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Ryan O'Connell, carrying heavy loads to the base. This was Ryan and I's third El Cap route together but it had been a while since we were down in the Valley together and we hadn't completed an El Cap route since 2008.
Ryan and I hadn't climbed an El Cap route together since 2008. |
October 2015: Due to time constraints Ryan O'Connell and I flew down
from Seattle to Sacramento and rented a car. We had always driven down
in the past, but since both of use didn't have a lot of time we decided
to fly-down instead. This worked surprisingly well (maybe that's
obvious to others); after we flew down, bought all of our food in
Sacramento and drove to the Valley. We left Seattle on like a 6am flight
and rolled into the Valley in the early afternoon, having already
bought all of our food.
We hiked our loads to the base of El Cap, we originally wanted to climb
the North American Wall, but with two parties on it, plus nearby
Pass-the-Pitons Pete attempting what would be a 25 day ascent of
Tempest, and Steve "Shapoopee" Schneider soloing Sea of Dreams, we opted
for T-Trip which had no-one on it, at least that we could see. However
upon our arrival at the base of the Trip there was another party just
starting up. This helped prompt us to take a rest day between hiking
loads and "blasting off". I have never actually waited a day between
hiking-and-blasting off before, but now I think its the way to go.
After traveling down there and hiking loads, taking a whole day off just
let us recharge our batteries and only increased our stoke to climb El
Cap.
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| Ian Nicholson leading the second pitch of T-Trip on our first day on the route, Photo: Ryan O'Connell |
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After our rest day we hiked up our food and the last of our water,
before fixing the first pitch. We slept at the base with the plan to
"blast-off" in the morning. The alarm went off at 5:30am and it was
still dark. After some breakfast pastries (AKA fancy Pop Tarts) we each
traded off jugging the free-hanging line we had fixed the night before.
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| an Nicholson leading the Second Pitch of Tangerine Trip before the sun hit. Photo: Ryan O'Connell |
I reached the top of pitch one first and self-belayed while Ryan took
his turn on the free hanging jug. For me it was rather easy to
"short-fix" this section because it started mostly with easy mid-5th
class climbing and plenty of places to stand and feed slack through my
GriGri with two hands.
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| Ryan O'Connell arrives at the top of pitch 2 after cleaning it on Tangerine Trip |
We also derived a system of leading and following on Tangerine Trip. In the past we just sort of "winged" it and however felt the most stoked would lead the next pitch. However to more evening split the load of leading we decided we would try to climb 4-pitches each day, with Ryan and I leading 2-pitches in-a-row each. So one person would basically have the morning off, and one person would have the afternoon off.
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| Me on top (in Orange) at a small stance at the "Black Cat" belay while Ryan gets ready to release the haul bags. |
Chris Mac's SUPERTOPO guidebook talks about belaying ~30ft higher
out on the face above this corner where this photo is taken. This
certainly offers the leader less rope drag, but Ryan was nice enough to
let me "stand" on this small ledge, something my hips certainly
appreciated.
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| Ryan leading pitch 4, looking down on me belaying in the "Black Cat" belay Photo:Ryan O'Connell |
The lowest part of the wall is steep, but this is were the route gets
radically STEEPER. I watched as Ryan aided up marginally tricky C2+ to
get to the base of the roof. He didn't have to place much of his own
gear on this pitch, especially the second half. This is because most of
the section straight down below the roof has a ton of fixed gear, to bad
it was such terrible mank.
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| Ryan leading Pitch 4 with me below at the "Black Cat Belay". Ryan would ascend straight the crack system he is in up to the roof and then diagonal downward following the roof system nearly to its end on the far right. |
After a mix of tensions, down aiding, and pendulums Ryan reached the
belay at the top of pitch-4. The wall was so steep the
tensions/pendulums were slightly tricky because once I lowered him, his
feet could only barely touch the wall. We did learn that pendulums were
the key and fully the way to go (compared with down aiding) and he
placed very little of our own gear. He would just swing hard, clip the
fixed gear (then often back-it-up) and then lower and swing hard again
to the next piece.
