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lizolasYosemite Valley
May 10-12, 2019
I’d like to think I’ve finally learned my lesson about using Tinder to find climbing partners, but I’ll probably do it again at some point. After asking multiple times to make sure he really didn’t have any other partners he could possibly employ for the task, I agreed to attempt Royal Arches and Crest Jewel Direct in a day with Austin - 30 pitches for his 30th birthday. The thing about CJD is it’s 10d slab. I wasn’t sure if he climbed 10d slab, but having failed to get past the crux of a 10a slab (outside of the Valley) on a toprope last summer, I was sure I didn’t.
I went to the Valley on Friday to hike to Clouds Rest. I was planning to do my Really Dumb Hike and continue on to Tenaya Lake, but had two thoughts on the way there:
- I would really rather get some sleep than start hiking at midnight again.
- Why do I think I have to do this in the winter when it’s a fairly large undertaking even with no snow? (I think the answer is that I want to see Tenaya Lake in the winter)
Someday I’d like to get from the Mist Trail trailhead to the bathroom/junction at the top of Nevada Fall in under an hour. As usual, my time was around 1:15 for that section. The steep part finished, I continued along the trail which quickly began showing signs of the recent storm events. While it was not difficult to navigate, I understood the Park Service’s recent Instagram post admonishing hikers to be prepared for muddy trail conditions. Downed trees and limbs clogged the trail in addition to frequent sections flowing with runoff.
Lots of stuff in the trail
Expecting the steady climb after the Half Dome Trail turnoff to feel miserable as it has in the past, I was pleasantly surprised that I’ve evidently gained the ability to pace myself. I stopped only a couple times for pictures rather than every other minute to catch my breath. I passed one group of backpackers along the switchbacks in the manzanitas. Maybe the forecast of storms had scared a lot of hikers off for the weekend, or maybe it was just that Friday has smaller crowds than I expected. The trail was clear of snow until the left turn at the end of the switchbacks, at which point it became completely covered in several inches to feet of snow. I expected there to be a well-worn path roughly on the trail, but there wasn’t one. Evidently not as many people consider this a good spring objective as I think. Using the Gaia GPS track I’d loaded, I tried to roughly follow the trail. The trip in January (when we hiked straight up onto the ridge) had given me the idea that even in snow it’s more efficient to stay where it’s graded for a trail rather than trying to cut up to the top of the ridge and follow the ridge.
View toward Mt. Clark from along the trail
I saw a pair of hikers struggling uphill and nearly followed them, then thought to check my map. Nope, the trail continued on along the side of the slope. I figured I’d meet up with them at the summit and could ask how their path had gone. I followed the trail as closely as I could until the very end, where I just took the path of least resistance straight up to the chute in the summit block. Unlike in January, the section of steps to the summit was nearly melted out, and I had no trouble walking up after stashing my poles.
The final ramp up to the summit
Much like January, however, the summit was not a pleasant place to be. In addition to the crow (raven?) that ominously appeared nearby, the summit was cold and windy with just a hint of precipitation. The Tuolumne area off to the east appeared to be getting some snow or rain, although it was still clear all the way from Clouds Rest to the Valley. Expecting to need to beat the rain back, I only took a few pictures before descending to where I’d left my poles. There I ate a quick snack and retraced my steps down. I never did see the other pair of hikers. Maybe they were much slower than I was and I didn’t see them along the ridge on my way back, or perhaps they mistook one of the intermediate rocky protrusions for the summit and turned around early.
Ominous summit bird.
On the way back I came across the group of backpackers I had passed earlier - I could swear they weren’t more than a switchback or two from where I’d passed them a couple hours before. No big deal if they were planning on backpacking anyway, but I did wonder what could have caused their snail’s pace. They asked if I had any advice for them to get to the summit. For once in my life I didn’t consider myself wholly unqualified to have an opinion, and fairly confidently told them that I believed it was best to stick to the trail (they said they had a GPX file loaded) and to make sure you didn’t head for the wrong summits.
Trail conditions from the summit to the turn onto the manzanita switchbacks.
It was a novel experience returning to the Valley in daylight, having also started in daylight. There was one interesting portion on the JMT after Nevada Fall with water pouring from the hill above in a massive waterfall onto the trail. While everyone nearby pulled out ponchos and pack covers, I thanked Google for making the Pixel 2 waterproof and marched right on through. The cold water was welcome with the temperatures getting higher farther into the Valley.
Back at the car at 5, I made a quick stop at Curry Village for ice to put in my cooler, then went and climbed a 5.8 at Pat and Jack Pinnacle with Casey. I had a very uninspiring time following, and although I didn’t fall, I didn’t feel like I wanted to lead. We were going to toprope a 5.10a finger crack from adjacent anchors on a ledge, but a swarm of ants appeared in addition to the mosquitos already assailing us and we decided to call it a night as the sun was setting.
