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Duped on the Dome

Almost embarrassingly, I had never climbed the on the 2,000 foot, vertical North face of Half Dome. The Captain always ruled me, it's mighty gold shimmering features like the Shield and the Heart adding to an elegance and grace of the most classical formation. and the 5-minute hike to the base of El Cap certainly was a bonus. For years, Half Dome's dark silhouette frowned down on me, and many times I had watched storms nail the steep grey cliff and grimace for those who were struggling on it. Even from some airy perches on El Cap, I had sweated out a light rainstorm which revealed snow on the summit of the black and white streaked "Dome." I knew of the notorious cable descent as well, having done it on a fine sunny day from a hike on the backside. Clearly, 10 or so deaths on the cables over the years makes this a dicey proposition in a lightning storm. The 600' of 2" thick cables are a natural lightning rod, and I was tentative thinking about the consequences of getting struck on the descent or stuck on the face. Tom (sport climbing guru Tom Herbert) and I undertook this goal with several constraints. One, he was going into medical school, the very next week. Two, a forty-day-old baby boy, Tommy, and, three, a lovely wife whom I'm sure was mortified after hearing Tom's version of this story. So I druthered about Reno, after knowing the Valley was in the classic summer thunderstorm pattern, trying to delay as long as possible to avoid a nasty weather run-in. But Tom was hyperanxious and was determined to see this project through, comne hell or high water. We racked in the Herbert's garage while Tommy (the baby) was hanging on his dad's chest, papoose style. Mostly I put all the stuff together while pops soothed his baby. Tommy seemed to like the clipping sounds and I secretly hope he'll be a bad-ass trad climber. We slapped a bunch of cams and runners together as per the gear list, and then reduced about 10% of it all. The Approach Both of us being basically lazy, and not wanting to trudge huge packs up the backside, (an long hike), we opted for the slabs approach. Tom had a map of this devious ascent faxed to facilitate routefinding on the shorter approach. The standard approach is a grueling 8 mile trail that winds it's way around the backside and finally cuts back to the eastern slabs after miles of swtichbacks. We were to take the 2 mile, but very steep approach which involves fixed ropes and some dicey scrambling. We got lost for an hour, even with the map, wandering around finally near the Porcelain Wall before figuring out how far we had gone awry. But after a 1 hour, disconcerting retreat, we found the right path and continued on, sweating buckets in the humid afternoon. Leaves and other debris would fall on the back of my neck, where I couldn't reach it and it became more than annoying, but Tom wouldn't brush it off. We were both "too gross" in his words. I reached futilely for the detritus, fighting packstraps, but to no avail. It would stick there until I dried off. We took many breaks and slogged to the base, where we saw 2 parties, one on "our" route and another on an even harder route. We scurried underneath the second party, well aware of the rockfall potential. Scoping out a bivy site in between the two routes was easy. There was a large flat spot 400 yards from either route. This is where we would sleep. We decided to haul all our food except for breakfast, up the first pitch, as I had heard and seen the damage done by bears. My friend Nicki's haulbag was pillaged and bear slobber remains on it to this day, a grim reminder of this hazard. Another friend claims that a bear was trying to get the bag while they were hauling it up a snowfield at the base (which is present early in the year). He said the bear would charge them on the snow, then slide down after losing his traction. My friend used the steps kicked into the snow by others, and was thankful that the bear didn't do the same. Dubious story, but still, I didn't want to take any chances. Tom led the first pitch, a 10c crack, in fine style and then hauled our food and water for the route, up to the anchor. I fought off a persisrent squirrel, who grabbed the packet of Fig Newtons and tried to run away with it. He didn't get that, but managed to run off with a PowerBar. It was chocolate, the flavor I despise, so I didn't really mind, and I had a vigilant eye on Tom, for whose life I responsible. A few raindrops fell, and I watched the other team, with a huge haulbag, creep up one pitch. We fixed the tent up, and watched a nice sunset as Tom called his wife on her cellular phone. I heard Tommy in the background and Tom tripped out after hanging up, marveling at the amazing deus ex machina (machine of the Gods). I always speak highly of technology, having some vested interest in a digital world, but the scene was pretty bizarre, likely the first time someone has called from where we were and talked to his newborn. At least I was amused. The night was hot, due to cloud cover keeping the heat from the Valley floor from dissipating. Our small two man tent kept the mosquitoes at bay, but was like a sauna after a bit. We get through a restless night of sleeping and waking. Both of us burn up inside the tent. Tom bumps me when I start to breathe loudly. Finally at 5:00 in the morning, we awoke to cloudy skies. A few drops fell by 6. I told Tom we could go down, but, he was bent on doing the route due to certain constraints (see page 1). So we simul-climbed some and ran a lot of pitches together with a 200' rope. We were definitely racing a strom which was building up in Tuolumne with dark clouds. 17 pitches up, in the Zig-Zags, the technical crux, a few raindrops starting hitting us. I cleaned these pitches on jumars in a frenzy, not caring about organizing gear, just get up there. I arrived at Thank God Ledge, a horizontal 16"wide ledge with a crack in the back that runs sideways for 80'. I shoed up with free boots and quickly embarked on the traversing pitch, as rain started to soak the rock. I crawled along the ledge using a combination of heel hooks and dog crawling. The end of the pitch was a nightmare. 5.9 chimney is hard when dry, but when dripping wet definitely ups the grade. The protection is below the feet in a loose chockstone which makes falling dicey. I squirmed into the crux moves and was facing the wrong way. I pawed at a sloper that was probably nice when dry. I desperately entangled myself to face the other way, where I was able to stretch to reach a reasonable hold. Tom said later that he couldn't bear to watch me as my feet bicycled inside the wider part of the chimney, unable to get purchase. I thrashed to get my foot outside the chimney and screamed my way out of the narrow. Perhaps we could make it, I thought, as rain drove me to the belay. Lightning cracked at the top, with instantaneous booms of thunder. I was gripped, but knew the crux wide pitch was done. It had stopped raining as well, but I asked Tom to lead after he followed the chimney in fine style batmanning, dogging, and squashing the pack. He told me how, instead of cleaning the pieces, he moved them along in the slightly ever-widening crack. I called him chickenshit and we laughed because we both really were. We found a bolt ladder that went free at 11d, but not when wet. Tom made quick work of the next two short pitches, though, and we topped out in a drizzle. I went to packing the gear and shooting down some sports gel as Tom coiled the rope. Tom commented on his hair standing straight on end. The static electricity was building up rapidlly. I had a cap on so I didnt feel the effect. I noticed and broke into a sprint, towards the backside, emphasizing to Tom the need to book down the cable descent. Lightning is eminent when your hair is standing on end. We scrambled madly down to treeline. Tom mostly clips bolts, which was my explanation for his naivete about lightning. We hit the shoulder within 30 minutes and busted down through the wet manzanita tunnels. We were relatively safe from lightning, and the storm was just hanging out, spitting the occasional shower. We hastened below the Japanese party, who had done 2 pitches in the time we did the last 19 and descended. They were knocking off loose rocks, I started screaming "NO ROCK," but more granite footballs fell near us, so again we broke into a sprint. After a call to the wife, Tom and I packed our sleeping gear and trudged down the slabs in on/off rain, but no lightning. We took 2 hours to get down and caught the shuttle bus from Mirror Lake back to Curry Village. The tourists stared at our weary faces and large packs, brimming with ropes and other gear, and whispered comments about our general condition. After an ice cream, a deli sandwich, and being sickened by the madding crowds in the Valley (the line at the pizza joint was over 50 people long), we drove back over Tioga pass, reveling in a bloody red sunset over Fresno on the return drive. After stopping by TM's (Tom's dad) place, and exchanging some epic stories (one in which Frank Sacherer had fallen out of the 5.9 chimney that was such a wet boggler for me), we continued on the road, so Tom could "play with my baby boy..I love my baby that's my boy.." Such a doting father he is. Tom told me to remind him the next time he had some hare-brained big wall scheme to just slap him. I told Tom he should never climb anything big in the Valley again, and at 2:00 am, we concurred. I wrestled the pack out of Tom's truck and dropped it in the living room, another climb completed (it's really done when you are lying on your mattress), and well worth the E-ticket price of admission.