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| Ryan Hauling from the top of Pitch 4 with me cleaning. This is were the wall started to get VERY STEEP and would stay like that for the next 10 pitches. Photo: Tom Evans |
The Wall was soooo steep here, I jugged up through the steep corner
above the belay and was amazed at how poor so much of the fixed gear on
this section was. It wasn't as bad as the Shield's Groove pitch, but it
was pretty bad.
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| Me jugging pitch four. I've done a lot of tricky cleaning on ascenders before but cleaning the downward traverse on pitch four certainly got my attention. All the gear in the downward diagonaling roof was soooo manky looking and if it popped I was looking at an epic swinging leader fall onto my ascenders. |
I've done a lot of tricky cleaning on ascenders before but cleaning the
downward traverse on pitch four certainly got my attention. All the gear
in the downward diagonaling roof was soooo manky looking and if it
popped I was looking at an epic swinging leader fall onto my ascenders.
As a result down-jugging the roof was one of the spicier and more
physical big-wall following experiences I have ever had. I've jugged a
lot of tricky-to-clean pitches, but these lower-outs were so long, I'd
just lower back-out into space, pull the backside of my rope through the
fixed piece and again jug free-hanging-in-space back up to the next
piece, it was SUPER physical jugging and dare I say straight-up burly. I
could certainly feel my biceps, particularly might right one when I
reached the belay and was stoked that Ryan was leading the next pitch
which had the reputation of being the crux of the route.
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| Happy to break out the portaledge for the day, and from here on out the wall is steep enough that we were able to haul our ledge open for the next 3 days until would would have to put it away only 2-pitches from the top. Here Ryan looks down on me as he leads pitch-5, one of the crux pitches of the route. Photo Ryan O'Connell. |
We set the portaledge up which would make our belays for the next few
days far more comfortable. Ryan took off up the overhanging and very
diagonalling pitch. It was quite physical for him as the wall leaned
away almost like a crashing wave in a sea of granite.
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Ryan leading the outrageously steep 5th pitch. No camera tilt here, just look at the rope hanging straight down next to the profile of the nose. It was a spectacular place to spend the night.
After our night at the top of Pitch-5 we woke up to find a nearly 3ft long tear in the bed of our portaledge. This would actually get worse each night and begin ripping on both sides of the outside sleepers "bed".
Ryan woke up the next morning and despite having holes in the portaledge on either side of his torso, quickly racked up like a boss to lead the next two pitches (6 and 7).
Ryan halfway up the spectacular pitch 7, while I lounged comfortably on the portaledge, enjoying fantastic morning light on golden granite. Photo Tom Evans
Ryan nearly at the top of Pitch 7. He wished he wore free climbing shoes for the first half of this pitch, as it was pretty splitter and struggled slightly with his approach shoes. The "ledge" at the top of the pitch was nice, as any stance on the right side of El Cap, but you wouldn't want to bivi there without a portaledge.
This photo of Ryan Hauling Pitch 7 earned us Tom Evan's Elcapreport.com's photo of the day.
Ryan finishing his morning shift, happily hands over leading responsibility. It was the hottest day of our climb and we were both parched. The next pitch was the other "crux" (as it was the only other pitch rated C3) pitch and we wondered how it would go. Since Ryan lead pitch 5 hammerless I left the hammer in the bag and hoped for the best.
Me leading the awkward start to pitch eight. The start is funky traversing out to the edge of a very narrow ledge to reach the first bolt. The bolt is pathetically close as you teeter on this little ledge. It looks so easy, and was hardly hard, but Ryan laughed as it took me a moment to reach the bolt.
Tom Evans photo of me starting that same slightly awkward section at the start of pitch 8.
