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Brutus of Wyde
climber
Old Climbers' Home, Oakland CA
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Apr 25, 2008 - 02:26pm PT
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SENTINEL ROCK
CHOUNARD-HERBERT ROUTE WITH KENN KENEGA 28 AUGUST 1993
Quiet dark canyon of Oak is spanned by a soaring
steel-and-concrete highway bridge. Illumined by a
moon nearly full, I trot beneath in the hush, while
overhead the lamps and rush of occasional cars grow
and fade against the soft background of breeze in
leaves, the starlit sky, and the distant voice of the
stream.
In this evening where the blazing stars are
washed away by the awakened moon, I seek the silence,
the stillness, a place of quiet beauty and deep
magic, where liquid crystal streams leap laughing
among the jumbled canyon boulders, while above, the
brown parched hillsides frown thoughtfully in the
night.
I reach a place where a trail winds, corkscrew-
like, down to waters' edge.
Startled, like a jolt of energy through me, I
sudddenly recognize in the dark another moving shape,
small, skunk-like. Oh God. Please don't spray...
The half-grown kitten walks up, sniffs my air,
out of arm's reach, and joins up with me.
My naked legs part the waters of a deep, icy
pool just above a waterfall: A place of silence and
power; the seemingly placid water soon to explode
into the roar, the spray and the mist, the chaotic
turbulence of the falls, then to find another
reservoir of repose; the moonlight dancing on the
rippling waters below.
The kitty sits on the bank and watches me,
purring, her eyes dancing in the moonlight as I dip
and dive.
::
Three AM. I stumble through the dark forest
after two hours' sleep, feeling wretched. I blunder
around another bandit camper, apologize. He sits up.
"Kenn?"
"Yeah."
"Let's go climbing!"
At seven I start up the first lead, shivering
slightly in the frigid air.
::
Feast or Famine. After blasting up the first
five pitches,, I am confronted with a thin seam in a
steep corner, so steep the runners hang away from the
rock. After several cranking explorations into the
5.11 section, I stem and lieback over the top onto a
sloping belay slab and ancient bolts: Palming,
underclinging and swinging off thin flakes, ballet in
the sky.
More 5.10... Solid face gives way to flake-loose
crack, kenn hunkering below on a tiny stance. We fly
up several pitches more. Feast or Famine.
::
Far above me now, Kenn stems wildly across a
vertigo-inducing dihedral, bridged between smooth
holdless wall and an invisible bump at the lip of a
roof, blue sky above as I in the shade fidget and
fear my coming lead.
Kenn's lead, 5.11, leaves me pumped and scared.
I shake despwerately while following the 5.10d finish
to his pitch. Definitely all Feast here.
The Big Roof cuts across the sky above us, a
grim traverse 5.8 through looseness, fist jams and
fingernail flakes, the climbing equivalent of
clearing yout throat before a song.
I have moved in here. What a place to live. Two
loose, lichened foot holds and a slot behind a flake.
I shoulder against rthe flake, and eye the 137 pieces
of protection I have placed just below the 5.11c
crux. Webbing festoons the lip of the roof. The
equipment courage is not working. Finally I commit to
sidepulling opposition between two worthless seams,
crank the crux, move the foot, slip, scream, reset,
and grab the pin at the end of the crux. Wasted, I
clip, clip, and contemplate the 5.10 above.
::
Pitch black night. We peer into the darkness and
listen to the sweet music of the stream as the
Sentinel Canyon Orchestra tunes up: Crickets,
whirr of moths' wings, the quiet river of air moving
down the tilted descent chute behind us, stirring
pines and ferns. We add our percussion as the crackle
of rockfall from our bivy preparations echoes off the
canyon walls.
Gently the Yosemite sky lightens as the unseen
moon rises over an unseen horizon. The sparkling
lights of Yosemite Lodge twinkle in the thin slice of
valley floor visible from between the steep walls of
our canyon. Slowly the slice is bathed in milky
moonlight, while we, our canyon, our steep and
tentative descent slabs below, remain cloaked in
night.
Lest we forget what these romantic, adventurous
bivies are really like: My back alternately lumps and
curls, as do my sides, on the tangle of ropes and
gear that is my mattress. Three feet away, Kenn
raises his voice with the Sentinel Orchestra,
wimpering as his legs convulse in body-wrenching
cramps. Next time, we'll maintain our electrolyte
balance with ERG or Gatorade or something.
Although we have no sleeping bags, we still have
"food" and water, and could actually build a fire if
we really, really needed to. Midnight snack time: We
divide four almond M&Ms amongst us, a feast. Mid-
morning (3 AM) we halve the peanut butter Kudo.
