the high peaks had to offer, and each trip found him more amazed at the places he visited, not world weary or cynical the way so many travelers become.

“Bard and Carter.” “Carter and Bard.” After years of stories in the pages of Powder, the names seemed so natural together, so made for each other, symbolic of a partner-ship forged on serrated ridges and sharp metal edges…

...the boys had pioneered the Redline, a 200-mile, three-week three-pin ski tour along the spine of the Sierra Nevada. What studs!...

...Bard’s passing would be sad under any circumstances, but to me it seems espe-cially tragic because there are so few men like Bard left in the world. Allan had such a freshness and enthusiasm, such a wit, that you absolutely always felt better for having been with him. He was a raconteur in the truest sense of the word, with a permanent twinkle in his eye and another incredible tale always on his lips. I guess, in that sense, Bardini was indeed retro—retro in a way that he was reminiscent of an earlier age where you could use words like “swashbuckling,” “bon vivant,” and “elan’ and have them mean something.

… Fortunately we’ll always have Bard’s words to keep us true; to remind us...and to inspire us.

- Steve Casimiro

The Bardini Foundation begun work on the publication of a book of Bardini lore with anecdotes by noted personalities from Allan Bard’s skiing and climbing past including hundreds of Allan’s pho-tos. Ed Hartouni has begun digitizing all of Allan’s 35mm slides. Ed is doing this at no charge with better equipment than the Foundation has to work with. Ed’s toil will facilitate the book’s production eliminating the time consuming labor of scanning the thousands of slides four at a time. We are currently seeking a publisher for this endeavor and hope to begin selecting photos from the myriad of skiing, climbing, rafting, fishing, and landscape images to supplement the anecdotal text.

Bardini Book Coming

Winter 2016/2017 Issue The Backside of Beyond 3

Continued on next page

he cliffs. Unconsciously, my eye was drawn to the cliff, not just any cliff, a large gold wall. It was the biggest face around. I musingly picked out a line. It was quite direct and esthetic looking. I wondered if anyone had done it. Probably. I know Rowell had been here. Beckey too, I guess. Almost a month later Dave and I are walking toward the gold wall like forty-niners to the Sierra foothills. Ours was a differ-ent treasure but a no less arduous a task. The heavy loads shifted and creaked. My shoulders ached, my legs screamed for rest. “Dave, wanna stop at the bridge? Take a blow?’ “Naw, Glen Alvin is just a bit further.” “Yeah, I guess you’re right. Besides, the packs aren’t that heavy.” Just as we left the trail, it began to rain. “Super,” thinks I to myself. Trudging through a treacherous talus field in the rain is just gangs of fun. Eventually we take shelter under a large boulder to wait it out. We eat, talk some and doze in our bumpy awkward semi-prone bivy site. Finally the rain stops. The air is fresh as we walk the little bit to the base of the route, a broad spacious ledge. Almost on cue, as we unpack and sort our gear, the sun comes out, complete with Cecil B. DeMille “God rays”. The view from our comfortable little roost is grand. The wall above is beautiful and steep. I am scared. Why am I here? I don’t know what’s up there. I can’t nail A5 or A5. I have grim fantasies of totally losing control, difficult nailing, impossible blank sections, hideous 5.11 cracks that I might have to nail for lack of sufficient strength and technique to do them “correctly”. And there’s always unwarranted fear of tak-ing the dreaded plummet to the ground. Accident report reads: Better anchors, possibly a bolt could have saved those poor unfortunate lads. A hard hat (orange, of course) would have made the bodies easier to spot from the helicopter. “Oh well, enough of that, “ say I, “It’s all poppycock or the like, anyway. You’ve done walls, just never first ascents. Dave is more than experienced. Just RELAX!”

