Sad news in the climbing world. Climbing legend John Bachar, age 51, was found at the base of the Dike Wall in Mammoth Lakes, California yesterday. There are not many details at this point, but it’s presumed that he was free soloing.
The Dike Wall is a beautiful cliff of pristine granite situated at 9,000ft above Mammoth Lakes where John lived with his son. John was climbing by himself and was found at the base of the 80ft North Wall.
SuperTopo has a thread up as a memorial to John.
(via Climbing Magazine and UKClimbing)
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known for his routes in magazine articles, does one know John Bachar. I first read about him in, “Rock Jocks, Hang dogs, and Wall Rats.” A book written by John Long. He talks about a young climber soloing pitch after pitch and finding no crux that would make him hesitate or cloud his certainty in climbing the route. I was a young teenager when I first read this book and John Bachar was more than twice my age. He was one of my first Idols in climbing, considering Chris Sharma had yet to be in a magazine for his first 5.14 climb. Article name, “Fourteen on Fourteen.” For me, John Bachar was a charector who lived in magazines like his famous boreal Vector add, “That dude has a particular oddor.” And something about a saxaphone. For me I”ll always have my magazines with climbers like John Bachar to read about, but the climbing world only has a handfull of rock heroes who do the stuff that he did. It’s the memory that will never die along with his routes only one, and one pitch of it have I tried. He truely was a mighty climber.