By Jim Arnold

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The Breakfast Club

So there we were, at the "breakfast club" (a table full of SAR GUYS, SAR = Yosemite search and rescue) some of them (SARS) are "GROVELING"(eating left over food that the tourist don't throw away) and my wife asks "What are you doing?" A SAR boy looks up and replies "groveling what else! ". My friend "MONKEY BOY" tells me I should go get on Selagenilla a 5 pitch 5.8. He said "take the Commitment a 3 pitch 5.9 to get to the start of it, ending in a total of eight pitchs altogether. Take the Yosemite Falls trail back down to the valley and we'll have some beers tonight ! A tourist looks over in disgust at another SAR BOY groveling some leftovers from yet another table. "JIM I" comes over with his girlfriend, an employee from the cafeteria. The SAR boys start to drool as she leaves them 4 big pancakes, bacon & eggs. They all dig in and feast. Another one grabs a coffee cup from a recently vacated table and gets a free refill. Another tourist leaves a danish half eaten and it's desert for the "club". Kelle' & I leave to start our day of climbing. After a short walk we find the base of our route. We fire off the first route no problem. We are rewarded with a scenic view of the Lost Arrow Spire. Three fantastic pitches with no crowds and a nice little roof move just to make it a little fun. What more could we have asked for! At the breakfast club Kelle' had got most of the beta on how to find Selaginella from "MONKEY BOY", (a.k.a "THE COILER") when I went to the bath room so I didn't hear much of it first hand. After topping out on the Commitment we were to head up and right, find a 3rd class ramp, traverse it, then head up 5.8 crack. We found a ramp as we gazed at the wall in awe, belays and slings were everywhere (not a good sign). Routes seemed to be all over the place. We rejoiced after climbing three wonderful pitches, and were rewarded with this beautiful place all to ourselves, away from the crowds of people and the hordes of climbers monopolizing the standard classic routes, forcing long lines and lots of sitting on your @#!. I set up a belay for Kelle' on a tree. We were being attacked by a army of fire ants, I tell my wife to fire the first pitch off and head for the tree. I start killing the ants but they just keep coming. They are biteing me. Hundreds at a time I kill them. I belay my wife. The ants keep coming like some creepy sci-fi movie, I'm being eaten alive. I keep killing them, ten, twenty at a time. Kelle' disapears around the corner. She screams "oh' shit, - Fuck, - Fuck, - AHHH, - uhg, - Ahh"! I asked "Are you ok ?" She replies "The rock is rotten & sandy, and to make matters worse the crack is filled with dirt!" "God I made it, off belay" she yells. I follow up the traverse, there were no places for her to put in any pro, so if I fell it would have been a "king swing". I hit the traverse, do a small down climb and see Kelle' at the belay, I climb up towards her, "Shit this is bad! Man this sucks! Dam how did you? Fuck this sucks, it's so insipid.". I make the belay "Nice lead hon' you did a good job on that one." (It was one of those pitches that you're secretely glad that you weren't on the sharp end) "Thanks" she said. I thought our belay was somewhat dubious and expressed my feelings. Kelle' pipes "You said "head for the tree! "". "That's not a tree thats a rotten log, let's back it up with something.". She places a cam in and hands me the rack. The next pitch starts out a ramp that turns into a chimney. The ramp is straight foreward but no place for any pro (again). I get into the crack and get a peice in. It gets steep, real steep, I'm "way" overhang'n. I get a double shoulder lock, this a cool chimney I think to myself. I back step off the back wall and get a funky knee bar. I'm now completely inverted in this large man eating crack. I'm now to the point that my back is pointed to the ground. I'm almost horizontal in this thing. "Go Lon your a wild man thats cool, crank it" she yells "you can do it!". I find a deep fingerlock inside, I pull up and find a small ledge that I can stem up. I'm run out from my last pro. The chimney widens again and I get another double shoulder lock this time I find a place for pro but I can't get to my rack, I'm screwed. Gotta run it. I go for it, another back step, a knee lock with a pull up and the angle eazes up finally, the route becomes manageable. I get to the top and find some rotted slings, I look over and see a hangen' belay with two prehistoric rusty old bolts. The line heads up to a tree high on the wall. Kelle' takes the next pitch. It starts out a short 20 ft crack, then traverses on a sloping dike. She starts the pitch "I don't know about this pro". "What do you mean you don't know? Just back it up then.". "Fuck Lon this rock is rotten!" "Just cross the dike and grab that horn" I yelled to her. "Fuck Lon it's bad" she yelled. "Just grab the Horn". "I can't make it" she insisted. "Come on baby you can do it". "Fuck man, I don't, Fuck, I'm shit, I'm coming down YOU can have this one". "Ok, I'll lower you". "NO!! I'LL DOWN CLIMB. I don't like the pro" she screamed. "Ok" and down she climbed. She gave me the rack. I look up, no problem. I cruised up the crack, hit the dike and immediately broke off part of the dike (yikes). I hit a sheild like flake, it's fractured. I thought to myself "I'd like to take that rotten peice of rock for a Tae Kown Do demo, one front punch and I would turn that peice of granite into sand. God, how I could impress people with my technique and power. "Jeez, this crap is holden' my pro" I laugh to myself. I blindly place a zero TCU. This damn thing isn't going to do dick in a fall I think to myself. Oh' well, its' psychological at least. I'm crankin' hard on a small sloping dike, my right foot is placed up high and to the right in a stretched out fashion on a very small edge. My left is smeared on a small sloper way down and out to my left. I'm completely streched out. "Go Lon. Come on baby you can do this" she screams. Fuck! the flake is rotten. "I know it's bad up there. Don't fall" she states. The dike was breaking off on me. "Come on, you can make it" she encourages me. I shift my weight, more pressure on my right foot, a little more on the dike. How much can the dike hold before it breaks, I wonder? Suddenly I wish I was a wippit thin 185 lb sport climber. I shift again crimping hard. My arm is fully extended. I reach under the rotten flake, it's to FUCKING BIG for a fist jam, I'll have to do a straight arm bar and prie into it. I get deeper and deeper. My feet are slipping, I let go of the crumbling dike with my left hand (finally), I lean back on my arm bar, the horn is near. Sweat is dripping down my face. I start to have that talk with God, the one I always have with him. It's always the same I tell him that I'll quit climbing if he only lets me make this move and live. He knows I'm lying to him but he always gives me a break and let me do the move. I reach my left arm up and over, then around my head to my right side to grab the horn. My left hand hits it. I might live. I pull out my right arm from the undercling arm bar jam. I throw for the knob, my feet pop, I'm 25 ft off the belay on a one hander (gee, what fun). I grab the horn, my heart beats like a herd of Rhinos, hang on I think to myself, I want to live! I'm getting pumped, way pumped. My wife yelled "come on LON". I get a solid hold of it with my right hand, my feet smeared on the rock. I'm gripped. I let go with my left and grab a runner off my neck. I sling the horn. CLIP, ...OH' FUCK ME, that was close! I pull up myself up to nothing, blank, zip, notta ...just 5.10 plus smearing, no pro on dirty rotten grainy rock, not my idea of fun climbing. "Screw this! Let's see if this horn will hold me and I'll lower off." I hollered. After all I already had one conversation with God that day and I did'nt wish to press my luck. Kelle' lowers me down while I clean the route. We flip the line to get the sling back (I set it up so it could be retreived). I down climb the other side of the chimney to a small tree with rapel slings on it. I lower Kelle' off the slings from the top. We make a few more raps and we are back on the main ledge ALIVE and in ONE piece. God its good to be alive!

By Lon Harter

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When are you a "Climber"? by Lon Harter

When does one truly consider him/her self a climber? My climbing started as most I was backpacking at age 12 on weeklong trips. At14 I was going without any adult super vision covering a fair amount of ground in good time. All off the beaten path, scrambling up the peaks. My scrambling lead me astray many times forcing me to down climbing, and being scared to death of falling and dieing.... I took an Ice ax course then I started climbing at the local climbing shop/bouldering gym, this was way before we had the big climbing gyms of today. I started buildering, you know climbing on all the building at school. When I went to the mountains I would still getting in over my head without a belay.

I moved to San Francisco to be with my girlfriend, it was to far from the mountains for me. I was becoming consumed with climbing. On a trip back to Reno I met my future wife (which at the time I had had no idea about), Kelle' for the first time. I left my girlfriend and took a job, working in a program that Dan Osmond started as a climbing instructor for Rite of Passage. I worked under the supervision of an ex-marine core Mountain Warfare Instructor who happened to a AMGA guide as well.

I took assaulted kids climbing that had been incarcerated under a court order. Hey I was out climbing and these kids were belaying me. On my off days all I wanted to do was climb, drink and have sex. Kelle' and I went climbing for the first time and after only spending one day with her at the crags, I knew I was going to marry her. After a year with her we were married at Lover's Leap. Yet still I was not a climber. While in the program I met and started climbing with one of Dano's old climbing partners, Adde Bridwell. Later another one named Jim Arnold . All good things come to an end as they say so did this program. They asked me to coach tennis I laughed at them and quit. I still didn't feel like I was a climber.

I continued buying my rack. My ropes wore out. All my Christmas' and birthday's as far as I can remember have always been some type of outdoor gadget of some sort or an other. Now all I wanted was new ropes new harnesses. My whole paychecks were spent on climbing gear. I kept meeting new climbing partners, and going to new crags. My climbing season never ended, there was Ice climbing or a quick drive to Owens Valley where you could climb in the winter. I still didn't feel like I was a climber....... Something was missing.

I had become one dimensional, my list of good friend became short. I had nothing to talk to them about except climbing. I had almost every book on climbing that there was and every video made. I would even buy a new Gumby beginner book to see if there might possible be something in the book that I didn't already know. My thirst for climbing was unquenchable. Kelle' and I got married. I bought a stair master and would train every day watching my climbing videos over and over. I drove Kelle' nuts. I actually got down to a whippet thin 185 lbs which is hard for me to imagine now, after lifting for so many years. Mark Miller became our main partner. I only took jobs that would pay me enough money that I could go climbing at least 3 to 4 days a week. One year Mark, Kelle' and I went 26 weekends in a row on road trips to the Valley or the Leap, climbing and drinking up a storm. A climbing friend had a wedding and put a stop to our streak. We picked up next week right where we left off. I was leading hard 5.11 sport, high 5.10 trad, and WI V+ but I still didn't feel like I was a climber.

I looked at guys like Dano, Tommy Herbert, Jim Arnold and Mike Carville now they were climbers. I had put up a few first ascents.... Still I didn't feel like I was a real climber. Every summer we would tic off a 14'er (peak) never walk up, always fifth class routes or more. The harder the better. We went after some of the fifty classics and the Yosemite tee-shirt routes. People started asking me for beta on climbs that I had completed. The three of us (Mark, Kelle' and I) were always passing slow parties of two. Those few years were like magic for us. Still I was not a climber, but I knew some day I could call my self a climber. Mike Carville and I took a friend of mine out climbing in Tahoe once and we all did first ascents. My friend said to me as I was teaching him how to place a bolt "I feel like I'm climbing with the Guru's today." I laughed and thought to myself I feel that way ever time I climb with Mike.