I’d arranged to meet Austin at 4 am in the Ahwahnee parking lot, so I got up at 3, threw my gear together, and headed off. We were quickly underway, and my headlamp promptly died as I was following the first chimney pitch. I assumed the batteries had somehow died despite being full at the car, as no amount of pressing the power button did anything. I even made sure I was really pushing the button and not the piece on top that feels like a button. Of course, once I got to the belay and went to get batteries from my pack, it functioned perfectly again without needing a replacement.
I took off on the next lead where I apparently annoyed Austin needing to put on climbing shoes to lead a 5.6 pin-scar finger crack (“I’ve never had a partner need to stop in the middle of a pitch to change shoes” ok well normal pitches don’t involve walking along a ledge until you get to the actual climbing?). I was secretly hoping we’d be catastrophically slow just so I could say “I told you so.” Nothing I’ve ever said or done in an interaction with him should have indicated that I could climb Royal Arches in under 4 hours. I explicitly told him several times that I didn’t believe I could climb that fast. We swapped leads with him taking more of the harder parts. There’s a section of about 25’ of 5.7-ish hand crack that felt surprisingly insecure to me based on how nice it looked from the start. He ran it out without placing anything. I would definitely take more than one #2 with me if I were planning on leading most of the route.
I truly have no idea what his deal is regarding his need to relentlessly mock people for not meeting his standards. I’m all for heckling in the gym, but insulting someone leading outside while they’re clearly in some kind of distress just seems awful. I’m pretty sure I understand why he can’t even find someone willing to let him rope gun an easy Yosemite classic for them. After saying he was “surprised” that I led a 5.0 with a 50-foot runout (I was being cautious but wasn’t actually scared at all; he slipped a little trying to be Indiana Jones), he convinced me to lead the “5.3” pitch #15, which he said went over to a tree across a very wet slab. After a couple tries traversing with no protection, I went back over to the side to see if I could either find some gear to make it less scary or find a different way. He told me I wasn’t supposed to be going that way. When I not-so-kindly asked him to fuck off because I was terrified, he replied “Maybe you could see if you can get some gear in over there” “GEE AUSTIN I FUCKING WONDER WHAT I MIGHT HAVE BEEN DOING LOOKING IN CRACKS OVER HERE”
View into the Valley from the top of P16 (waterfall visible running down the rock)
I built an anchor and he came up to finish the pitch supposedly so pathetically easy anyone should be able to sprint across it. What actually happened was it was so wet he couldn’t actually climb across it and ended up placing a piece in a horizontal crack, then lowering until he could pendulum across the remaining slab to the bushes, which he climbed up to a belay spot. Upon beginning to follow the pitch, I noticed 2 nice shiny bolts for an anchor just above where we started. I figured he must have seen them on his way up and somehow knew they weren’t the rappel bolts or we were skipping the rappel. Like the brilliant doormat I usually am, I didn’t do anything useful like yell over that I saw an anchor here.
Sure enough, it turned out that we had accidentally tried to combine pitches 15 and 16, and what I’d seen were in fact the anchor bolts for the rappel route. We decided that a. We weren’t going to do Crest Jewel Direct because b. The walkoff was too slippery and sketchy, per him - I don’t know if he thought it was too sketchy for him or for me, but the next day would demonstrate that I’m actually the less timid one when it comes to uncertain unroped moves. Since I had seen the bolts and knew where I was headed, we decided to reverse pitch 16. First he lowered me from the tree he’d belayed from, then I pendulumed over toward the crack. It has a fixed piece that he couldn’t reach, but I had clipped with a bail biner on the way over before recovering his cam. On the way back I now had to climb up to it to clip it as my only way to avoid a fall all the way back across the horizontal traverse. Sometimes I’m fairly certain there is a deity out there that takes some kind of pleasure in outdoor routesetting. Right in the middle of the blank-but-low-angle traverse that was currently impossible due to running water and slick algae there was a single inch-wide protrusion filled with dirt and grass. I desperately scraped it as clean as I could and stood up on it, grabbing for the sling on the fixed cam. I clipped it, assuring that, as long as the fixed cam held, I would at least not have to repeat that portion of the pitch. From there it was a much less intense traverse out of the water until I spotted one of the bolts for a lower traverse that we hadn’t been able to see before. Since it was the only option, I clipped it despite Austin’s protests that it would leave him with too little rope for the rigging he was planning to do to avoid climbing. After that the aiding was done and I reversed the traverse back across the mostly dry rock, finishing in yet another slimy spot as I reached around the corner and grabbed one of the rappel rings (not the bolt hanger) and secured myself.