We sleep. The anticipation awakens me periodically. Next morning comes sooner than expected. Dave leads, skillful-ly, I might add, up past a bolt, and some dicey nailing, a short lean left and a sling belay from two slings. Standing, sitting, stretching, leaning, straining, exhaustion will be the rule on this route. The next pitch is up and left under a small roof, then a long awkward corner to a bag belay. The nailing is already too much for my fairly unskilled hands. “Good job man, that looked hard,” Dave says as he grabs our menagerie of tools. “Not as bad as the first. The next pitch looks easier,” I chirp. Awkward, licheny, and steep. Wire, stack, tied off pin, small stopper. “Watch me!” Dave moves on to the nut behind a flake. The flake groans and without warning belches him into space. It’s quick and short and my heart resumes beating. “You okay, man?” “Yeah, shit!” “What did you pull?” “The nut.” God! Did that tied off pin hold you”” “No, the number 2 stopper.” “Whew, thank our Father in Ventura, eh?” Dave resumes the climbing and soon comes the familiar “Off! You’re tied off!” I jug up to the belay. Slings again. Above us is one of the most beautiful corners I have ever seen. Mostly it looks good because it may go free. I begin. The climbing is complicated, jam, stem, face climb, chimney, jam. It is clean and harder than I expected. A few ex-changes with aid slings brings me to the end of my rope. Slings again. God, when is it going to let up? I drill to beef up the an-chor. My hand cramps around the hammer, it drops and hits me smartly in the shins, “Damn it!” “What?” “Oh, off!” The day drags on. Dave cleans. I sit in my butt bag and wonder whether we will find a comfortable place to bivy or if that will be in slings, too. After a quick exchange of iron, Dave boldly leads off. Amazing-ly, he manages to climb free a while, then back to the business at hand. He works like a machine, never fast, but never stop-ping. I can’t tell if it’s hard or not. The rope always moves. Any-way, it’s vertical or more where he is.

Brautigan Dome By Allan Bard

Reprinted from the March-April 1976 issue of Climbing

4 The Backside of Beyond Winter 2016/2017 Issue

Brautigan Dome - continued

Sling belays. I think to myself, my mind wanders into private pud-dles, awkward at first, comfortable for awhile. My mind is everywhere and nowhere. The intermittent blast and calm of wind. The whisper of nylon on rock. A hundred silver ear-ings hung from steel lobes strung with a rainbow thread stretch-ing up and out of sight. “Off belay!” Dave’s voice strains against the wind. The haul bag swings and levitates. Clean house and jug up. Pins and nuts, smash and jerk. Clean so there’s no trace. A chromoly foothold will tell of our passing. As I round a corner and clean toward Dave, I realize that not only has his belay not ended up on a ledge, but also the wall is slightly overhanging. Que bummer! Hammock bivies and I don’t get along, but it’s better than standing in slings. I dig for the ham-mocks and Dave drills. I cry to myself, “Man, I don’t want to sleep here. There must be a ledge.” “A ledge!” Down and left of us there is a ledge! A very comfortable looking platform. A quick rap, lower the baggage, and stretch out. We lounge, eat, snap pics, and generally farce about. Perfect bivy. The Volkswagen ledge. The weather is holding as the rock, our wall, our little perch, takes on the dark hues of twilight. Finally complete dark and twin-kling sky fortifies our hopes for good weather. I begin to count the numerous times I’ve felt the secure, cozy, almost Munchkin marvelousness of a warm bivy surrounded by puffy down. It’s fun camping on the crags. Well, sometimes. Off to Z-land for both of us. We sleep ,soundly. No rain, and no freezing temperatures. What more could we ask for? Snorting and groggy eyed, we feather our consciousness. Sun-rise on Tuolumne Peak. “Not a bad view, Turkey.” Morning du-ties, ciggy-butt for Dave and breakfast. Between peaches and honey and biscuits, Dave gurgles, “Ya know (chomp, chomp), I sure like this stuff better than getting fried eggs at the grill.” “Me, too!” What”ll we name this?” “I don’t know. We’ll think of something.” Organization of the bood-war and the kit-chin back into the haul. What fun. Stuff, cram, and crunch. Jug and drag back to the high point. Boy am I glad we didn’t have to park it here last night. We organize and orient. I take the rack and the sharp end. Up a lichen crack, nest, tied off, zero. A mini grapple avoids drilling and gets me into a better crack. More dirt and lichen in my eyes and down my shirt. “I’m climbing free!” “Slack!” “Okay I’m off.” “DY-NO-MITE! We got us a ledge!” Dave begins the familiar cleaning process. When he arrives, we sit and wish we’d found the ledge yesterday because it’s a good ledge and right on route. Anyway it looks like it will only be a couple more pitches.