One day at the Leap, Dano was working on the big boulder problem. I saw him chalk up his shoes. I asked him about it, and he said, "It cleans off the dirt and helps them stick". A week later I was in the Valley going up a greasy climb watching Mark and Kelle' slip all over it. I chalked up my shoes and walked up the route. They could not believe their eyes! "Ya! Just a trick Dano taught me" I said. Dano and I only spoke on about six occasions. I don't think he even knew my name but he always said hi with big smile. That's the kind of genuine climber he was. We had beer's with the "Man" Big Jim Bridwell a few times, once in Yosemite at the "Center of the Universe" when talking about our climbs of the day he said our climbing times of long routes were respectable for a party of three. It made me feel good but I still didn't feel like a climber yet.

I was teaching people to Ice climb and rock climb doing some guiding and still learning new short cuts. I would see people in the back county with big # 5 Camelots and brand new gear and think there in trouble.... Sure enough they would have an accident. Just not enough experience to be leading out on their own yet. My climbing career had lasted 8 years by this time. I was leading some of the harder ice routes at Lee Vining and I would hear the guides tell their students that some day if they stuck with it they to would be able to climb those routes. I had a few big walls under my belt, some hard sport lines, and alpine peaks as well. Still I couldn't call my self a climber. Something was missing. Then I realized I had not climbed what I considered the "Crown Jewel". I had done a few big walls but I had not climbed El Cap. Yet!

I wish I could say that I had a great time on El Cap. It was nice watching Alex Huber free the Salathe'. Truth was... some of it was great, most of it sucked. My partner, Jim and I were fighting and it ruined what should have been a great time. To make matters worse, embarrassingly, I fell on the "Great Roof" pitch, my buckle caught my rib cage and tore my cartilage. I blacked out for a slight second.... I was dazed and really screwed up. I didn't know how bad I was really hurt. I finished my lead. That night Jim and Kelle' would say something funny and I would start to almost cry from the pain in my ribs from the laughter, I would scream then laugh at myself then scream from the pain and then laugh again it was a vicious circle that I could not get out of. Jim and Kelle' got a good giggle out of it. It really was quite funny. I was starting to feel like a climber. Some people quit climbing after they top out on the "Big Stone" selling their gear and never to climbing again. John Long "my hero" talks about climbing partners who get in fist fights with each other whenever together, and hate each other but would never dream of climbing a big wall with any one else. Jim and I were at each other throats the pressure of walls. The best of friends and the worst of enemies, I though about throwing him off the route, but things cooled down and he helped me out. He is definitely one of the best climbing partners that I have had the privilege to climb with. Well, we made it. We topped out. There we sat and had some Port, smoked a fine cigar and pondered. Then it hit, I was a climber!!! Of all the stupidest things too do!!! I swore up and down I would never ever climb again. In one quick instant I became a climber then a retired climber. I didn't care that I had over $25,000 worth of climbing gear, I was not going to ever climb again period! Ya right!

It took 9 months for my ribs to heal. I statred climbing again just after a short two month lay off. I never fully regained my passion as it comes and goes in spurts. The next few years I concentrated on school and became a mountaint bike fanatic with my shock bike.. Now I have a small child (Keegan), a job and oh ya, I do a little bit of climbing and guiding. Today I asked my wife when did she feel like a climber? She said "The first time she climbed out side and could tie her own knots".

My Tae Kwon Do instructor always told me that "The Black Belt is only the beginning of understanding your art... you have come full circle, and now you can truly learn." El Cap didn't make me a climber, for I always was a climber at heart. It took me full circle and made me ready to learn. At 230 lbs I wouldn't say that I had the build of your typical climber. I have been privileged to climb with some truly great climbers, and they make great teachers. They made me the climber I am today.

Well I have to go pack my haul bag I'm going climbing! After all I am a climber and I will have to take Keegan on all those great routes that I climbed in my youth. So where are you going to climb today?

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Mt. Conness with Fred. by Jay Anderson

Simul-climinbg is something you only want to do with someone you trust, I thought as the rope went tight through the belay plate and I had to tighten my shoes and kiss the ground good-bye. When I got to the part where Mike on lead had said “I'm stymied” I had to wonder what sort of terrain he was currently on, sixty meters above me.

First Climbed by Warren Harding, Glenn Denny & Herb Swedlund in 1959 and freed by Galen Rowell & Chris Vandiver in ‘76, the Harding Route on Mt. Conness (V 5.10) features consistently good climbing on (mostly) firm, white, Sierra granite. This quality climbing, along with spectacular views of Tuoloumne Meadows, Conness Glacier and the arid, interior ranges of Nevada combine with the remote but accessible alpine setting to make this route the popular classic it has become in recent years.

The start of the climb is identified by the sobering memorial plaque placed for Dan Goodrich who was killed by rock fall on an early attempt on this route. For a guy whose name is attached to a number of things in the Yosemite climbing Pantheon, he didn't have a very long life: he didn't quite make it to thirty.

Five ten offwidth at twelve-thousand feet is wheezy enough to begin with, but when Mike yelled up that the amount of rope left was the same as the length of wide crack above me, and that he’d be simul-climbing after that, that’s when I got seriously out of breath. The moves were easy, but my respiration and heart rate accelerated the higher I climbed into the wide section. I no sooner clipped the last, worthless thirty-five year old bolt, and squeezed though the crux when my Mike yelled “okay, that’s it, here I come.”

I better move up into the five nine squeeze, I thought, reasoning that if Mike fell Id at least be wedged instead of yarded. A few rushed moves showed me the folly of this course. My heart thumped like a subwoofer in a popcorn popper. I could not suck in enough thin air, fast enough, to make the down payment on my oxygen debt. I wedged myself in as well as I could, panting and wheezing, My heart was going harder than I remembered it doing for some time. Hhhmmm; How fast is the max for a guy like me? hmm? 220-38=182 well, got that one beat, easy.

By the time my heart was down to it’s theoretical max. I was on the move again, past the hard climbing and hunting up a handy ledge.

Mike popped up onto the ledge, we drank some water and he was off. Although the climbing was going well, we were concerned with time. We’d left the car at seven am to do the six (?) mile approach and hadn’t managed to launch until twelve thirty. It was now maybe three and we were only about five-hundred feet up. We hoped for two more, two hundred foot pitches, but you never know.

“Off belay,’ Mike yelled from above. At least I though that’s what he yelled. I dismantled my belay and made ready. Try as I did I couldn’t raise a verbal response from my partner. But the rope kept tugging at my waist, so, crossing my metaphysical fingers, I started up. The crux of the section ahead was an overhanging face traverse. Its amazing some of the gravitationally-austere situations we take for granted when the time comes to do them, and there aren’t any other options. “Hey Mike, yoo hoo, I’m at the traverse now old buddy, hellooo!” My voice was lost in the breeze. I heard no response, but the rope remained tight. Yahoo! I blindly spread-eagled for obscure holds around a corner.- And to think, Walt Shipley actually soloed this route without a cumbersome rope. Well I had one, and it was probably attached to something. I made the traverse, the rope kept up with me and I caught up with Mike. His lead ended two and a half topo pitches up on a friendly ledge. The wind was up the heat had subsided and it was time to move on.

I ran out sixty meters to a stance in a low angle groove. After that, we were able to scramble to the summit easily. We’d done a ten pitch route in five pitches and four and a half hours. Anne was waiting for us when we got to the pack drop-off point. We drank the rest of our water, ate our powerbars, gossiped about our friends. We started down as the sun dipped behind the western mountains.

We had to hustle, but it felt good. I new we were going to get back with enough light. We were pretty tired as we marched down the trail. I wondered how my partner was feeling. One year earlier he, Mike Friedrichs, had just crawled out of a body cast that he’d inhabited for twelve weeks after taking a seventy foot grounder at American Forks that had broken his back in three places. He seemed to be holding up pretty damn well. The Sunlight gasped its last, just after the perilous creek crossing that we managed with six dry feet. I stopped off at the little house in the campground while my cohorts elected to let their inertia carry them the rest of the way.

When I arrived at the car Mike was supine in the dirt with his head on a pack. “My back is sore,” he said. Fair enough.

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Wide World of Sport by Jay Anderson

There are a lot of tricky wide cracks, gymnastic climbs involving inversion and or handstacking techniques. But the epitome of offwidth is a continuous, full rope length crack slightly overhanging of constant width. Too wide for handstacks, too narrow to get inside, in a crack of a certain width and steepness, no upper body lockoff technique is applicable. A solid chicken wing is a utopian fantasy. Reality is an irrepressible force; tipping you back and squeezing you out; the only thing holding a climber in such a climb are various thigh- and leg-locks. These low lockoff put a huge lever-arm on the upper body; constant tension of front and back torso musculature holds the body in place. Arms and shoulders pressed hard enough that the rock cuts to the bone merely relive a small amount of the shearing torso strain. Such a crack is an ultimate expression of the offwidth ideal.

Richard leversee in his gridwork exploration of climbable rock found a crack that seemed to fit the criterion. It splits a two hundred and forty foot tall flake in the kings River basin. The flake sits atop a chaotic hillside of manzanita, scrub oak, ticks and rattlesnakes. It sits at the base of the six hundred foot loaf of orange granite from which it cleaved. Nightmarish tales of horrendous bushwhacking through overgrowth so thick that progress takes hours to the mile, so bad that it lead one party of bolters, (forty years ago, no names, please) to opt for the extreme measure of clearing a trail via a controlled (?) burn. For us this dictated an approach from the top of the crag. An abandoned summit road, overgrown but hikable, and six hundred feet of static rope allowed for a relatively stress free approach. It also lent a sort of big wall feeling to the whole affair; rappel in, Tyrollean across to the flake, climb, jug out.

Prespective routes first become projects then obsessions. How deeply involved the participants get embroiled determines the final product. I was lucky enough to get involved in this after Richard had done some of the Donkey work of bolting the rappels and finding the approach, I got off easy, or so I thought.