Shivering, we watch the morning twilite turn into a
new day.
Breakfast: we munch on the last remaining food,
1 1/2 lifesavers each, as we stuff gear into our
single day pack. Kenn takes one last look around at
our remarkable (remarkably sparse) jagged granite
bivy site. He reaches down, picks up an M&M wrapper,
pockets it.
"Thanks for doing the dishes," I say.
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Brutus of Wyde
climber
Old Climbers' Home, Oakland CA
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Apr 25, 2008 - 02:43pm PT
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Here's another, a short poem more more about a winter peakbagging trip than a climb. Dingus Milktoast, of course, is the main character.
Red Lake Peak, 27 March 2004
Dingus swings on angel wings
linking turns like serpent strings
while Brutus and the Ratchet Nurse
crater, biff, and yard-sale curse.
He swishes down with master's skill
his upper body quiet, still,
and shouts to us "Just hop and hope!"
Ratchet shakes and recoils "Nope!"
We think this tour will never end:
Researching ways that legs don't bend
with fractured skull and twisted spine,
we hear the call "Just SKI that Line!"
Slowly, with a swishing sound
the sky and mountain turn around
I rocket headfirst down the slope
a soft runout my only hope...
Finally we're at "Crater" Lake --
I pray the Lord my soul to take;
Another turn, another dive...
we'll never make it out alive.
Eventually our free heel woes
stagger to a painful close.
No sign of Dingus, he's long gone,
as night brings thoughts of distant dawn
with Brutus sprawling on the snow
and Ratchet singing songs of woe.
But wait! we see his car draw near!
Craig hands us each a frosty beer.
Thanks for an awesome day!
Brutus
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survival
Big Wall climber
A Token of My Extreme
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Apr 25, 2008 - 02:45pm PT
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rockanice & Brutus,
Awesome you guys. I'll be reading those again!!
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Lynne Leichtfuss
Social climber
valley center, ca
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Apr 25, 2008 - 03:01pm PT
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Good Reads Guys! If this is the end of this thread I'll have to start working. Anyone else have something to post?
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hobo_dan
Social climber
Minnesota
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Apr 25, 2008 - 07:54pm PT
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I wrote this piece earlier but I think its one of the better things I've written and so I would like to share it again.
1986 spring break comes and I have just bought my brand new off the lot Toyota truck $5500 bucks. So for the first time ever we have a vehicle that WILL make it across the Dakotas with out a break down.
Devils Tower
We scrape off the winter rust by going to do the Durrance route. There are about 15 people hanging out at the base and its a good scene until some guy from Bozeman cries out Rock! and then silence and SCRAPE- real low-the rock goes SCRAPE and then it goes BOOOOOOM! and THOOOOM! and its getting louder and closer. I crawl into a hole about the size of coffee cup and this pig keeps coming down bouncing wall to wall down the bowling alley. This guy had just run for cover. All of the safe places to hide were taken and he was forced to crawl into his own ass to hide, when this big assed rock lands exactly where he was sitting. like an X on some comic cartoon pirate map It smashes into a million fist size pieces. After the obligatory cry of fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!, like munchkins we all come out of the flowers to get back to Oz. The climb was finished with no other theatrics
We then go over to Walt Bailey and enjoy the small to big fingers to hands
After rapping Walt I am stoked to go back to camp and drink beer when Shawn sez- We are going to do Hollywood and Vine and YOU are going to lead it.
Good move on his part because I never would have come near this part of the world if I knew we were going to do something so stupid.
This is a 10c route and what makes it a little different is that its crux is a thin face instead of the usual tower crack.
Its pretty low angle and I am thinking that I'm the best for the first 50 feet and then things run out. I am about 10 feet above a wired stopper. There is a three finger hold/jam and smearing feet and reaching and reaching and then BANG I get a pretty good finger lock and I twist until I hear bones cracking and then pull up and get in a good jam and man I felt like a star about to Nova.
I thought that move was one of the hardest I ever did.
You go from complete terror to being totally satisfied because of a rock climb.
What a stupid sport-but for a long time I kept going because I was not just a nobody, half assed, college student, on academic probation
NO! I was a nobody, half assed, college student, on academic probation who had led Hollywood and Vine with no falls!
In the '70s Henry Barber had a bad scene soloing this route. i can only imagine
murf
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Brutus of Wyde
climber
Old Climbers' Home, Oakland CA
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Apr 26, 2008 - 03:04pm PT
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Another winter peakbagging trip.
Next one will be about climbing.
