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.
Ian Nicholson leading the second pitch of T-Trip on our first day on the route, Photo: Ryan O'Connell |
an Nicholson leading the Second Pitch of Tangerine Trip before the sun hit. Photo: Ryan O'Connell |
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.
Me on top (in Orange) at a small stance at the "Black Cat" belay while Ryan gets ready to release the haul bags. |
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.
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.
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.
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.
Looking across El Cap at Pass-the-Pitons Pete during his 25 day ascent of Tempest.
Looking across at Pass-the-Pitons Pete on Tempest during their 25 day ascent of the route. |
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.
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!!!
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