The slabs were running with snow and melt when the three of us started down. Richard went first, since he had placed the rappel route we thought he would know where he was going. Six hundred soggy feet below I arrived, soaked to the bone in a twenty foot wide grotto behind the 250’ by 400’ potato chip flake. It was like rappelling into a glacial crevasse, cold and dark with water pouring down on top of us. Soaring cracks promised a potential for exceptional, multiple pitch shaded summer climbing. At the time I only wanted to get to the sun. The cracks in the grotto split through to the outside of the Flake making the day’s project and projects for future days. After Richard fought the sponge like ropes out of his descender we scrambled through the grotto around the flake, and traversed back along the outside of the flake through dense shrubbery to the crack.

“What do you think?”asked Richard. I didn’t know what to say as I looked up the perfect crack. Above where I sat on a bay laurel branch an almost perfectly parrallel-sided, wide, offwidth swept up for over two hundred feet. A trick of the perspective and foreshortened made it look less than vertical.

It looked like a beautiful, classic moderate offwidth. I planned to get inside it and run it out. Place two bolts for a belay and we’d be out of there; ha-ha!

I hung my clothes out to dry in the dense undergrowth as I racked the Arsenal.: Two sets of bigbbros, two sets of Big dudes, Five # five camalots and a larger , prototype cam. I included some smaller pieces on general principles.

The first ten feet were like the crux of some five eleven minus route, Cream maybe, it over hung slightly, but was never quite wide enough to get in. I could jam my legs but my arms merely served to hold me upright. Twenty feet higher and it hadn’t let up, it had gotten harder. But fortunately the overhanging nature kept the rain off me and even Richard hanging in space whit his photo gear.

Forty feet up I passed the last place narrow enough for a #5 camalot. There had been no let up. I did an occasional five ten stem move to rest ( read, fatigue different muscles) long enough to get my breathing back down below the anaerobic threshold.

At fifty feet after placing a marginal ‘Bro and seeing double, the decision to drill was made. I’ll just haul up the bolt rig, place a good one here and get on with it.

With three and a half inch steel security, I proceeded. Above me the wall rippled like a highway on a hot day in the desert. I climbed right side in , with my back against a pronounced offset, unfortunately the whole wall overhung slightly and the crack slanted to the left. Above me the more overhanging left side of the crack undulated into a series of little overhangs. I could see a series of little mincruxes coming one after the other, but after each, it looked like a little rest.

Five overhangs, four bolts and no rests later, I was only a hundred feet up and the March afternoon shadows were getting long. I left a photo rope clipped at the high point and bailed.

In a misguided effort to save ourselves work we had left those massive ascenders and anchor-like aiders behind, planning to do an easy wet route back to the top of the cliff. Since the day had gotten too late and wet to get the three of us up a genuine climb we opted for the walk-out. Richard had heard that someone had done it before and lived. We left all the climbing gear tucked safely away at the base.

By the time I lowered off, the sun, like killroy, barely peaked over the western horizon. Paul had wondered off to find the remains of the once cleared trail.

“It’ll be dark in an hour,” said Richard. “That ought to be enough time to walk back up to the road.”

But, when we ran into Paul, bushwhacking his way through the jungle that makes up the certain parts of the sierra foothills, his view was different. “It’s going to be a long night. We should have started up hours ago.” It might be a mile from the base back up to the top of the cliff. It took hours. One headlamp, one flashlight and a full moon helped. Some places we could walk, staggering through Manzanita, shrub oaks and laurels, avoiding cliffs and working our way up and right, these were the best times. Mostly we crawled on our bellies. Underneath the underbrush was the most common approach of the evening.

Two weeks later we returned.

We were motivated, the last two weeks had let the tension and anticipation simmer. By the time we were to go we were ready; barely containable.. For various reason we arrived separately at the crag. Richard left at eleven o’clock at night, arrived at dawn hiked in, rapped the slab, Tyrollean traversed to the flake, armed it with anchor bolts rapped the route, installed a belay station and some more protection bolts. I knew he was psyched.

While he did that I drove, crossing the snowy spine of the Sierras. Even in a Saab with studded snow tires, and udder disregard for the speed limit, it still took seven hours just to get there. But the white knuckle driving triggered the fight or flight response I was to need the next day.

One hitch though, Paul couldn't make it this time. One hundred miles east of Fresno seven PM on a Monday night, we were full of adrenaline, we were ready to go, too full of vitriol to halt the wheels now. “Know anyone in Fresno?” asked Richard. He didn't add that we needed someone who could climb 5.12 offwidth, didn’t mind rappelling six hundred feet down a wet slab to a Tyrollean traverse, then jumar out afterward, was free during the week, and could find the way out there on backroads in the first place.

“ ... I don’t think so ...”

“Oh, I know, that guy that started the route on the other side of the flake. Where's my day-timer?”

In a few minutes he was on the phone with Brad Jarrett, a guy he’d never met, who was fresh from a new route in Patagonia, with time on his hands, who’d done the offwidth circuit in Yosemite and said he would meet us at eight am.

He got there at Eight thirty, what the hell? A Half hour late is early by climbing standards.

Hills only get steeper and packs only get heavier. At least there are three people to hump the load. The ground seemed drier except for the snow drifts, what a crazy spring.

What I like about climbing, any climbing, be it; offwidth, finger cracks, crags, slabs, pockets, sport climbs, long routes, granite, limestone, plastic, even trudging up snowfields or hanging in a hammock in the rain; is that the way through it is to fully abandon yourself to what your doing and accept it on it’s own terms. Keeping this in mind, there was a lot to like in this climb.

The first fifty feet were harder than I remembered or expected. I truly didn’t think I could do it. I decided to keep going as long as I could. I climbed as far as possible, then got whatever, thigh-locked, toe smeary, upper body levered out backwards-’rest’ that I could and held it until my breathing rate dropped to a sustainable level, or I got too pumped holding the rest. Then I’d creep a little higher up the crack, hopefully through the next overhang and to the next bolt. I never felt like I could do the entire thing, but I always felt that I could go just a little bit farther. I didn’t think of the climb as a whole but managed each short section individually. The climb felt better after I unloaded all the usable pro in the first fifty feet. The climbing above is harder, but I was down to slings quickdraws, two pair of large Bigbro’s, and a solitary mutant marfanesque giant cam; a skeleton rack as these things are judged.

Every so often I tried to push the cam along for overhead pro, but each time it slid right through and I ended up clipping it on the rack to give it a ride up the cliff. There were no little tricks left, just climbing on, face grinding into the rock, clipping bolts as they came.

The route by this point was a series of mini-bulges each with its own physical and technical crux. My Legs and hips were in a constant state of tension, levering me into the crack, as it was too narrow to hang much weight from my shoulders and upper body. I approached each little bulge, squeezed through it, and found some sort of feeble stance to rest on, long enough to get my respiration and heart rate back down to sustainable levels. I had to pace myself and I couldn't get a regular breathing pattern going. Illustrate more strain

In the last fifteen feet the angle lessens somewhat, there are occasional, actual, microedges. I pulled up on a thank-god face hold near the top and just as I start to adjust my hips it snapped! Visions of failure; all that work for nothing, I’d have to come back! I ground in my hips, and slapped the china smooth surface of the inside wall of the crack. I got just enough purchase to fight gravity.

It’s in the bag, I thought, as I neared the end. Then I reached up to clip the second to last of the eleven bolts and my forearm spasmed. Try as I could, I couldn’t work a carbiner held over my head. I inched up until the bolt was at my waist, then I could clip it.

One more bolt and the belay stance was just above me. I reached the lip to pull up, it was too hard, I couldn’t do it. I continued up the crack until I could step over left onto the Eagle perch of the belay. Careful not to blow it at the end, I tied in slowly and methodically, the double loop of the clove hitch was almost beyond the available dexterity of my mashed potato forearms; I dropped it twice before I could tie in.

“Off belay! “

“Belay off.”

“How much rope is left?”

“”Bout a foot.”

Richard, on his photo rope jugged into the stance and laughed.

“Good guess at where to drill the belay, Bub.”

Brad, anxious after spending half the day belaying, started off quickly then slowed to a steady measured pace. ‘This must be at least five eleven c,” he said, pausing to unclip the the first bolt.

See what you think after the next hundred and twenty feet, I thought to myself. He tied the rack he’d cleaned onto the end of the photo rope and kept plugging away.

“I’m so out of shape,” he muttered, a phrase he was to repeat several times. Yeah right, Brad.

Occasionally he experimented with going left side in, which often worked for a few moves.

By the time Brad reached the belay it was getting late. How do we manage to keep running out of daylight? I wondered. He would need time to recover, so I had to lead the last pitch to the top of the flake. A much shorter, lower angle, wider pitch, it felt like the last round with a heavy weight. It looked easy from the belay, like everything else on this route it was much more difficult than expected. It was just too wide for heel toes. I could get way inside it, I got bomber chicken wings, no way I could fall, but upward progress was incredibly slow. I muddled upward.

Eight feet before the end the angle kicks and it really is easy, careful not to skate on black lichens I lurched to the summit.

“Off belay”

“Cool, you’re right at the middle mark.”

The sun was down low on the horizon when Brad Yelled, “To Save time I’ll try to lieback. “

He made good time, until the rope went tight at my waist.

“Umph, stupid lichens.”

Brad topped, threeway congratulations, quick arrangements for lowering the haulbag across the void, and confirmation on which line to jug and Richard took off up the four hundred foot fixed line. He topped out and started hauling.

I began the Tyrollean traverse-escape just as the sun cratered into the horizon.

