DMM Couloir ropes: great durability and water repellency

Time after time, the Couloirs softly caught our leader falls and were not worse for the wear. With the amount of intense use we put on these ropes in nine days, I was surprised that they held up as well as they did. Generally, I go through multiple ropes in a year. The ropes still look ready for another trip. In a few weeks, I'm taking them on a month-long expedition to climb granite monoliths in Alaska's Kitchatnas. Here "the wind blows [around the towers] like a whistling gun notch—worse than Patagonia," says Ben Erdmann, my climbing partner.