I promise.
Rubicon Peak
Desolation in Winter.
“Things often look their darkest just before it gets pitch black”
After 1 p.m., Frank Tarzannin and I strap on skis after a half-day drive to Tahoe. The sun blasts down as we skin up the hollow slopes: 4 feet of fresh, bottomless powder is the winter’s first crop of snow, concealing a minefield of manzanita and buckbrush; my rental Randonees pop off at each sweltering kick turn until I set the tension release up into the realm of fully-cured concrete. “The manufacturer disclaims all responsibility for any injury that may result from incorrect binding settings” as I reach down and twist my leg to extricate yet another buried ski tip from an unseen, hooked shrubbery.
Summit. The thin afternoon sunlight provides no warmth. We huddle in the lee of the icy rocks, cold wind slicing through sweat-chilled pile, and scope out the lack of ice on the north face of Crag Peak. The shadowed face remains dry in spite of the mid-winter snow. A westering sun highlights the upper snow shoulder of the peak as if to remind us of the waning daylight. Time is slipping by.
A short icy downclimb lands us back at the skis, fools who have overextended their stay. Frank swoops off down the slopes, linking graceful turns, as I tremble, face-plant, sideslip, cartwheel and awkward my way down the slopes, a pinball crazy-bouncing off tree bumpers toward numerous and inevitible craters. TILT!
Late night. Frank is somewhere behind me, following my tracks, patiently kicking through the dark powder. Hopelessly lost, I sob desperately in the blackness and hug another tree to stay upright. Not the way we came. I used to at least think we were descending toward Lake Tahoe. The faded twilight of the burned-out sun lingered long in the sky behind us. Or still is. Unless that is the moonrise soon to come. Or maybe the lights of Tahoe city?
Fading headlamp shows dark, trackless snow, dim and grey, impaled by trees, with only the starry sky overhead to hear my bleak helplessness.
Disoriented, the twilight now to my right up the gully I have followed, (I don’t remember the gully changing direction. We are SO LOST!) the bottom drops out of my stomach as I realize I must have chosen the wrong way, long ago, up there somewhere on the summit ridge. We’re headed into the backcountry of the Desolation Wilderness, miles between us and civilization, with a cold, wet unplanned bivouac ahead. I don’t want to be here. I blink back chest-clenching tears as I top the ridge and stare, uncomprehending, at a street light.
Back at the car, we sip Pete’s Wicked Ale. Frank shakes his head again in amazement. “That” he says, “was incredible route-finding.”
“Nah... Piece of cake.” I smile, fingers crossed in the darkness, and we resume loading gear into the car.
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jstan
climber
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Apr 26, 2008 - 08:39pm PT
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A wise person once said, "Speak, only if you wish the people who believe you a fool - finally to have proof."
Managing Improvement on a Production Line - Part I
John Stannard
10/16/00
At least since the early eighties when I first came, the Company's holy grail has been to "transition engineering into production". As a sound byte the phrase worked extremely well with the customers. The reality has been more conflicted. Even as late as the year 2000, Production believes the Work Instructions are frozen and can not be changed. Indeed believes all problems can be traced to changes that were made. The engineering camp asserts we have yet to make two units the same way. That all the hardware is in reality, a series of experiments and nothing has actually been built "To Print". Will the twain ever meet? More importantly, will the twain meet while we are yet on this earth? Our function here is identical to that performed by the father of the bride-to-be in The Graduate, who in a conspiratorial manner said one word to Dustin Hoffman; playing a character almost as confused as are we. "Plastics."
Production and Improvement can meet, if but one word is said. No reply is needed. "Statistics." The two can be brought together, but at a price. We can bring them together,
but we cannot do so while also giving everyone all they would like.
A natural limit is, after all, posed simply by the number of parts we process. This limit is just as real as the physical principles we have studied all our lives.
The number of process changes must be limited.
Engineers love a physical principle; to death generally. (In general it is the principle whose exam the engineer aced in college, that will control all the processes they later study - whether they actually do or not.) Nobels are awarded whenever someone constructs a physical realization so perfect that we know only one physical principle is operative. Doing so directly proves the physical principle. By some leap we feel infrared detectors are perfect realizations and that we know what principle is limiting them. We can make them in quantity and when the performance or yield is too low we can change the process in agreement with the controlling principle and gain fame, if not riches. This is the first thing we have to give up.
We can’t.
It really would be nice to get a Nobel for each detector we make. All we need do is push our yields to 100%. While Alfred Nobel may be able to afford this, I doubt the US government can.
