Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Of cameras and granite

My record with cameras while on granite slabs is now 0-2 in favor of the granite. The first such instance was 2 years ago on the MR while returning to the Portal after going as far as Iceberg Lake with Snowy and Calhiker, and the results were nowhere as severe and final as the second instance, mentioned below (minus the details).

So as to the second instance, during the coming weeks, if anyone finds themselves (deliberately or by accident) wandering along the bottom of the south face of Half Dome (approx. below the saddle and the bottom end of the cables)



and you happen upon a bright red Casio Exilim "card" camera, in whole, or more likely in pieces, which looks like this (front view only),



and if either the tiny blue 2Gig SD chip or the part of
the camera still holding the SD chip is found, I would be more than grateful if you could retrieve the chip (I have full replacement coverage for the camera, so I don't really care about retrieving the camera itself) and contact me here so I can arrange to have the chip mailed to me.

In short, absent the highly unlikely event that someone actually finds the camera/chip while wandering in this rarely frequented area, the 2 weeks of vacation pictures that I took with this camera are lost (most notably, my first summit of Whitney via the MT, and my Tenaya Lake-Cloud's Rest-Half Dome-Happy Isles dayhike -- it was while descending the Half Dome cables during the latter that the camera met its demise). I realize that the chances of someone finding the camera/chip are slim to none, but ya never know...

As mentioned elsewhere, separate TR forthcoming.

CaT

CT,

Sorry you lost the camera.I know it's too late now, but I always put an address sticker on all my equipment, even my hiking poles. The odds are your name might have worn off by the time someone finds the camera, but then, maybe not. Now no one knows who to send it back to. Hope you get it back

With all the photos on the chip, it would be worth a trip before the first snow to perform a SAR! With the price drops on the cards, it's worth noting to carry several on such trips.

There are several other forums you can post for assistance.

http://yosemitenews.info/forum/list.php?f=1

Good luck

Man, CaT! That camera has got to be smashed into little pieces after tumbling down that path. Sure sorry for your loss.

But I doubt you'll spring for a trip out from Columbus just to go bushwhacking the back side of Half Dome.

Do you think it tumbled all the way down, or could it have stopped somewhere part way down?

That looks like the place where the Japanese student fell to his death a few months ago.

bobcat - Thanks. Good idea for my next camera and other equipment.

CheckSix - Thanks for the additional forums. I'll check them out. A personal camera SAR has certainly crossed my mind, despite coming from Ohio. Depends on Skybus airfares and my schedule.

Steve - If the cost were low enough, I'd spring for a trip from Ohio to bushwhack anywhere in the Sierra. I'm guessing the camera went all the way down to the ground. The mountaineering school in Curry Village also said it would probably be in little pieces. When I finally lost sight of it as it was tumbling down corner-over-corner, it was still intact.

DocRD - Yup, the 41-year-old Japanese tourist took the same fall line, but not nearly as far down, from what I remember reading.

CaT

CaT: Sorry for your loss. You have my sympathy. I was in Australia and my wife left our digital camera in a taxi. Of course the taxi company never found it. It was our trip of a lifetime and now we have very few pictures of it. Luckily I also had a video camcorder with some still shots on it. I was also on Half Dome in summer 2006. I dropped a 2-way radio going up the cables. I was amazed when the radio took a left hand bounce and kept going past the cable bottom and last I saw, it was heading down to the valley floor! Hope you get your chip back.
MJF

I'm sure there's lots of intersting stuff in the debris zone to the north and south of the cables.

( sounds like a good trip to plan . . . )

CaT, What is full replacement coverage mean? Please explain.
Joe

ShoelessJoe - Full replacement coverage means I paid an additional $90 when purchasing a $300 camera that guarantees that in the event of damage or loss (except theft or other third-party insurance coverable event), I get a completely new (or repaired to new status) camera at no further cost to me. In short, in this case, I get a new camera just like the one that went down the mountain -- well worth the $90 investment, since it would have cost me $300 to replace it otherwise. I don't normally purchase these kinds of insurance add-ons, but given the risk in this case (2 weeks of hiking in the California mountains), and my record with cameras on granite slabs (not too good), I thought the investment was worth it this time, and I'm now glad I did it.

Joel - Yeah, it would make an interesting hike, wouldn't it.

CaT

CaT- sorry to hear about your camera. The best 'insurance' you can get against things like this happening again is to attach and wear the lanyard whenever you are using a camera on high risk situations.

Can you let us know how well the replacement policy works in this case? I tried to collect on one once and learned that I had to return at least part of the damaged product so that they knew I wasn't just selling it.