Reaching for the belay at the top of pitch 8. The free climbing wasn't too bad (~5.10b) to avoid the tricky C3 pin scars in the middle of the pitch, but the hooking/mandatory free climbing at the end of the pitch felt near impossible with the epic rope drag. It was truly horrible and I cursed myself for not minding it better after the pendulum.
Ryan cleaning the end of pitch eight while I organize the belay and the portaledge. I was so thirsty when I arrived at the belay I hauled as quickly as I could just to get into the water. Despite my rope-drag wows I was happy I didn't have to nail on the pitch and was able to free-climb almost the entire C3 section at a fairly moderate grade.
Me feeling hot and thirsty. pitch nine went mostly into the shade. This pitch wasn't too bad to lead but I had to take a fair amount of care to protect Ryan on the mostly traversing pitch and still keep enough cams for me to lead it. I ended up back-cleaning almost the whole first half of the pitch so Ryan wouldn't have to do almost any tricky jugging. there would have been several placements that would have been extremely difficult to clean with its traversing nature. It also saved me quite a few extra .75-3" cams which were super nice to have later on the pitch and we only brought a double set of. Even then I free climbed the final traverse to the belay and Ryan was more or less forced too as well. This is one of the spots. Where we had a small stance for us to help organize our belay, but halfway up the pitch there was a pretty baller ledge.
Me leading the start of pitch 10 the next morning. Photo Ryan O'Connell
Hauling pitch nine was also very tricky with the portaledge open. We actually moved the bags and retied them into the middle of the haul line. Once in the middle of the line, I hauled while Ryan tensioned/lowered the bags out to keep the portaledge from getting even more destroyed on the slopping ledge below the pitch. While this took a fair amount of effort it was successful in keeping the ledge from getting trashed. We spend then spent night on pitch nine which was a nice place to camp for the night. There is a small 1+ foot deep ledge to help set the bags on and stand while getting things organized.
Me nearing the end of pitch 10 on Tangerine Trip.
The next day I had the morning leading block and lead up pitch 10 to start the day, It was longer than I expected and ate up so many small cams of all sizes. Near the top I even had to quickly lower down and back clean a handful of cams near the top just to finish the pitch.
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Ryan took over for the afternoon leading shift on what was now our third day of the route. Here he is leading pitches 12 (pictured above) and 13. Pitch 12 went quickly for him, it was a little tricky right off the belay but then that lead to a long rivet/bolt ladder which he cruised.
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| Looking across at Pass-the-Pitons Pete on Tempest during their 25 day ascent of the route. |
Looking across El Cap at Pass-the-Pitons Pete during his 25 day ascent of Tempest.
Ryan and I organizing the belay on pitch-12. The second half of pitch 13 offered a fair bit of mellow free climbing but there is certainly some loose rock. Its worth-it to wear rock shoes for this pitch and we spent the our third night at pitch 13. We knew there was a chance of rain in the forecast for the following day so we wanted to
sleep at pitch-13 which, which was completely sheltered in the event of rain (its under a HUGE roof). That evening there was a fire that started down valley near Curry Village and with the small amounts of rain we received overnight made the valley incredibly smokey in the morning.
We woke up in the morning to find the smoke thickening as the fire had gotten worse and the light intermidate rain only adding to the problem. Ryan lead off with the smoke thickening, the start of pitch 13 proved awkward with good, but hard to place pieces deep in the back of a traversing flair. To motivate us to get off the wall that day even more were the portaledge tears which were getting a little ridcicular and with light drops of rain starting and stopping we knew we had to get off the wall today.
Ryan cruised past the flare, and sprinted up the bolt ladder for 160ft to the next belay.The bolt/rivet ladders were plentiful on the route and while they took away a little bit from the over-all climbing, we both still thoroughly enjoyed "The Trip".
My biceps were feeling extra soreon our fourth day and there were mini-lower-outs required on the steep wall on nearly every bolt that required a fair amount of upper body strength. I think I had tweaked my right arm on the first day on the downward traverse and now with four days on the wall they were letting me know.