Statistics is a branch of study dedicated to the proposition doing an ignorant thing a thousand times instead of just once, makes us thirty times smarter. Given a choice, we unfortunately prefer to talk about what we know, as that makes us look good. That weakness disadvantages future planning in the management of a production line. Good management requires us on a production line to admit publicly that we are using statistics to compensate for our ignorance. For a manager to take that leap he has to have confidence higher management knows it is possible to be good while not exactly looking good. They have to know
there are times when looking good - is bad.
In the above we have set apart what we take for the conundrii by which we are enslaved. We will get to Statistical Management of Improvement in due course, but first a couple of realities:
Production lines obey the Uncertainty Principle. If engineers go into a production line and study at great length the process by which indium is deposited, they learn the process's present location to a high precision. But by so doing and making changes they lose all information as to where the process is going. They themselves generate a series of desired changes, all with unintended consequences. More subtly, the people on the line assume they were doing something wrong, and so start doing it "better". There is more. If we once cease assuming our work instructions and engineering knowledge are perfect, we have to admit there are factors on the line about which we do not know and which blink on and off in the line. Recognizing this leads us to the next reality.
A set of Work Instructions is not sufficient to define a baseline. Work Instructions represent inputs and so are a measure only of what we perceive is important.
What is actually important may be quite different.
Some element of reality, such as an output, needs to be included in defining a baseline. When defining a baseline process we need to include all the statistical stuff such as yields and distributions at different assembly levels. Using those we have a chance to discover whether or not we have left our baseline, and maybe even where.
We are painfully edging closer to a real discussion of Statistical Management of Improvement, but first an illustrative look at the guises assumed by process changes clamoring for the manager’s attention.
Grandstand Play: An engineer interested in improvement asks to have two wafers redlined to a new technology assured of giving a factor of two improvement. You should:
A. Give him one wafer
B. Give him two wafers
C Ignore him and start complaining to your management about this person. This will make it easier on you when he leaves.
Normal Production Program: The manager for the program composing fully half of your volume in the line wishes to process their parts in two wafer lots, each lot to a different redline. You should:
A. Say," you are the customer. The choice is yours"
B. Send the program to a competing lab because "our equipment is old"
C. Submit capital requests for all new equipment
D. Send out your resume
E. All of the above
The Mob: The manager has assigned either improvement or god-help-us tasks to five people. Each one comes back saying a change is needed. You should:
A. Make all of the changes
B. Make some of the changes
C. Make none of the changes
D. Maneuver your manager into making the decision
Part II finally gets to the central point of how to vary processes on a production line while still building parts "To Print". There everything rests upon the integrity and adequacy of your production data.
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Ed Bannister
Mountain climber
Riverside, CA
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Apr 26, 2008 - 11:44pm PT
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Great thread Tarbuster, thanks!
I dance on the still waters at sunset
or race as wind on a cloud.
I seep down grass valleys as fog.
In evenings still, I pause, as air,
to glide back down canyons from whence I came.
I am the chill of winter’s first snow.
I glisten at dawn.
I am the romp of an otter,
the hilarity of a woodpecker drunk on fermented sap.
I am the solitude of oceans of steep clean granite,
and the wonder of glaciers.
I play in desert sand,
bask in the quiet.
I am the singularity of winter's lowest spring tide.
I am thunder’s explosion,
lightning’s cleaving power.
I am the majesty of the ocean’s waves,
and the lulling peace of waves lapping on alpine lakeshore.
I am soft wet moss,
shaded by eons of trees and rock.
I am the rhythm of the seasons,
recorded in tree rings, in bedding planes,
by the erratic miles from a canyon.
I am a quiet moment,
as a kingfisher pauses,
or the thrill, of a golden eagle gliding close by.
I am humbling, as swallows show how it is done,
inches from the cliffs, inches from death, fearless.
I am ephemeral blooms in hard and remote places.
I am timeless.
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Brutus of Wyde
climber
Old Climbers' Home, Oakland CA
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Apr 27, 2008 - 07:06pm PT
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South Central Route, Washington Column
24 April, 1998. 12:00 noon. Old Climbers' Home, Oakland, California. Michael "Betamikester" "Bro" Brodesky has not arrived. I check out a chrome-plated walker from the front desk, then move my piled packs to the porch of the Old Climbers' Home so we can load Brodesky's car without him seeing the disaster area in the catacombs where I currently reside, a hybrid of garbage dump and exploded haul bag.