Sell your soul for all the biggest cams you can find; #5 camalots, the larger size big dudes, (now #6 Friends!) these are the smallest things you’ll need . Use them to protect the first fifty feet. After the first bolt the crack is too wide for all conventional pro, except the two largest size bigbros. Carry them for possible use between bolts on the rest of the pitch, if you can hang on long enough to get them in.

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Excalithe by Jay Anderson

“This is soo scary... All these pieces could come out... I could die any second... This is so cool!!...”
Andy, a big wall neophyte, got to lead the A-4 pitch. From the belay it sounded like he was getting his money’s worth. From on top of a line of copperheads and rurps topped off by counter diagonal opposing hooks came his shrill banshee wail. From his hooks he was able to regain the crack and make his way to the end of the pitch. The fixing was over. Andy had been horny to do his first Wall.
I was looking for a new offwidth project. the previous summer I had finally climbed Lucille, the world’s first five thirteen squeeze chimney and my off and on project of the last nine years. I hadn’t done done an El Cap route in a couple of years. Andy was up for anything. We decided to go for Excalibur. Years earlier, Steve Quinlan had mentioned that the wide pitches would probably go free; photos seemed to back him up. The first day we fixed five easy pitches. For the next few days a plethora of big wall delay beasts attacked us; I dropped the RP’s, another party appeared on our fixed lines one morning only to spend the day branching onto, then bailing out of, Cosmos. We awoke for a dawn patrol start only to be rained on. We ran away to the Bay Area for a couple of days. When we got back to the valley our time was running out; we both had commitments coming up back in Arizona and couldn’t handle any more delays. Fortunately the weather was great.
We jugged seven pitches and Andy stormed across the hook pitch to the base of the wide cracks. We hauled our two hundred pounds of gear up as the afternoon sun caught us. I was psyched, the pitch looked good, but we only had one afternoon available for it. The first part was a licheny lieback protected with four and a half inch pieces, it came slowly. After thirty feet of so the crack doglegs left and the real offwidth begins. Hard from the start, it is especially hard to protect without getting tangled in the rope and pro. I tried it several times and wound up yoyo-ing back down to the belay more times than a Duncan Imperial ™. The sun sank behind the Gold Wall to the West. Eventually I made it up three quarters of the pitch, having worked out the pro and moves. But it was late and I was hammered. Had it been on the ground somewhere, I would have taken a rest day and come back. As it was, with our time frame and position, there was nothing to do but leapfrog big dudes and aid to the end of the pitch. I was able to tack on the next pitch in the same lead when Andy tied on our third rope to the lead line. I collapsed on the top of the flake, where it forms a chimney. I knew that the pitches would go, indeed Werner Braun had told us of almost freeing the first one on lead and having Dave Altman almost follow it free, but for me, it would have to wait for another trip.
I hauled the freight up to the belay and tried not to think of the accomplishment that hadn’t gone down. Instead , I concentrated on having a good time on the big wall adventure we found ourselves in the middle of. The next morning started with the almost overwhelming task of getting two hundred pounds of shit into two haul bags. We had gear distributed along two clotheslines, stacked on both levels of the condo, as well as a precariously balanced stove and coffee pot perched on the brink of the chimney abyss. If we dropped the coffee we would be in trouble.
Conveniently ignoring the Second (?) law of thermodynamics we were able to decrease entropy, load all that crap into and onto the bags, and get going. A few pitches higher, Andy got to have his way with an A-3, spongy , mossy waterfall. I cleaned the pitch, and joined him. There was a fork in the road; I could either stay on route by hooking off left on more mossy hummocks, or hang a right and do a pendulum that makes the king swing look like a bump, and get into the Salathe.
“Okay, lower me another twenty feet and I’ll try again,” I yelled.
The decision made, we proceeded up the El Cap route that requires possibly the smallest rack on the stone, (an afternoon’s freeclimbing rack for vedauwoo would do it) with an arsenal fit for the Troll Wall. The benefit of being on an easier faster route was that we had about twice as much food and water as we needed and plenty of available ledge time to eat it.
That night we slept on El Cap Spire. We walked around, took our harnesses off, we each ate three cans of mandarin orange segments. The next morning we sponged carbo’s to just under the puke stage and then went merrily on our way. We strolled along the pitches until another suitable ledge materialized under our feet and we stopped for a twelve hour snack.
We topped out pretty early the next day after an unpleasant episode of freezing on the hanging belay on the head wall waiting for the sun, wishing that the hats weren’t buried in one of the pig twins. After topping out the real trouble began. Although we’d made a big dent in the food and water department, alternately leaving it for other parties and guzzling, we still had a mammoth rack of wide gear, 60 some pitons, ledges, hammers and all sorts of other ‘essential stuff’. And only the two of us to carry it down.
Andy carried a pack in front and one in back.-”This ‘s gotta be ninety fuckin’ pounds.”
I got off lightly with the major haul bag stretching from below my butt to over my head. I’m sure it wasn’t over seventy pounds. We staggered through the manzanita toward the rappel route. To pass the time we played a game of counting the number of times we fell down. When we reached the top rappel anchor Andy had pulled fully into the lead with a comfortable margin, nine falls to my seven.
We survived the three rappels and I made my move, utilizing the steep pine needle covered trail to my advantage. Quickly I tied Andy and actually moved ahead. But by the time we got to the road youth prevailed , he caught up and we tied with thirteen full craters a piece.

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Lucille by Jay Anderson

-"Lucille has messed my mind up, but I still love her." Frank Zappa, from Joe's Garage.

In Vedauwoo I found the ultimate Wide Crack challenge. It seemed like the place to look. The words Vedauwoo and offwidth go together like coffee and climbing. Even some of the face climbs there have token offwidth sections. It’s not true that all the climbs at Vedauwoo are wide and mean. Dogmatic wide crack avoiders see the large fissures that lurk there and imagine “Jaws”-like scenarios of being trapped inside. Scenarios become rumors, rumors become stories and the tale they tell is of nasty five inch cracks with pointy teeth and caustic venom. Most Vedauwoo climbers don’t even like offwidth. They just have to do it more often to get up various lines. They don’t search it out. But I do.

Ever since I learned that you could get inside ’em ( a back to the womb thing) I’ve been afflicted with a gluttonous offwidth Jones. At a certain point I realized that although Vedauwoo may have the most offwidths per acre, it didn’t, until recently at least, have the hardest ones.

In the Eighties, Bob Scarpelli uped the ante as far as hard Vedawide climbs are concerned. His climbs Squat, Pretzel Factor, Bad Girl's Dream, Muscle & Fitness and others represent probably the largest concentration of modern wide climbs in a single area. These, as well as some of the older easier classics, pioneered by Gary Issacs, John Garson, Doug Cairns, Layne Kopischka and others in the seventies, have made Vedauwoo a necessary destination for the aspiring offwidth hardperson. But, there are harder wide cracks in California, Arizona and Colorado, respectively; The Owl roof, Paisano Overhang, Improbability Drive, and Animal Magnetism, others as well.

Still, there was this one crack in Vedauwoo that I imagined would prove to be harder than any of those... The first time I saw the roof that would become known as Lucille, was in August of 1979. I couldn't believe it. How could a line so beautiful have remained unclimbed? A magnificent forty foot roof with a squeeze chimney running through it in the corner where it meets a vertical wall. With the bulging, smoothly rounded lines of a Henry Moore sculpture, the chimney turns the roof and the offset slides from the North side to the South side, from a vertical to a horizontal orientation, while the the crack goes from horizontal to vertical. We looked up at it and tried to imagine what it would be like. It looked like you’d be tunneling sideways through a chimney with one foot low on a foot rail. Hard five ten or so, we guessed, easier if hidden holds turned up. Little did we know.

First we had to put up a pitch to access the cave beneath the roof. Even this got us in trouble. Bill Roberts and I attempted the crack directly beneath the big roof. It sported it's own four foot fist crack roof. Our first attempt was brought to an end when we had to do a lichenectomy on Bill's eye. That night we watched TV and drank beers. A commercial for a record collection of Blues came on and we had a name for the first pitch "Best of The Blues".

The next day we went back up joined by Bob Scarpelli. Bill lead the pitch and Bob and I followed. Being either ignorant or insecure, we underrated (if inflammatory letters to international climbing magazines can be believed) it at 5.10a. Finally we were in the cave looking at the big roof. To say it was intimidating, especially in those days of E.B.'s and tube chocks, is like saying El Cap goes up for a ways. Here we were, isolated in the bowels of a dark, dank, chill belay cave, the uneven floor paved with vermin poop, while before us, the roof swept out above and off into the blazing sunlight. The crack flared downward like an elongated cross section of an inverted funnel, threatening to disgorge would-be ascentionists. We worked on the roof for the rest of the day. Over a period of several hours each of the three of us tried it several times. After the exhaustive effort of trying to tunnel sideways, we discovered that we could use the foot rail and do a sort of a five ten 'walk' out to near the end of the roof.

I finally made it most of the way out the roof, with the psychological protection provided by tipped out tubes. That got me out to the hard part. Where you have to move up, after going sideways, is where the puzzle starts. Your toes are on a sloping edge that you can't see. Your shoulders are in a bomb bay chimney that starts at mid chest height and is offset from the the foot-rail by almost two feet. You lean back over the abyss. Somehow you have to move your body into a chimney that is so flaring that you have to hoist yourself up to a horizontal orientation to get your lower leg to a point narrow enough to jam the flare knee to heel, and yet two feet higher, it’s too narrow to turn your head. You could either look back at the tube chalk, rocking on it's tips, or alternatively, out through blinders, into the abyss. In either case, you can't see the part of the crack where your arms, legs and body are trying to make unlikely jams. You have to do them blind, looking ahead at how far you have to go. After a few feeble attempts we ran away and tried to plan a better protection system.

Late that summer my Father died and I went to California. When I got back to Wyoming it was winter and nobody was climbing cracks, wide or thin.