WaClimber - I had the wrist strap around my wrist until the camera was safely in its carrying pouch entirely. Normally this procedure works fine. On the cables, it didn't. It was during the 1-2 seconds between slipping the strap off my wrist to zip up the pouch that the camera popped back out of the pouch. I will certainly take extra precautions in a similar situation next time around.

I'll let you know about the replacement insurance when I put in the claim, probably later this week. The insurance is with the camera store itself (Cord Camera), not the manufacturer (Casio).

CaT

Not that this will help in your current situation, however, there's a device called "Gear Keeper" http://www.gearkeeper.com/
that attaches to your camera case (which should be secured to yourself) and to the camera that is on a retractable thin cable that allows you enough range of motion to take a photo, then it retracts back in place. It's also quick release so if your companion also has a gear keeper, you can hand the camera to him (before going up the cables), he attaches the quick release to his Gear Keeper, and he has the same protection.

I use this for canyoneering and it's one of the best gear management devices I have found.

If you look at the way Bob carries his camera, you'll get a really good idea that insures you'll never lose it. I've adopted his method of using a piece of stout string that's long enough so that you can put the camera in your pants pocket.

When carrying the D-SLR, I carry the case with the strap across my left shoulder and the camera on my stomach. I have a mini-carabiner attached to a short lanyard that is attached to the shoulder strap clip on the camera that allows me to take photos without worrying the I'll lose it. I've "dropped" the camera several times, but the lanyard kept it from going too far.

CaT, sorry to hear about the loss. I know how much it hurts when you've lost valuable photos 'cause the card's still in the slot.

BTW: congrats on the Whitney summit. Who's crystal going to go after now? :-)

Jennifer - Thanks for the link. Looks like a great idea.

Richard - Do you have a link to the picture of Bob that you mentioned? I'm having a hard time visualizing your setup based on your verbal description (I'm one of those "gotta see it to visualize it" types ... sorry). And/or, a link to a picture of you with your setup would work too.

As for summitting, since I don't have a picture of it, my register entry read something like "Finally!!! Thanks kitkat [my wife], Snowy and Sierra Snail!" (since you and Snowy both tried to get me up to the summit in previous years).

Nice to be off Crystal's list.

My wife and I began @ 4:50 am, and got to where she had to turn around near the top of the switchbacks above Mirror Lake exactly 5 hours later. After making sure each of us had the gear we each needed to get to our respective destinations, we parted ways at 10:15. I summitted at 3:30, spent a half hour on the summit, departing at 4:00 p.m., and after sludging through the uphill portions of the back side before Trail Crest, finally buzzed down from Trail Crest, arriving back at the Portal at 8:45 p.m. More in my upcoming TR.

CaT

CaT - Sorry about your camera (and more importantly the pics).

One thing I like to do is use a couple smaller size memory cards versus one large card on long trips, that way if I ever do lose my camera, I atleast have the other cards with pictures on them.

Congrats on summiting Whitney!

Mike - Definitely a good idea. When I bought the camera, I had the option of buying two 1Gig chips, but ended up buying one 2Gig chip instead so I wouldn't run out of room so quickly on a long trip. Having used the camera a lot since I bought it, I now know that replacing the chip with a new one in transit would take about two seconds, so I will definitely reconsider this in the future. Thanks.

I was just thinking that if any of you who live in the area want an excuse to do a day hike in Yosemite before the weather degrades, and would be open to doing a "camera SAR" hike to try and locate my camera (see picture of camera at top of thread), or at least the piece with the little blue chip in it, in the area below the cables noted on the picture also at the top of this thread, I'd pay your (1) round trip gas, (2) Natl Park entry fee (if you don't already have a pass, etc.), (3) reasonable meal costs for the trip, and of course (4) mailing costs to mail the chip to me, if it is found in the camera or in a piece of the camera. This offer would be more for folks who already live closer to Yosemite than, say, for those who live in L.A., but if someone from the L.A. area is already up there anyway, the same offer would apply.

If interested, contact me via PM.

CaT

What I have done on long trips is take my laptop along, and every couple of days, offload the camera chip onto the hard drive. ...only last trip, I forgot to pack the power supply to the laptop

Re: the camera SAR. I'm tempted. I've always wondered how tough it would be to bushwhack down from Half Dome's backside rather than go the roundabout way the trail goes.

CaT: The weather is changing fast out here in California. A small storm front is heading toward the Sierras (not as far as Yosemite) so the camera SAR effort should be undertaken soon (I'm glad it sparked an interest).

Couple of things as a follow-up: Could you go to Google Earth and locate the POR area (point of rest)? Also, all National Park entrance fees are waived on Saturday 29 SEP 2007 - consider it a NPS holiday!

Anyone taking up this SAR - please be careful.