1:30 pm. Bro finally shows up, and mentions that his brakes are smoking. Sudden change of plans, we shovel all our stuff into the back of the Cave. Shove off along Highway 580 at 70 miles per, eastbound from Oakland, California toward the Valley of Dreams. Brief stop at the Oakdale Taco Bell to choke down roadkill. Bro takes the wheel. I snore with senile satisfaction in the shotgun seat, spittle staining my shirt, confident we are safe from attack for the moment.
Somewhere on Highway 120. As Mike brakes hard and swerves, I jerk awake. The pavement is covered with a thin layer of slushy snow. Truck is fishtailing around an overturned SUV, narrowly missing oncoming traffic. Several cars are stopped. A group of lean, honed sportclimbers loiter beside the road as the snow drifts down, one miming the beta of the accident to the others. The immediate problem seems under control. We pull into Crane Flat, Mike reports the accident. I return to the snooze.
Yosemite Valley. The incessant rain is a dreary homecoming after my two-month absence. Brodesky feels ripped off. Just another beautiful day in Patagonia. "Hey," I say. "Tomorrow is another day." As the evening gloom deepens, we retreat to the Curry Village Pizzeria and down our sorrows with cholesterepperoni.
Awahnee Hotel. Dusk. Headlamps out, I totter my walker ahead of me behind Michael as the sky sprinklers shut down. I've slogged this stench of forest so many times this year that I remember the places where I made handprints in the snow, the locations of coyote dung, the blue gear-marking tape where Nurse Ratchet and I joked about trail markers, remember where to turn, where to rest, where I left the food stash two months ago when attempting a winter ascent of the Prow; where I peed, pooped, and puked. An attempt that was pre-doomed to failure due to storms and the flu, under the sleet sheets and snowy blankets of the Upper Pines Hospital Ward, our week-long physical therapy trudging-haulbag-heavy up and posthole-portaging down the slop to the Column, weak and wasted. Ya pays for yer ticket and ya takes yer chances.
Presently Bro and I bivy at the Astroman base at 9 pm. We slip into the sacks, sinking snoozeward, alarm set for some ungodly hour.
4:00 am, 25 April 1998. Deep sleep interrupted by the dreaded beep. Sluggish, yet aware of need to move. Breakfast. harness. Carefully stretch the old body. Stash the walker and the packs. Slug last glug of water, force-march the gully to the base of Washington Column South Face Route, where our adventure is to begin. I retch. Betamikester looks concerned. Guess he'd forgotten about that part..
Dinner Ledge. 7:30 am. Mikester sped us here in virtually no time at all. My turn. We're leading in blocks, selected for our relative strengths. I get a last blast of beta from Brodesky and totter out 120 feet left to the base of the first steep section, a 5.9 offwidth/squeeze chimney. Bro follows, another brief conference and gear transfer, then its up the offwidth, belaying at bolts [OH, the IMPACT!!!] 130' higher. Mikester follows as if on wings, dumps the pack and rack, and I'm off again. This time it's a tension traverse to a 5.10c crack which feels a lot like A1 to me ol' geezer bones after the first few moves, feet skating on flakes and flying bits-o'-rock. Slow swim upward in aiders, over the bulge, to cut into 5.9 free climbing up to the belay.
Yet again. Step right, 5.9 (loose and grainy A1 to the geezer) up a bit, pendulum again, gulp gulp in fear, place place pro pro, long traversing runout below, then creep, mewling, up the vertical C2 crux through flakes exfoliating and clenching my crawling incontinent bowels to a bolt, another pendulum, and finally stance at the base of a 40-foot high, 3-inch thick granite wafer held in place by inertia; morning sunlight finally sweeping the face.
Mikester appears, wrapped in pack and tangled rope like a confused beetle bound in spidersilk, awaiting a last meal on the web. He stumbles to the stance, muttering it might be quicker if the Duffer heads up first, giving him time to unstrangle. Done. What follows is a terrifying 5.8 jam/cryback up the flakexpanding, a 5.10 romp up the offwidth, power pulls through loose and wobbly, to a leftward traverse over unprotected face. Pins would get me a pendulum, but that is unthinkable as I thoughtlessly find myself pinned to the wall in a half-mantle-half-flail, feet-slipping 20-foot pendulum fall ahead taketakeTAKETENSIONTAKE!!!! and the rope tightens, I winch myself back into the corner, and reassess. This time the rope is my handhold, tensioning across the 5.11 face, liebacking off nylon and nubbins Oh Dulfer.
Crimp and slap and i reach a fixed pi and easyaid up to the Top of the Mark and the end of my leads.
Mikester arrives and heads across unprotected 5.7 face we call 5.7+ [translation "feels like 5.10c"] to yet another tension traverse, then a ledge where he stops to bring me across, the 80-foot pitch having netted us a vertical elevation gain of two feet.
