The Sheep Buggerers of JT...BITD

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Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Apr 15, 2016 - 10:48am PT

Bushman asked:

How did Russ get 'the Fish' nickname anyway? Was it the fish face, like an angry carp?

Maybe later.
But I'll tell you what, Mooney knows!

This thread needs more pictures of Douglas Munoz.

From the 2006 JT reunion:

Climbing in the Flatirons, later that year:

The Fifth Flatiron:

The Dome, Boulder Canyon:

looking sketchy there...

Social climber

Lassitude 33

Apr 15, 2016 - 10:51am PT

The origin of the Fish moniker... a classic tale.

guyman

Social climber

Moorpark, CA.

Apr 15, 2016 - 11:31am PT

Swelly.... a step in the growth of one man.

Keep the pictures coming.....

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Apr 15, 2016 - 12:53pm PT

Mooney and The Boxer and I started climbing in 1974, when we were 14 years old, on Goldline.

This is way before we could drive, so our maturation as climbers was slow. And for a high percentage of that, through summer of 1977, it was just Doug and me, and still we didn't drive.

In late 1977, I started climbing with Larry Stone and Jeff Sewell and John Freriks. Larry would pick me up at Arcadia High School on Fridays in his big brown Dodge Power Wagon. I did the Joe Boy thing with them pretty solidly throughout the spring and summer of 1978. Also got roped in with Keith Cunning and the Uplanders at that time.

1978 was the year Craig Fry was deemed Rookie of the Year by his peers, which included not just Team B, but the remaining Stonemasters and their immediate disciples.

Fall of 1978 through spring of 1979 I really started branching out and although still doing some first ascents with the Joe Boys, I started climbing more with other people, first with Darrell Hensel, then, Erik Eriksson, Charles Cole, Kevin Powell, Lynn Hill, Dave Evans, Nick Badyrka, and Guy Keesee. Lots of bouldering and top roping with Bullwinkle, Bachar, Long, Mike, Mari, Yabo (... and soon after that, much partying with the Beatles and the Rolling Stones).

One of the main reasons I got out ahead of Munoz and The Boxer and started climbing with Larry, Jeff and John... and then E and others, is that Doug was doing varsity track & cross-country all the way through Pasadena High School graduation in 1978. From 1977 forward, I was only interested in rockclimbing and I was dedicated.

Russ Walling didn't enter into it until he bat-manned the rope behind Munoz on Sundance at Suicide in 1979, virtually as a non-climber. Ed Kaufer (an Uplander) and I climbed The Nose and the Steck Salathe just a month or two later. Bullwinkle and Mari and Lynn were just starting up the wall as we topped out on El Cap.

The Fish rose quickly. The Sheep Buggering thing started sometime after that. Erik met the Buggerers on the PCC campus, playing hacky sack in 1980 or 81. By 1981 and 1982, most of the separation of these different groups had melted away, and we were one big community of fairly seasoned climbers. That's when I started climbing with Russ.

Mooney and I got together just last year to recollect some of these things. Jeff, Erik and I have also looked into these timelines.

AKDOG

Mountain climber

Anchorage, AK

Apr 15, 2016 - 01:23pm PT

AKDOG

Mountain climber

Anchorage, AK

Apr 15, 2016 - 01:30pm PT

Check out the old school quick draws

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Apr 15, 2016 - 02:11pm PT

Jack Marshall a.k.a. Tripper Jack,
Working it on the Big Stone:

photo, Doug Munoz

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Apr 15, 2016 - 02:23pm PT

Erik on Chisholm Trail, Suicide:

photo, Doug Munoz

guyman

Social climber

Moorpark, CA.

Apr 15, 2016 - 02:31pm PT

Thanks for the photo of TRIPPER on the big stone.

This all brings back the memories that have now become so blurred... it was PRE-KIDS after all. (to Quote LA Women) And you are correct about the different factions blending into just one scene... by the late 70's I was starting to branch out and climb at many different spots around California, The Needles, Sequoia and the Mammoth Lakes area.

Ice camping with Nick.... 1979

BY 1984... I had a family who got most of my time....