-"Any Girl that looks that innocent just got to be called Lucille" -George Kennedy, Cool Hand Luke, as recalled to by Paul Piana after last call on 25¢ beer night in “The Operating Room.”.

The spring of nineteen eighty I spent in Yosemite, riding earthquakes and big walls. I didn't get back into offwidth shape till the fall. I placed a bolt at the end of the foot-rail and it began to snow. I tried the moves a few times before lowering off. Winter came and I called it a year. Eighty one was like eighty with the difference being that when I finally got to the climb and clipped the bolt, it broke off in my hand. Remember the defective bolt episode of the late seventies/early eighties?

In eighty two I moved four hundred miles away, to Utah, commuting was getting impractical. I didn't return to Vedauwoo until the Fall of eighty four. Mike (Fred) Freidreichs and Greg Waterman and I went out and tried the climb this time armed with big camming units. (“Friend” is a registered trademark that I wouldn’t want to compromise). The BCU’s worked perfectly. I was able to safely fall more times than I really wanted to. Cold reality hit me in the face like an old diaper, a realization came over me, I knew then that it would never go.

"That's it, I'm tired of this damn thing, I don't ever want to see it again!
I'm never coming back here!"

A few months later I was in Laramie for a wedding. I visited Bob Scarpelli.
"Are you going back on that climb? Because if you're not, I want it."

"It's all yours Bob." I said.

It was three years before I came back. I climbed in Vedauwoo for three weeks before even thinking about the big roof. Even though I'd abandoned it, we'd named it. It was now known as Lucille, after B.B. King's guitar, continuing the Blues motif started with best of the Blues.

Somehow word of this route got out. People I'd never met before in Yosemite, Paradise Forks, Joshua Tree,even far flung gravel piles in the Desert were asking me how Lucille was going. With all this commotion we decided to give it another shot, just for laughs.

We set out armed with tunes. We soloed up Walt’s Wall, the blaster in Fred’s pack sending out a sonic wall infringing on some nearby, athletic slabin’ greenies’ wilderness experience. For the nth time Fred lead best of the Blues. We left the booming boom box at the base of the Crag. I tried a few times and at my high point came within less then a body length from the summit. This was real progress! It changed my whole view of things. Fred was still skeptical, but hopeful. Just then Little Richard’s memorexed voice wailed from below, “Lucille!”

"That's the first time I ever thought this thing could go." Fred said

when we got down. We decided to take a break and get rested before the next attempt. We rapped down to get into the sun; did I mention that this thing is always in the shade and it's always cold, no matter what? Even on ninety degree days in August? Unfortunately we found the University of Wyoming Norwegian exchange students having a many keg, generator-run-stereo-party. We stayed for “a beer” but after a few beer relays, keg spout sucking marathons, etc it was late. The next day was the last chance to try the route before I had to take off to Arizona (I'd moved again).

When I tried the climb, the efforts of the previous day appeared to have created more Lactic acid then I could push through. We’d also climbed pretty hard for the previous weeks with too few rest days (At least for an old guy like me.) I got into the hard section and just hurt too bad. I needed everything and could muster nothing. Rats! For over a year an armbarring wound on my left elbow would make it too painful to rest that elbow on the armrest of the car. [as we approach the millenium, twelve years later, that pain is still with me]

Nineteen Eighty Eight. This thing had clearly gone on way too long. Visions of it were invading my dreams at night, I was dating events in my life relative to attempts on this climb. I was going to be in Wyoming for other reasons and decided that my only goal in Vedauwoo this time was Lucille. I was completely invested, I wanted nothing more than to do that climb. I I talked to Fred and he was psyched too, he wanted this thing over with as much as I did. He spent $150 on wide pro.

After a day of warmups Fred and I went up to the Hatbox, I'm not sure if that's the day he lead Best of the Blues blindfolded or with one hand tied behind his back. I lead out the roof and toped my previous high point, but still didn't make it. Then Fred tried it (The first time in all these years anybody else had, after the very first attempt!). Ten years of climbing fierce offwidths had honed him more than he’d thought. He made it into the hard moves before being launched into space. All of a sudden this was something within his sphere. We decided to rest and do some easier climbs and come back in a week.

That week we got some rest and did some early ascents; pretzel Factor- 3rd ascent, Muscle & Fitness-2nd? (5.11? Bob? really?) in an effort to “Think Wide.” The drive built. When the bolt broke in '81 Will Gilmer, my comrade on that attempt, and I considered toproping it. I wasn’t completely sure why we didn’t.; I was so frustrated at not being able to continue right then that it seemed like the only thing to do. But for some reason we held back. Likewise, as this project dragged on into the more conservative era of Reagan, Thatcher and top to bottom climbing, somewhere along the line we realized that we could have saved a lot of time (years) in the long run by employing the hangdog rehearsal strategy. A strategy that by 1988 was hardly controversial. But we didn't. It wasn't so much that we felt as strongly against these styles as in ” the old days”, But that I'd started this climb in one style and it seemed important enough to finish it that way. Another compromise presented itself. When I almost had it, on the last few attempts, slimy lichens caused falls. It seemed almost stupid not to wire brush these on rappel, I’ve certainly done this on other climbs.. This time a war council with Fred decided against it. This climb had already turned into a nine year epic, since we’d already gone so far doing it , we figured we might as well persevere and go the full, classic, yo-yo, ground up, traditional style. We weren’t making an effort to sway anybody else's views of how to climb. It was more that we were going to get the full value, for ourselves. It could at least be a lasting footnote to a passing style and a tribute to the climbers who thought enough about style to climb that way.

I remember thinking; “Today it has to go. This is the the third day on the route.” The third day on the current trip, that is, I didn't even know how many times I'd tried this climb in the last nine years. “ It has to go today. “ I had put back my travel plans a day for not getting the day before. “I've got to climb this climb get in my car and drive a thousand miles.” “Yesterday was so close, my chalk marked hand had marked a spot I'd once put my foot on when downclimbing from the summit. It had to go. I couldn’t be that close and not do it. “

Fred tells me the belay's ready and I go. The five ten lieback seems shaky in the cool morning eight thousand foot air. After ten feet of lieback I'm at the start of the forty foot roof. I reclip the #4 Camalot ( in 84 it was a #4 friend, in 1979 an #11 Hex) left from yesterday. Now I'm squeezing through the first constriction, my feet below me on a toe-rail, my upper body jammed over space in a downflaring bombay chimney. I rest and get my breathing under control before I continue out sideways, clipping the next two pieces, bigbros. Now I'm in a position that seems like a rest only because it's easier than where I've been and what's to come. I clip the last piece accessible from the dwindling toe-rail, a six inch big dude. Lichens grind into my scalp, I blink chalk out of my eyes. I'm losing strength here.

Fred reminds me that the pump meter is going.

I start the first five twelve sequence. “ I went up and almost got it.

Fred went up and I expected him to get it. “I'll be so glad to have it over that I won't go psychotic by the thought that I worked on it all these years and then still didn’t lead it first,” I though/believed/rationalized. Fortunately I didn’t have to test this rationalization. Fred came close, but not close enough. Lucille squished him out into space in the middle of a particularly difficult and insecure sequence.

We took an hour off for stretching and meditating and previsualisation after the first attempt. As it turned out I previsualised it all wrong, but I hung on long enough to be at the top finally, screaming and crying with Fred screaming at the belay below me, and Alobar the Dog barking at the base of the crag. After all those years, all the changes in techniques and equipment, finally I knew where the hardest wide crack was.

On my second attempt I lead the crack and it became a climb. To my knowledge it is the very first 5.13 Squeeze Chimney, one of a small number of five thirteens put up in traditional style.

When it was Fred's turn to follow he got going and climbed the hardest squeeze chimney in the World in perfect form.

The next day Alobar and I drove home to Arizona. We took the long way, East through Cheyenne before heading South, so that I could see the climb one last time from interstate eighty. Appropriately enough, just as we saw it, KTCL played Stone Free by Jimi Hendrix. -"Play it, Lucille." B.B. King.

---

Mon capitan

Jim Arnold give an honest introspect into the state of mind of climbing on the "Big Stone", with these frank stories.