Now Bro's on a thin crack the topo calls A1/5.9 meaning after you aid up tiny brass where the crack disappears into the featureless face you launch into 30 feet of 5.9 mandatory face climbing thinking only of how-far-below-are-those-last-two-brass-bits-nestled-in- the-crack and I'm so very glad you led it and not me, thank you Bro. Mike ends the pitch where the rope does, and I romp upwards, giving the lead line a shake to dislodge the few anorexic pieces. This pitch is scantily decorated, and janitor Brutus has little to do but jug.
Next are roofs which resemble chockstones resembling roofs in our gutter/gully/corner, and Bro, a bubble working around seaweed to the surface of the fishtank, swings upward in aiders, backcleaning until out of sight. "Fixed!" echoes down and I confirm he's off belay, then abandon the stance to the moss, the oak, and the teetering death block; jugging roofs, chimney and rubble onto a wide slickery pineneedle ledge. Mikester craftily heads out before I can dump gear onto him, then brings me up to the end of the climb. Quick sort and we scratch up over the top of the Column, stumbling across the brush ledges, thrashing for the gully.
We find a fixed rope at the top of North Dome Gully and, grinning and not proud, rappel the steep dirt clear down to the stream. I dig out the headlamps and we head down the slabs, racing the end of the day.
Arrive at the base of the Column at last light 14 hours after we started, unearth the packs and the walker, chomp bootybeans, swill beer, and from our sleepingbags greet Doctor Coomer who is carrying loads for a solo attempt on Southern Man; sleep, totter out, sort gear, and return to the Old Climbers' Home 48 hours after we left. I check my walker at the front desk, until next time. Nurse Ratchet peers over her spectacles: "So how was your walk?"
All in all, a nice little stroll.
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Mungeclimber
Trad climber
sorry, just posting out loud.
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Apr 28, 2008 - 01:32am PT
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adapted from another unwordly place. Inspired by a frozen Sardine Falls...
Ice: The final frontier
These are the voyages of the Starship Tacoma
Its lifelong mission
To explore strange new areas
To seek out new climbs and new first ascents
To boldly go where Royal, Tom and the gang has not gone before
que trek music... aaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaa
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MisterE
Social climber
My Inner Nut
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Apr 28, 2008 - 09:45am PT
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The Doctors Office
Climbers’ office, our cool playground
in the desert.
I miss the claustrophobic feel
of narrow slot canyon
in the heat of summer,
laughing, respite from the sun
Hot, hiking up
in the blistering heat
of Oak Creek Canyon
Crossing the creek passing
tourists, families
some watch our heavy packs
curiously
as we disappear
into the dust above them
Sounds fade, dust remains
hiking steep drainage,
labored breath and buzz of heat
sweat stinging eyes, then the Tree:
the place where coolness
from the slot canyon above
sweeps upon us
cooling brow
The walls steepen to hundreds of feet above,
and narrow sharply
casting permanent shade
and further freshening:
Swamp Cooler Canyon.
The effect is such
that eighty-five degrees
in Sedona is the minimum temperature
or it is too cold
in The Doctor’s Office
At the foot of the canyon
lies a micro-environment
all mosses and sword ferns
in this desert world,
air almost cold now
Also at this oasis
inscriptions from the past
chiseled into sandstone:
DR B FRANKSON
RUGBY ND
1906
Much can be gleaned
from this simple statement:
The man was a doctor
played rugby
probably at Notre Dame
The stylized lettering
from hammer and chisel
indicates a skilled hand
we scrub the moss
out of the letters
trying to know
B Frankson
Our own Doctor
the canyon’s namesake
looks upward
pointing out
new routes to climb:
the now, the future
We scramble into the fissure
walls looming
merely five to thirty feet
apart
vertical waves of sandstone
comforting, or cloying
In places we touch
both walls, straining
pretending to keep
them apart
All day we climb, play
enjoy the acoustics
of the canyon
from mini stereo to
catching odd sounds from
people, creek below
birds, planes above
At two-thirty
comes the half-hour of sun
we bask, watching the beam move
across our path
and gone
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survival
Big Wall climber
A Token of My Extreme
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Apr 28, 2008 - 09:59am PT
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Mister E,
Wonderful writing, I could feel it...
I have had very similar experiences in hot places. Great.
Dr. Frankson....
He could've played rugby at Notre Dame.....
or he could've been from Rugby, North Dakota...
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Mungeclimber
Trad climber
sorry, just posting out loud.