Dave leads with slings up a leaning awkward corner. Free and easy after, then slower, easy again and out of rope. Also, “Off belay! Hey, man, I’m on top!” Clean, push, push, clip, bash, bash, ting, ting, ting. Push, push, clip, snap, flop, push, push, clip. Extract, figure out the puzzle backwards. Jug handles slide and bite to the summit. “All right! Hurray, the summit, the summit. We’ve made it!” The gear is strewn haphazardly around Dave. We pull up the rope and the bag, take off our slings and racks and packs and belts, and things. Relax. Snap pictures. Look at the high Sier-ra. Primo. Descend. The descent is typical, a gully. Two raps down small creeks, down climb, scramble talus and brush to the trail. No beaten path. First descent. Now all we have is an eight mile hike back. YEECH! We walk up to the Mountaineer Center as if we had just re-turned from work and swing through the kitchen. Herbert says, “Did you make it?” “Sure.” “You guys went pretty fast.” We drop the pack and the sack and talk. Herbert dubs it a mini-wall. We smile. It’s over.

Editor’s Note

This article, as mentioned in the title block, was written for Climbing – a magazine in its infancy in 1976. Not only was the magazine young, but so was Allan. He was not yet 24 years old and this article reflects that in its rhetoric. Allan became, in just a few more years, a prolific and gifted writer as evidenced in these two excerpts from a Powder article that he and Tom Carter authored in 1983 entitled Redline: “Can this pleasure be measured in thousands of feet or num-ber of turns or breadth of our smiles? Our joy ran like a cur-rent between us, a product of that whimsical flying feeling that is skiing … We had not conquered or skied the ultimate line, but the inti-

macy we gained on this ski route made us realize that this was only the highest line for us. There were many secret high lines, with hidden treasures waiting to be skied … “

I published the Brautigan Dome piece to illustrate and com-pare the style difference that a few years can make. What do

you think? Do you discern a difference? Of course I’m giving Allan all the credit for the Powder excerpts … maybe Tom actually wrote them … Tom are you out there?

Statement of Purpose

The Bardini Foundation is a group of friends and relatives who wish

to honor and commemorate their friend and brother, the late Allan

Bard, fondly known as "The Great Bardini". The Foundation was

formed to continue Allan's work and carry out his plans and dreams of

exposing people to the total mountain experience. In Allan's memory,

the Foundation will strive to provide the common man with Muir's

inspiration to "Climb the mountains and get their good tidings". The Bardini Foundation is providing: 1. Year-round backcountry guide services 2. Sponsorship of courses in avalanche safety, mountain Emergency medical practices, mountaineering skills, and wilderness appreciation 3. Continued publication and distribution of Allan's Shooting Star Guides 4. A newsletter to promote mountain ethics, protocol, and safety 5. Publication of Allan's writings and photographs 6. Funds for search and rescue groups, for training and equipment 7. Slide shows and seminars on mountain sports, and safety, 8. Funds to train and accredit, in cooperation with the American Mountain Guides Association, mountain guides of Allan's quality 9. Support for environmental and cultural projects of community interest in Bishop, California

Winter 2016/2017 Issue The Backside of Beyond 5

Nature walk in the Bristlecones Orientation at the Bristlecone Visitor Center

Scenes from Bardini Activites

South Lake rock climbing

Support Foundation Efforts

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Bardini Foundation PO Box 1422

Bishop CA 93515-1422

The Backside of Beyond Volume XV III January 2017 Number 1

The annual newsletter of the

Bardini Foundation, Inc. (760) 873-8036 www.bardini.org (760) 872-4413 don@bardini.org

Publisher/Editor

Don Lauria

Board of Directors Bob Behrendt - Don Lauria

Tim Villanueva Advisory Board

Robert Dery, MD - John Ellsworth

John Moynier - Walter Pachucki - J. Kent Steele, LLD

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