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mucci
Trad climber
sf ca
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Topic Author's Original Post - May 8, 2008 - 03:58pm PT
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October 7th 2007
Last fall Tyler and I decided to have a go at the Direct route on Washington Column. Once a popular route it has since faded and for good reason. We had no Topo, just the memory of the old description in Ropers green book. The direct garners a III 5.7 rating read "old school 5.7”. We started at around five in the afternoon.
The route started from the 3rd class ledge system that leads up to the line of demarcation splitting the arches and the column. Bulging puke starts to the left about 60 feet I think. I lead 3 200 ft wandering pitches with just a touch of 5.7, This brought us to a ledge with a tree we dubbed “Helper Monkey Ledge”. IT was dark and we had a monkey party at our perch hundreds of feet above the valley floor.
Pitch off of Helper Monkey Ledge leading to Lunch Ledge:
Morning, The wine is gone and climbing has to ensue! I lead up and left on chimneys and corners traversing to a bolt and hard offwidth I think is named “Offenbacher chimney”? The old book said it was 5.6, well as I soon learned Don’t take the book to heart. I make the Lunch Ledge and its around 9:00 am. Tyler wasted no time taking the next lead the notorious Fat man Chimney 5.7b. Toward the end of the grunting and the rope I hear “Slack, Take, F*#k, AHHH. He makes the belay. I follow with the Mini Pig on and have a brutal time. I notice the sporty runouts between the ancient pins and Thank god T led it. At the belay Tyler explains that the last pitch may well have been the hardest pitch he has ever lead. We laugh and I take the lead on the “Friction Step” Pitch, Starting by a tree on a large ledge I notice a big right facing corner, go for it and then back off of it moving further out and right to a tremendously exposed face/friction move into a crack, then 80 or so feet of loose rock to the belay.
All the while up to this point the rockfall was moderate. Rope drag was a constant problem and following pins and aiming for the Great Chimney was only working so well. Communication was non existant due to wind. This made the long wandering pitches difficult on both of us.
A few pitches that are blocked from my memory, read: SCARY! Voila, The Great Chimney. This was going to suck. T led the 1st pitch. A huge 6-foot Death Spike lay right under the start of the chimneying. T was apprehensive about the pro and so I told him I would tell him where to put it when he got there. No problem he says. 25 feet later I’m yelling purple Camelot, 6inches higher, yeah now push! First piece is in, now comes the pin and then squeeze technique.
The chockstone belay. Now That the famous picturesque first pitch of the Great Chimney was down it was my turn to lead the second. Steep, Loose and filled with ancient soft iron pitons. I commit to the kitty litter, wandering up this chute thinking; it’s not a Death chute, it’s not a Death chute.
Pitch 2 of the Great Chimney
I make it up to a very large tunnel made by a chockstone.
Then a 2nd class forest. Its now around five thirty, where has the time gone? T and I decide there is no way we are going to bivy on this route twice and begin the summit assault.
In the roper book it mentions the forest and that there are many options on exit pitches, all around 5.7. We take stock and decide “Were on the direct, may as well go directly to the summit. These last 3 or so pitches involved everything in the book and some 5.10. Finally, after T runs it out 75 feet on suspect rock in the dark He yells, “I see North dome”. Sweet, I take one look behind me and see the campfires 1800ft below and think “Grade III 5.7 my ass”. We topped out. No idea how many pitches, beat up worse than the grade V we had done together and all alone on the Column’s summit.
A huge bonfire and much ranting to folks on the RNWF of half dome and we were asleep.
This was a fantastic chimney fest and definitely much harder than the Royal Arches route. 16 or so odd pitches with its fair share of bad rock. Read: A must Do!
Peace Mucci
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mucci
Trad climber
sf ca
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Topic Author's Reply - May 8, 2008 - 04:18pm PT
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sorry bout the size I'll do better next time
mucci
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mucci
Trad climber
sf ca
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Topic Author's Reply - May 8, 2008 - 04:30pm PT
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it wasnt that big but gave us warmth and energy for the jingus descent. Thats another story!
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Willoughby
Social climber
Truckee, CA
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Nice! I especially like the impeccable route-finding logic: “Were on the direct, may as well go directly to the summit."
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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wow, great TR mucci, go on you guys!
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Great trip report! Thanks for sharing.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Yeah, with no topo, you arrive in that clearing just below the exit pitches and it's like "Let's make a deal, choose a crack"
Except they all look hard! (Maybe one isn't but having done the route twice, I haven't found the 5.7 way out yet)
I seem to remember a downclimb down a slab near a big tree and around the corner to the outerface sometime before the great chimney.
PEace
Karl
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Here's a version of your topo with the belay numbers cleaned up:
Is this overlay close?
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murcy
climber
San Fran Cisco
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that looks like so much fun. thanks for the tr and topo!
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GoMZ
Trad climber
Eastern Sierra
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Awesome! Thanks for posting
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mucci
Trad climber
sf ca
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Topic Author's Reply - May 9, 2008 - 02:01am PT
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hey clint nice job on the red line! At pitch 6 on the topo we broke up and right a few hundred feet to the 1st 3rd class forest and the start of the G Chimney. I am pretty sure it is easily recognizable from curry. Your line seems more direct but hey its a big face. The whole climb seemed like up and right after pitch 6. We followed pins on almost every pitch but there are ALOT of variations that look killer all the way up so It was tough. Roper got it right
Karl I read your tr before we rocked this thing and YOu summed it up perfectly, nice work , next time hit up the Helper monkey hotel!
mucci-
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Zander
Trad climber
Berkeley
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mucci,
This report is so cool. thanks,
There will be lines on it this weekend for sure.
Z
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lars johansen
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Thanks for the memories. I did this route 30 years ago with Mark Stockhus. I remember a suitcase size block at the top of the first belay in the Great Chimney. It seemed ready to go. Was it still there? Also remember old ring angle pins in the back of the fat mans chimney. I hope they are still there for all to appreciate.
Best
lars
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F10 Climber F11 Drinker
Trad climber
medicated and flat on my back
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Cool TR, I remember always looking at the route in the green Roper guide and thinking that would be fun but never got around to it. guess I should have,it's never to late
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Thanks for the adventure TR. I used to do this route all the time back in the sixties and seventies, usually unroped with North Dome South face. I actually did it again with Inez Drixelius back around 1999.
Your Offenbacher chimney is actually called Reigelhuth Chimney (after the climber of that name) and isn't really a chimney but multiple cracks. Another point, Instead of Fat Man Chimney, you can go slightly right at that point to gain Charlie Brown Chimney which is 5.8. It has a slightly shifty chockstone it. This variation is much more interesting and is on great rock, especially compared to Fat Man which is coarse, granulated and bottomed out. Lastly there is a really cool easy unobvious way out after the "2nd class" forest at the top, RR and I did it once but before then and every since then I have taken the other 3 options, since I could not remember RR's trick.
Best PH
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steelmnkey
climber
Vision man...ya gotta have vision...
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Very nice TR! I've always wanted to do this route
just for the adventure. Thanks for the topo! I
cleaned up your topo for use later. Hope you don't
mind. Here's the version I redrew...
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L
climber
The salty ocean blue and deep
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May 10, 2008 - 12:02am PT
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mucci,
You had me laughing and cringing the whole way up.
Thanks for the great entertainment!
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WBraun
climber
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May 13, 2008 - 09:39pm PT
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I remember onsight free soloing this route one winter day in the month of February. Higher up on the route I became bored with the climbing and continued to harder terrain.
It then became more and more sporty and thus I became happy.
I never have seen a topo for this thing, I just looked at the wall and eyeballed it and went.
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