Looking back the way we came across P16
After that the rappels were straightforward. Because we had one 70m rope we just stopped at every pair of bolts we saw. Had we stopped to rappel on the way up, we would have finished the route in under 7 hours. A dismal time by Austin’s measure, but I was perfectly happy with it. We were back in the Valley about 3 pm, at which point I made the mistake of suggesting we drive anywhere. We were planning to go to the pizza place in Curry Village and then maybe go climb something else. Neither of us had eaten anything all day in good Liz fashion. Instead we got stuck in 2 hours of traffic, and our saving grace was the campsite that Billy had offered to share with us. Rather than being turned away because of a “full” parking lot at Curry Village (which was actually emptying out later in the day), we were allowed through to the campgrounds. By the time we got settled and headed off for dinner it was almost 6 pm and there wasn’t really time for any more climbing. We decided to make plans for the next day later.
I evidently can’t read Mountain Project and got convinced to lead Bishops Terrace. All Austin remembered was “perfect hands” and all anyone on Mountain Project seems to remember is “perfect hands” but I found the two small sections of awkward climbing and got stuck at both, so apparently I can’t even lead 5.7 and am an absolute disgrace of a climber. Oh well. Maybe someday I’ll find someone who isn’t an absolutely shameless douche to go climbing with and actually work on my weaknesses with a partner who isn’t more and more vocally incredulous at my shortcomings with every hour.
After that we went over to Church Bowl Tree, a 10b finger crack which Austin onsighted and then I toproped. Much to my surprise, I did it with only one hang where I needed both hands to get a cam out. Just barely, but I didn’t fall for the rest of it. This apparently surprised Austin, too, who is still unaware that different styles of climbing exist and evaluates everything solely by the grade. He toproped it again, followed by me attempting to mock lead it. The mock leading didn’t go very well - not that I expected it to - but it made me feel like at some point in the not-impossibly-distant future, I might actually be able to climb harder than 5.7 outside. Following that, he wanted to try an 11b sport route up an arete. He went bolt to bolt on it, but got the rope to the top. I declined the offer to toprope it.
Looking for an easy way to get a few more pitches in, I suggested After Six because of the short approach and mostly easy climbing, on the condition that I didn’t have to lead the first pitch. Austin wanted to lead the first pitch in approach shoes, and did so despite my attempt to discourage it. He complained the whole time and afterward said he couldn’t use the right wall at all and had to climb the crack like a slightly overhung offwidth that was probably 5.10, but he did send it. As usual, I followed it thinking maybe it wouldn’t be that bad, only to find that it was, in fact, that bad, and I can barely even follow it clean. There was a nut in the same crack that I fell on during my first attempt; evidently I’m not the only one who’s done that.
In the interest of time, we skipped the short 5.6 finger crack pitch and walked/scrambled (it was harder scrambling than I remembered for exactly one move) up to the wide chimney feature. I got mildly lost trying to stay on the outside, then eventually committed to the couple moves of 5.5ish offwidth that gets you securely up to more good face holds. I traversed across to the crescent ledge and belayed there because that was in my head as the belay. I remembered while I was pulling up far more rope than I expected that that was the end of the pitch linked with the 5.6 finger crack P2. Austin took the next short pitch up to the ledge, where we walked (unbelayed this time, thank goodness) to the 4th pitch, which I have reportedly found the hardest possible way to do. My route involves a somewhat tenuous-feeling traverse, while Austin’s involved walking straight up a more featured but totally unprotectable face.
The previous time, Eric had been surprised at how much farther the route went than he expected. This time Austin was surprised at how short it was. I said I would take P4 to the beginning of P5 (which is normally how climbing works, but there’s an easy scramble that I think Brad and I did unroped my first time). When we got there I repeated several times, rather amused, that yes, all he had to do was climb up toward that tree up there and that was the top. He did it easily and soon we were on the summit, just 2:20 after starting the first pitch - about ⅓ the time of my previous climb on it.
Unrelated photo of Liberty Cap
The highlight of my weekend was meeting Jacob Cook and Bronwyn Hodgins - a husband and wife climber duo who do all kinds of hard climbing while seeming to have a lot of fun. Jacob was taking off to hike some stuff to the top of El Cap while Bron was going to solo After Six - and here we thought we’d started late in the day.
I had planned to stay an extra day to hike up to Glacier Point for sunrise but, after some discussion with my sister about her upcoming wedding, decided it would be best to go back and get a bridesmaid dress ordered ASAP on my day off.
Lessons Learned:
- Don’t climb with people you know to be massive assholes.
- Probably should learn how to climb offwidths.
Liberty Cap and Mt Broderick from the JMT