I was still super stoked to have the Portaledge open to relax and belay from for one last pitch. We both talked about what would happen if it starting raining harder (as luckily with the latest forecast it wasn't supposed to start now until that afternoon)? Could our portaledge really survive one more night. Ryan would actually "Sway" in the breeze because he was now only suspended like a hammock from the ends, (Yikes is right!!!)
Ryan lead pitch 15 which started with a bolt ladder to some funky moves before the route traversed slightly to the left. He took a while places a few small pieces and then before I knew it; I just heard him flying through the air and I felt the strong upward tough up the rope!!!
Ryan had pitched off and blown a cam he was standing on. He partially flipped over and even gave himself some rope burn. He fell about 20ft, hung for a moment, and then batman-ed his way back up the rope. I was impressed with Ryan: he slowed while he replaced the pieces that had pulled during his fall but then took off again making over-all quick work of the pitch. I meanwhile changed from cotton into capilene as the rain drops began to fall a little more frequent and a little heavier.
Ryan reached the top of pitch 15 and quickly shouted that he was off belay. I sucked up my strained biceps and attempted to jug the pitch as quickly as I could. About halfway up the pitch the angle of the rock flipped over and I could stand in my stirups again taking a tremendous amount of weight off my arms. This allowed me to make very quick work of the cleaning the traverse.
At the top of pitch 15 Ryan and I packed up the portaledge. The rain was getting a little more frequent but there was enough sun pocking throught to keep the C2 Hooks and 5.7R dry that started pitch 16. The 5.7 R really wasn't bad at all. The protection was poor but the climbing more secure than I expected. It wasn't slabby/friction climbing at all. In fact it was near vertical but covered in nice edges as the beginning of the pitch started up a fragile flake that while difficult to protect was pretty easy to climb. After the flake the pitch ended with a super fun corner that was mostly free climbing (easy 5.10) and C1 up a slowly steeping but overall slabby corner to one of the biggest ledges of the route.
Ryan jugged the pitch quickly now able to stand more on his feet as he ascended the rope. He wrestled with the haul bags several times, but couldn't stop smiling as we knew we were going to get off the wall today.
Ryan jugging the fantastic corner on the second half of pitch 16 on the second-to-last pitch of Tangerine Trip. The final pitch was wandery 5.6R, but mostly 5.0 slabs. Rather than the climbing the greatest care was more to keep from knocking rubble down on the rock-strewn slabs rather than having to try hard not-to-fall. I climbed up over the final slabs to were the ground was flat and searched for the most bomber tree I could find. I had to flip the rope over several trees so Ryan would be able to jug straight up. This proved a marginally challenging task with all the loose rock just sitting on slabs.
Once on top we realized we had made excellent time up the last four pitches and made it to the top around noon. After four days on the wall, nothing feels more awesome than walking on flat ground and taking your harness off. We looked down and waved to my in-laws who had been watching the last few days from the meadow. We could see them and they waved back. I called my wife to say hello and we packed up.
Other than when I climbed the Nose-in-a-day, the descent off El Cap always sort-off sucks. Your bags are always heavier than you think and it always is slightly more tiring then you remembered. It was fun descending El Cap together for now the third time, we stopped and talked about were we had topped out previously and were we had bivied on top of the rappels after our first ascent of El Cap together, when we climbed Zodiac in 2006, on the slabs were the bolts are at the top of the first rap.
On our hike down the clouds got darker and darker and just as we hit the road it started pouring. I left Ryan and our gear at the parking lot while I jogged back to El Cap meadow in what was a full-on down pour when I arrived. Then the smoke got so bad, they closed the road and wouldn't let anyone drive because the visibility wasn't good enough. Eventually the rain lighted and the road was opened. What we both found interesting is now every time we have climbed El Cap together it has rained the next day.
Some of the tears in my portaledge. Each tear was "only" 2-3 feet long but there were four of them.
Luckily Luke and Runout Customs was able to sew a new bed onto my frame and he was even able to use a yellow color!!!