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Mar 16, 2009 - 03:20am PT
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bump
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survival
Big Wall climber
A Token of My Extreme
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Mar 16, 2009 - 11:51am PT
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Thomas had immediately regretted not staying longer at the meager rest spot now far below him. He had fiddled for a couple minutes trying to work in a small nut, which only made the spot less restful, and then continued, sure that he could see better nut placements higher up.
But the wall had steepened almost imperceptively, and the hoped for placements had dissolved along with the subtle shadows that had made placements look bigger and less flared than they were.
"Why didn't I get a decent rest or at least let go and fall onto that good cam when I was so much closer to it?" The thoughts had raced through his mind in his last moments still clawing at the cliff.
He knew that Mathew didn't have the experience necessary to catch this fall, or to deal with the aftermath. But his ego and his confidence in his own ability to pick this plum of a crack that he had spotted high on the wall days before, had forced such thoughts out of his mind.
The sweat had stung his eyes and trickled down the middle of his back as he had struggled to keep his fingers in the shallow bottoming jams so far above his last acceptable piece of pro.
He knew the little RP sort of halfway grabbing the back of a flare twenty feet below him had no chance to hold....no chance at all.
The good cam that he had gotten in before the rest was at least twenty feet below that nut. It wasn't nearly close enough to keep him from hitting the flake. He knew it...
"Damn!" He had thought, "Why was I fooled by those shadows, why did I continue when the going got so bad, why didn't I rest when I could've, why didn't I let go when I had a chance, why didn't I wait for Steve to show up, at least he would've known what to do, why was Matt whimpering as badly as I was right before I came off, why was that good jam with the incut next to it just out of reach as my fingers had finally and screamingly come out for good?"
Thomas was amazed that he could feel the wind cooling his back and his forehead as he picked up speed. There was a small "tick" as the RP had popped without even slowing him down.
The world was strangely silent for a micro second as the flake roared toward him. He "heard" the flake crash into his side and back rather than feeling it. The sun grew smaller and more faded, almost eclipse like, as he heard Matt scream.
The world went black.
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Studly
Trad climber
WA
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Mar 16, 2009 - 12:24pm PT
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I just discovered this thread. Awesome! In some of these epic stories, my heart starts pounding and my hands get sweaty, and for a minute I was there pulling over the top of the Nose in a snowstorm, major cluster going on, cold and wet, freaking but handling.....great writing gentlemen.
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Studly
Trad climber
WA
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Mar 16, 2009 - 01:01pm PT
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My contribution
I was in England on business for about the 20th time, and had been making it a habit to drive out to Wales and Snowdonia National Park on the weekends for some climbing and hiking, usually by myself. I had it my goal of hiking up Snowdon Peak(highest peak in England, but thats not saying much) by the old miners trail which is this incredibly beautiful hike thru the old mine trailings and fallen down buildings past beautiful little lakelets and unknown cliffs. It lies on the opposite side of the crag from The Black Cliff, "Clogwyn du'r Arddur" or Cloggy as it is known. It can be a lonesome wierd and spooky place when it is rough weather which it usually is up there. I had on a pair of hiking boots, vibram soles of course, which is what I normally wear in Liverpool and surrounding countryside. You know why if you have ever spent much time mucking around in the cesspools of Liverpool or the farmyards of the countryside. The boots don't fit in with the suit and tie crowd of England but I am American and they love Americans in England so I damn well wore what I pleased. Anyway, hiking up the trail that I had done so many times I decided to do some exploring to find a different route to the summit. It was cloudy and damp but not raining. The summit was hidden behind swirling clouds. I decided to start up a rock ridge that looked fairly low angle and see how far I could get. At first the going was fairly easy. Lots of loose rock, and a few moves here and there but nothing to out of control. Then I came upon a section where I had to commit and go for it. I powered thru it knowing I did not want to try to downclimb it and pulled over the short face onto a ledge and found myself completely whited out in the fog. Knowing that up was the way, I blindly continued upwards, the angle much steeper then it looked from the ground, and my focus razors edge, as nothing else mattered but me and the rock. I could see nothing else, hear nothing, just black damp rock and fog, and the way was up. I must have climbed another couple hundred feet of moderate damp class 5 when I came to another difficult bit. It was wet and steep and fierce looking. I had to calm the racing of my heart. Here I was alone, no one knew where I was, alone in the fog, hell I didn't even really know exactly where I was. Down climbing seemed out of the question at this point due to the previous sections I had bypassed. I gave the moves a go and then reversed the moves back to the ledge. I must have tried the moves 5 times and always when I came to the little bulge I backed off. The quiet was errie and there was no exposure as I was in a cloud. I decided to hydrate and eat a energy bar, and then for a couple minutes I focused on meditating to slow my heart and breathing down. Rejuvenated, I stepped up and fired. Pulling over I grabbed first one loose rock, and then another, dropping them into the void as I desperately tried to find a solid handhold, the noises coming from down below as the rocks bounced down the cliffs and crashed into the scree were unnerving. At last with strength draining, I had no choice and commited to a loose block and pulled, as I brought myself over the top it came free and I released it into the void like the others. Looking up I could see nothing, just more rock but less high angle, and a few more minutes brought me to a false summit, and a few more minutes brought me to the tram station and people. yes, a tram station. Very strange, they run a tram up to the top of the peak from one side. Walking among the tourons, I gave thanks for my safe passage and reflected how very different my experience of coming up the mountain was from these peoples. Unable to handle the scene much longer, I turned and disappered into the fog, and down the descent trail back from whence I came. For a minute there, I had felt like Joe Brown or Don Whillans breaking new ground, but the pump faded, and I was left with the knowledge that some choss is better left unclimbed and it was luck and not skill that had carried me thru. A lesson learned. Cheers mate!
