Fixed rope is the practice of fixing in place bolted ropes to assist climbers and walkers in exposed mountain locations. They are used widely on American and European climbing routes but disdained by purist mountaineers. Many guided expeditions to any of the eight-thousanders normally set up fixed rope on steep or icy sections of the route. For example, on the Hillary Step of Mount Everest, fixed rope is used to reduce the bottleneck of climbers that typically results from climbing this technical section just below the summit.
Famous quotes containing the words fixed and/or rope:
“Genius detects through the fly, through the caterpillar, through the grub, through the egg, the constant individual; through countless individuals the fixed species; through many species the genus; through all genera the steadfast type; through all the kingdoms of organized life the eternal unity. Nature is a mutable cloud which is always and never the same.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“First you find a little thread, a little thread leads you to a string, and the string leads you to a rope. And from the rope you hang by the ... neck.”
—A.I. (Albert Isaac)