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Apr 15, 2016 - 04:11pm PT

Photos taken during my tenure with the Joe Boys, in 1977:

A very young Tarbuster:

On the descent from a new route in Indian Cove, Euhedral:

All photos, Larry Stone

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Apr 15, 2016 - 04:14pm PT

Awesome photo of Keith Cunning (leader of The Uplanders), John Thacker, Mike Lechlinski, and John long, 1978 or 79:

photo, The Uplander

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Apr 15, 2016 - 04:16pm PT

Photos taken during 1981 or 1982, when I started climbing with Russ:

Tarbuster and The Fish, horsing around at Turtle Rock:

photo, Shawn Curtis

Tarbuster, Jessica, Russ Walling and Mike Paul kicking the sack with Dick Shockley:

photo, Shawn Curtis

Tarbuster, Crime of the Century:

photo, Russ Walling

The Fish, Desert Song:

photo, Walling collection

Tarbuster

climber

right here, right now

Apr 15, 2016 - 05:52pm PT

A highlight Buggerer moment,
The Manx, really their understudy or even mascot, leading Taxman:

photo, Russ Walling

dee ee

Mountain climber

Of THIS World (Planet Earth)

Apr 15, 2016 - 06:30pm PT

Tar, WOW thanks for all that.

I wish I still had a decent slide scanner.

I may go back into the deep depths of the slide archives and pull out some gold.

.....and thanks for the shots of John (Freriks), what a frickin' stud.

dee ee

Mountain climber

Of THIS World (Planet Earth)

Apr 15, 2016 - 06:51pm PT

When Doug (Mooney) and I moved into the house in Santee (84?ish) with John Freriks and Mike Casper I didn't really know Doug. Later Kent (The Manx) moved in as well. Also Mike's younger Bro John was there almost every night.

We started off a little rough and on one trip down to the "Belly Up Tavern" in Solano Beach with Greg Epperson and others to see the "Rebel Rockers" (?) I wanted to punch his effing lights out. He had a way of pushing your buttons till you wanted to burst.

Soon after that I learned to love the guy. I had my new dog "Washoe" living with us and for some reason I thought it was important to train him as an outside dog.

I learned later that those nights that I made Washoe stay outside Doug would let him in.

Doug had the outside "shack" as his bedroom.

It was something like 10 years later when Margy and Washoe were at Josh and Washoe ran over to a person in a distant group and started jumping up on him and just generally loving him. It was Doug! Washoe remembered him after all that time.

Here is a quickly scrawled story from those days.

"Dang Tar, the memories keep coming back. Yes I lost a rack AND a VW van in Mexico. The '66 van was a money pit. Before this episode I had blown my trick 1835 racing engine (that I had built in our living room in Santee)at Josh, so on this trip it was a measly 1600. It broke down and I had to leave it at the campsite after limping in. I returned a week later with parts, fixed it, enjoyed a weekend of climbing and headed home. On the way home I had another major mechanical and had to park it near La Rumerosa. Marge was escorting me back (after taking me down initially). I pulled all items of value and left it with no regrets. We saw it a couple of times after that and then it disappeared. To lose it was a blessing in disguise. That was the last VW I will ever own.

That Mooney shot is classic. That was the first time we did a route on The Throne. He and I went down with no beta in bad weather (at first). We were driving on a section of road in a wash and it was raining hard and , flooding, quite a bit. I missed where the road cut left out of the wash and then we were in trouble. The water was getting deeper and deeper and the water was shooting up over the front of the van, the van was starting to bog. It was too narrow to turn around and too soft to stop, I had to keep on the gas (as such is possible in a VW van). Just when we were starting to panic the canyon widened and there was enough room, I gunned it hard, bounced over a sandbar and pulled a u-turn, just barely making it. We found the turn and made it to the camp.
The next day the weather was perfect. We headed in to do the E. Buttress, all we knew is that there was a route there somewhere and it was 5.10 and may or may not have had aid as well. We started swinging leads and found the climbing tricky (multiple 5.10 sections) and the route finding even more so. I did quite a bit of aid on at least one pitch, we had no etriers or jumars. There were no topos. We saw no evidence of other ascents. Very late in the day we found ourselves coming up under a huge triangular roof in a dihedral that stuck out 40 or 50 feet. It looked like a total dead end. We thought we were f*#ked. We lucked out though and found a cave/chimney that tunneled through the roof and came out near the summit. We had done about 15 pitches.
It seemed like every time I went to do a big route there it was some kind of epic! Too much fun.
Yes Watusi, Guy Andrews was a bro. I haven't thought of him in a while."