FROM: backcountry.com TO: content editors Hello, It is hard to believe the adventure sport that embodies individuality and freedom is suffering from traffic jams in the crags, but it’s true. I’m a Salt Lake based freelancer who just wrote this story about how the explosion in speed climbing is causing a major clash in climbing styles, after a distinguished local climber was forced to turn around on El Cap last fall. I wrote it for backcountry.com, and they told me I could send the story to whatever sites I wanted to offer it to as free editorial as long as their backcountry.com mentions were preserved. Let me know if you can use the story, or would like to see the one I sent out a few weeks ago on why ultralight backpacking gear makes sense for all hikers, or another on my test of the new MIOX water purifier. Please call with any questions. I pasted it below and attached a word file. Sincerely, Skip Knowles 801.608.0715 cell LOVING IT TO DEATH: TRAFFIC JAMS ON EL CAPITAN By Skip Knowles, courtesy of backcountry.com Severe weather didn't halt free climber Brad Barlage's assault on El Cap last Fall, nor did dehydration, equipment failure or injury. The mountain didn't stop him at all. Too many climbers did. Barlage, 31, a sales rep for Black Diamond, shot up 14 pitches in one on El Capitan, about halfway to the top of the 3,200 foot ascent. Starting in the pre-dawn light, he whooshed past eight people on the route only to rear-end a group that refused to let him pass. Not planning for a slow, gear-heavy climb, he was forced to retreat. On classic big wall climbs across the west, crowded routes and a community-wide increase in speed climbing prowess are causing traffic jams and pileups. The best routes are crowded for a reason; they are the best. It has always been a problem, but there is at least twice as much traffic as 10 years ago on most routes, and the advent of speed climbing has exacerbated the friction. It is a clash of climbing styles more than anything. If you want to climb fast, you do things differently. If you're traveling light and fast without extra gear to spend the night, or extra retreat gear, you can't switch gears and slow down because you are corked by other people who are doing it in a different style, taking up to five days. They have a lot more bulky gear and weight. Imagine you're on the autobahn, but it is only a single lane. You've trained your whole life to get here and go fast, but some body in a beater Volkswagon pulls out in front of you. They won't let you pass, and you don't have enough fuel to drive all day in first gear. "So you're going 20 mph," Barlage says, "and a ferrari whips up behind you. Most folks would let you pass." But not everyone. The solutions? Be willing to explore, learn to climb in the dark and know how to keep a cool head when things don't go your way. It was well within the capabilities of Barlage and partner Todd Bibler (of Bibler tent fame) to climb up and down El Cap in 24 hours. Barlage has climbed most crags in the West, and has racked up global adventures, too, even kite-skiing Baffin Island with Andrew McLean. Besides re-defining the term wall-tent, Bibler was one of the first climbers to do a 5.13. The weather was good, 70 degrees, and their strategy simple. Looking up from the ground, the team could see people clinging and camping above on the route. Bibler and Barlage decided to start super early, around 4 a.m., and get past everyone on the lower route while they're sleeping. "Then, the next section of people were a thousand feet up, and we'd get to them while they're waking up and plead our case," Barlage said. A lot like trying to pick a fast line through traffic on the autobahn. When you're moving so much faster than other people, (instead of five pitches in 12 hours they did 14 in five hours), most people will work with you, Barlage said, but the key is being unselfish; you offer to fix a pitch for them, take their ropes or haul a bag. "It's not a small thing to offer to haul someone's 200 pound bag up a pitch," Barlage said. "Most people are willing to do that and if not I offer to meet them and buy them a beer, and say 'what can I do'?" A speed climber is utterly at the mercy of a slower climber, and there's literally no getting around it. It's one path, one person at one time, with bottleneck belets forming stopping points for possible passes. At some point, the slower climber has to wait anywhere from five minutes to an hour on the belay-delay if they are allowing someone to pass. They have to wait to start the next pitch, "so you offer to take their rope up," Barlage says. Between 15 and 20 people were on the Nose route that day on El Cap, and Bibler and Brad had already passed at least 8. "You try to communicate upwards, and yell 'hey we're coming up'," Barlage said. Finally, Barlage and Bibler were atop a tower communicating that they would like to pass and the four people above them said no, they were not going to pass, no matter what. And that is that. All that travel, gear, preparation and expense, and that's it. Brad offered to haul their bag, put up a pitch, "whatever it takes, and they wanted nothing to do with it," he said. "So we had to rappel back down." Maybe 10 years ago he'd have raised his voice, but not now. "You can be a dick, and say we're going to pass you and that's the way it is," he said, "but that's their time is just as important as yours, just cause they're slower doesn't mean they have any less of a right to be there. That’s just the way it goes." People don't like to be passed because dropped gear could endanger them, and they invested time to get on the route. Sometimes, it's possible to find a place where the route splits and you can pass that way. If not, well... "They're doing their thing, you're doing yours, if you can't make it work go elsewhere, where there are less people," he said. Add in the problem of limited optimal climatic windows for a big wall attack, and weather and temperature concentrate people on any route of significance. "Every place, it's just a fact of life. Yosemite is where it really matters, big walls, lots of people, and some of the best routes in the world," Barlage said, "Zion in the spring and fall is pretty crowded." So should you not go fast? Go more with the flow? No. "Ultimately going fast and light is a huge advantage," Barlage said. "That day I climbed 14 pitches in five hours, and they did 3 pitches the rest of the day so I still got to climb a bunch more than others, and I think that is how most people are going, trying to get faster, all the gear is becoming lighter." The average Joe is faster than 10 years ago, partly due to the advent of gear and partly because of changing attitudes and goals. Carabiners, protection, even ropes are lighter and easier to maneuver. Utah climbing legend Ted Wilson pioneered many of that state's routes since starting out in 1957. He has hit the Grand every year since then, sometimes more, for a total of over 70 ascents on the Tetons, in addition to most of the other western classics. Now the crowding of routes reminds him of slow golfers not allowing others to play through. "It's frustrating, now I want to take my kid this summer (to Grand Teton) and I realize I can't go and just go up the mountain," he said. "I have to find out if there's a space available and be there at 6 a.m. in a lineup to get a camping spot. " "It's discouraging and it's a hassle to get the climb set up...but that's the lament of the pioneer," Wilson said. "You have to get used to it, be social, enjoy other people because they're going to be there. Give them leeway." Going early and working with people is still the best strategy, or do climbs when people are not climbing: start late, or consider climbing at 3 a.m. or 6 p.m., climbing through the night. NIGHT TIME: THE CLIMB-IT CLIMATE: There are some strong advantages to nocturnal ascents with headlamps. Most people cannot climb routes that are as difficult as ones they can handle during the day. It's too hard to see holds, place protection safely and doesn't seem natural to most. Traffic problems crop up when people are climbing quickly. And if you are climbing quickly, that means you are climbing below your peak ability level, and that means that with practice you can do that climb at night. Advantages? You use less water, and water is weight and weight is speed. You can't move fast with a heavy pack. Nighttime is quieter, there is no sun to zap energy , and less wind. There is a special appeal, too, in a zen-like focus that comes at night. "Things become really simple, all you focus on is climbing, you aren't checking other stuff out," Barlage said. "I like it just as much as day climbing." It should only be done after practice, and it is critical to know your limits. In the darkness it's easy to get over your head and into a dangerous situation, so work up to it. Start with climbing pitches that you know with a headlamp. Do daylight ascents of two-pitch routes, then five, linking them, and then move on to a 10-pitch route, spending a day and going as fast as possible. EXPLORE: If you are looking for something different, definitely explore, Barlage said. "But if you want to climb the good stuff, do it and just expect to work around and work with people and accomplish your goals," he said. Whatever you do, don't become a speed-snob. "I hate people that think they own the rock because they climb fast," he said. "Nobody is more important than anybody else." And if you're the slow caboose blocking a route, try Not to squash someone else's hopes if someone is faster than you, particularly if they are gracious in their pleas for permission to pass. Wilson prefers to remain the pioneer. In his sixties now, he still does summer and a little winter mountaineering, but he doesn't head here everybody else is, has been or will be. Instead, he goes to the ranges of Montana. "Nobody goes there, everybody wants to do the same climbs, the grand, El Cap, everyone wants to hang out on the nose route," Wilson said. "Climbers are funny, they like to think they're really independent people but they're really sheep. They read 50 Classic Climbs, so they all rush to them but there are thousands of climbs elsewhere and few people are pioneering these days." With longtime partner Rick Reese, a fellow Salt Lake City climber and Wilson's partner for a half century, Wilson bagged a beautiful west face in the Jefferson Range two summers ago. "It was a lovely multi-pitch rock climb on a face anybody would die to go to," Wilson said. "And nobody had been up there, to our knowledge." Exploring takes commitment, though. You have to be willing to do your research, and perhaps some severe backpacking to get to it. "But it's a lot more gratifying, also, than running out and doing some established climb that everyone and their dog is on," Wilson said. Whether honking your horn on the autobahn or exploring an uncharted crag, those who are down with the sickness know it's well worth the trouble. "Climbing is one of the greatest joys on earth," Barlage said. "There's something about it, it can encompass whatever you need. Maybe you need some peace, or a workout, some suffering, or maybe you just want to get out away from things and be in some incredible places. That's one cool thing about climbing you can make it whatever you need." EL CAP RE-CAP: Here’s a wrap up on the lessons from El Cap. 1. Speed climbing is still a rewarding technique, and should not be abandoned because of traffic, Barlage says, because you can do so much more climbing in a day. 2. That said, the two smartest approaches to dealing with traffic are getting a good alpine start while others are still sleeping, and showing a relentless willingness to work with people. If you can’t stay calm and be gracious, appreciating that everyone has the same right to be there as you, popular climbs are simply not going to work for you no matter how fast you are. If you’re impatient, consider exploring. 3. Besides starting early, consider climbing late, say, starting at 6 p.m., climbing into late evening or even through the night. 4. Brush up on night climbing. Nocturnal climbing presents a new world of challenges, but climbers who gain enough prowess so that popular climbs are below their peak level can enjoy the many advantages of climbing when the bats are flying: using less water (less weight); dealing with less wind; no crowds; cooler temperatures and enjoying a new dimension in climbing. But practice, practice, practice. 5. Explore: If dealing with the crowds sounds like more trouble than it’s worth, you have a pioneer spirit and should consider digging out new routes. While you will not discover a new El Cap, there are many multi-pitch climbs that have no name, and no crowds on the crags. This takes homework, time, and generally a home in the West.

 

---

FROM: backcountry.com



TO: content editors



Hello,

It is hard to believe the adventure sport that embodies individuality and freedom is suffering from traffic jams in the crags, but it’s true. I’m a Salt Lake based freelancer who just wrote this story about how the explosion in speed climbing is causing a major clash in climbing styles, after a distinguished local climber was forced to turn around on El Cap last fall. I wrote it for backcountry.com, and they told me I could send the story to whatever sites I wanted to offer it to as free editorial as long as their backcountry.com mentions were preserved.

Let me know if you can use the story, or would like to see the one I sent out a few weeks ago on why ultralight backpacking gear makes sense for all hikers, or another on my test of the new MIOX water purifier. Please call with any questions. I pasted it below and attached a word file.

Sincerely,

Skip Knowles

801.608.0715 cell

LOVING IT TO DEATH: TRAFFIC JAMS ON EL CAPITAN

By Skip Knowles, courtesy of backcountry.com

Severe weather didn't halt free climber Brad Barlage's assault on El Cap last Fall, nor did dehydration, equipment failure or injury. The mountain didn't stop him at all. Too many climbers did. Barlage, 31, a sales rep for Black Diamond, shot up 14 pitches in one on El Capitan, about halfway to the top of the 3,200 foot ascent.
Starting in the pre-dawn light, he whooshed past eight people on the route only to rear-end a group that refused to let him pass. Not planning for a slow, gear-heavy climb, he was forced to retreat.
On classic big wall climbs across the west, crowded routes and a community-wide increase in speed climbing prowess are causing traffic jams and pileups.
The best routes are crowded for a reason; they are the best. It has always been a problem, but there is at least twice as much traffic as 10 years ago on most routes, and the advent of speed climbing has exacerbated the friction. It is a clash of climbing styles more than anything. If you want to climb fast, you do things differently. If you're traveling light and fast without extra gear to spend the night, or extra retreat gear, you can't switch gears and slow down because you are corked by other people who are doing it in a different style, taking up to five days. They have a lot more bulky gear and weight.
Imagine you're on the autobahn, but it is only a single lane. You've trained your whole life to get here and go fast, but some body in a beater Volkswagon pulls out in front of you. They won't let you pass, and you don't have enough fuel to drive all day in first gear. "So you're going 20 mph," Barlage says, "and a ferrari whips
up behind you. Most folks would let you pass." But not everyone. The solutions? Be willing to explore, learn to climb in the dark and know how to keep a cool head when things don't go your way. It was well within the capabilities of Barlage and partner Todd Bibler (of Bibler tent fame) to climb up and down El Cap in 24 hours. Barlage has climbed most crags in the West, and has racked up global adventures, too, even kite-skiing Baffin Island with Andrew McLean. Besides re-defining the term wall-tent, Bibler was one of the first climbers to do a 5.13.
The weather was good, 70 degrees, and their strategy simple. Looking up from the ground, the team could see people clinging and camping above on the route. Bibler and Barlage decided to start super early, around 4 a.m., and get past everyone on the lower route while they're sleeping. "Then, the next section of people were a thousand feet up, and we'd get to them while they're waking up and plead our case," Barlage said. A lot like trying to pick a fast line through traffic on the autobahn. When you're moving so much faster than other people, (instead of five pitches in 12 hours they did 14 in five hours), most people will work with you, Barlage said, but the key is being unselfish; you offer to fix a pitch for them, take their ropes or haul a bag. "It's not a small thing to offer to haul someone's 200
pound bag up a pitch," Barlage said. "Most people are willing to do that and if not I offer to meet them and buy them a beer, and say 'what can I do'?"
A speed climber is utterly at the mercy of a slower climber, and there's literally no getting around it. It's one path, one person at one time, with bottleneck belets forming stopping points for possible passes. At some point, the slower climber has to wait anywhere from five minutes to an hour on the belay-delay if they are allowing someone to pass. They have to wait to start the next pitch, "so you offer to take their rope up," Barlage says. Between 15 and 20 people were on the Nose route that day on El Cap, and Bibler and Brad had already passed at least 8."You try to communicate upwards, and yell 'hey we're coming up'," Barlage said.
Finally, Barlage and Bibler were atop a tower communicating that they would like to pass and the four people above them said no, they were not going to pass, no matter what. And that is that. All that travel, gear, preparation and expense, and that's it. Brad offered to haul their bag, put up a pitch, "whatever it takes, and they wanted nothing to do with it," he said. "So we had to rappel back down."
Maybe 10 years ago he'd have raised his voice, but not now. "You can be a dick, and say we're going to pass you and that's the way it is," he said, "but that's their time is just as important as yours, just cause they're slower doesn't mean they have any less of a right to be there. That’s just the way it goes." People don't like to be passed because dropped gear could endanger them, and they invested time to get on the route. Sometimes, it's possible to find a place where the route splits and you can pass that way. If not, well... "They're doing their thing, you're doing yours, if you can't make it work go elsewhere, where there are less people," he said.
Add in the problem of limited optimal climatic windows for a big wall attack, and weather and temperature concentrate people on any route of significance.
"Every place, it's just a fact of life. Yosemite is where it really matters, big walls, lots of people, and some of the best routes in the world," Barlage said, "Zion in the spring and fall is pretty crowded." So should you not go fast? Go more with the flow? No. "Ultimately going fast and light is a huge advantage,"
Barlage said. "That day I climbed 14 pitches in five hours, and they did 3 pitches the rest of the day so I still got to climb a bunch more than others, and I think that is how most people are going, trying to get faster, all the gear is becoming lighter." The average Joe is faster than 10 years ago, partly due to the advent of gear and partly because of changing attitudes and goals.Carabiners, protection, even ropes are lighter and easier to maneuver. Utah climbing legend Ted Wilson pioneered many of that state's routes since starting out in 1957. He has hit the Grand every year since then, sometimes more, for a total of over 70 ascents on the Tetons, in addition to most of the other western classics. Now the crowding of routes reminds him of slow golfers not allowing others to play through. "It's frustrating, now I want to take my kid this summer (to Grand Teton) and I realize I can't go and just go up the mountain," he said. "I have to find out if there's a space available and be there at 6 a.m. in a lineup to get a camping spot. "
"It's discouraging and it's a hassle to get the climb set up...but that's the lament of the pioneer," Wilson said. "You have to get used to it, be social, enjoy other people because they're going to be there. Give them leeway." Going early and working with people is still the best strategy, or do climbs when people are not climbing: start late, or consider climbing at 3 a.m. or 6 p.m., climbing through the night.

NIGHT TIME: THE CLIMB-IT CLIMATE: There are some strong advantages to nocturnal ascents with headlamps. Most people cannot climb routes that are as difficult as ones they can handle during the day. It's too hard to see holds, place protection safely and doesn't seem natural to most. Traffic problems crop up when people are climbing quickly. And if you are climbing quickly, that means you are climbing below your peak ability level, and that means that with practice you can do that climb at night.  Advantages? You use less water, and water is weight and weight is speed. You can't move fast with a heavy pack. Nighttime is quieter, there is no sun to zap energy , and less wind. There is a special appeal, too, in a zen-like focus that comes at night. "Things become really simple, all you focus on is
climbing, you aren't checking other stuff out," Barlage said. "I like it just as much as day climbing." It should only be done after practice, and it is
critical to know your limits. In the darkness it's easy to get over your head and into a dangerous situation, so work up to it. Start with climbing pitches that you know with a headlamp. Do daylight ascents of two-pitch routes, then five, linking them, and then move on to a 10-pitch route, spending a day and going as fast as possible.
EXPLORE: If you are looking for something different, definitely explore, Barlage said. "But if you want to climb the good stuff, do it and just expect to work around and work with people and accomplish your goals," he said. Whatever you do, don't become a speed-snob. "I hate people that think they own the rock because
they climb fast," he said. "Nobody is more important than anybody else." And if you're the slow caboose blocking a route, try Not to squash someone else's hopes if someone is faster than you, particularly if they are gracious in their pleas for permission to pass. Wilson prefers to remain the pioneer. In his sixties now, he still does summer and a little winter mountaineering, but he doesn't head here everybody else is, has been or will be. Instead, he goes to the ranges of Montana.
"Nobody goes there, everybody wants to do the same climbs, the grand, El Cap, everyone wants to hang out on the nose route," Wilson said.
"Climbers are funny, they like to think they're really independent people but they're really sheep. They read 50 Classic Climbs, so they all rush to them but there are thousands of climbs elsewhere and few people are pioneering these days."
With longtime partner Rick Reese, a fellow Salt Lake City climber and Wilson's partner for a half century, Wilson bagged a beautiful west face in the Jefferson Range two summers ago. "It was a lovely multi-pitch rock climb on a face anybody would die to go to," Wilson said. "And nobody had been up there, to our knowledge." Exploring takes commitment, though. You have to be willing to do your research, and perhaps some severe backpacking to get to it. "But it's a lot more gratifying, also, than running out and doing some established climb that everyone and their dog is on," Wilson said.
Whether honking your horn on the autobahn or exploring an uncharted crag, those who are down with the sickness know it's well worth the trouble.
"Climbing is one of the greatest joys on earth," Barlage said. "There's something about it, it can encompass whatever you need. Maybe you need some peace, or a workout, some suffering, or maybe you just want to get out away from things and be in some incredible places. That's one cool thing about climbing you can make it whatever you need."


EL CAP RE-CAP: Here’s a wrap up on the lessons from El Cap.

1. Speed climbing is still a rewarding technique, and should not be abandoned because of traffic, Barlage says, because you can do so much more climbing in a day.

2. That said, the two smartest approaches to dealing with traffic are getting a good alpine start while others are still sleeping, and showing a relentless willingness to work with people. If you can’t stay calm and be gracious, appreciating that everyone has the same right to be there as you, popular climbs are simply not going to work for you no matter how fast you are. If you’re impatient, consider exploring.

3. Besides starting early, consider climbing late, say, starting at 6 p.m., climbing into late evening or even through the night.

4. Brush up on night climbing. Nocturnal climbing presents a new world of challenges, but climbers who gain enough prowess so that popular climbs are below their peak level can enjoy the many advantages of climbing when the bats are flying: using less water (less weight); dealing with less wind; no crowds; cooler temperatures and enjoying a new dimension in climbing. But practice, practice, practice.

5. Explore: If dealing with the crowds sounds like more trouble than it’s worth, you have a pioneer spirit and should consider digging out new routes. While you will not discover a new El Cap, there are many multi-pitch climbs that have no name, and no crowds on the crags. This takes homework, time, and generally a home in the West.

 

---

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