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survival
Big Wall climber
A Token of My Extreme
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Sep 10, 2009 - 11:40am PT
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Back to the top with thee oh thread of many great writings!!
So many great tales here, including some really good ones from our dear departed Brutus of The Wide.
Read and enjoy..............and put your story down.
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Ray-J
Social climber
east L.A. vato...
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Sep 10, 2009 - 12:23pm PT
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Two thumbs up!
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hashbro
Trad climber
Mental Physics........
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Sep 10, 2009 - 01:11pm PT
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MONKEY Boys
The Hidden Valley parking lot was still empty as we pulled into Site 9 at sunset on Friday. My brother Al, Steve Emerson and I had once again escaped the smoggy suburban wasteland of Orange County to the crisp air and climbing camaraderie of Joshua Tree, a pilgrimage that started during our first year in high school. By nightfall, VW vans, sedans borrowed from Mom and all other kind of rigs had begun to pack the camp. Climbers and boulderers busied themselves with setting up tents, making food, or hanging out and socializing.
Emrick Emrickson was doling out hits of Mr. Natural acid that he had scored 100 and by 8 p.m. half the camp had procured tabs of the psychedelic delicacy. By Sunday, we predicted, nearly three quarters of the climbers in camp would have sampled his goods. Older and more experienced than the three of us, Emrick knew about girls, standing on tiny holds and ingesting strong acid. We listened to everything that Emrick, our irreplaceable mentor, told us.
Over in Campsite 6, Crell and Dee were whipping up Dee's famous no-cook burritos Bailing out of Orange County just before rush-hour in Crell's mom's Torino, they had arrived starving and wasted no time in assembling Dee's Do-It-Up Burritos, cold refried beans smeared on cold tortillas, topped with a slice of aged Cheddar cheese and whatever salsa was on sale: Voila, Dinner served! Then after hammering their dinners and sitting back to relax with bellies full and half hits of acid yet to come on, Crell and Dee spoke about a route that Crell had spied the previous week at the Astrodomes.
Crell Fro was a sixteen-year-old string bean and child prodigy climber. His footwork had started out a bit lurchy, but his motivation, focus, and Popeye-like arm strength (which earned him the nickname "Guns") superceded that deficit and he later became one of the era's strongest cragsmen. Several weeks before, Crell and I had completed the face route Such-A-Savage at the North Astrodome. From the base of that route, Crell had spied the new nearly holdless face, with the obvious flake halfway up.
"That one face won't go free," Dee had warned.
Crell's response of "Man, I saw a line of holds up there" was partially drowned out by the whine of a hopped-up Fiat whipping into the campground. Ruby flew through the loop and skidded into Site 6.
"Have you seen Emrick?" he asked, as he threw open the Fiat's door and jumped out.
"He's in Site 12" Dee answered. "Wanna burrito?"
"Well, first I need to talk to Emrick. Jim and I need some acid 'cause tomorrow we're going out to the Wonderland to do this cool traverse," Ruby replied.
Ruby was a swimming champ from Tustin. With a keen scientific intellect and the ability to debate almost anyone on any topic, he could destroy a person's reasoning and leave them dead or begging for mercy. He was intolerant of rules and regulations, except when he believed in them himself. He and his climbing partner Jim Dutzi formed an improbable pair. Jim was a middle-aged social dropout from Fullerton who had worked his whole life in Orange County's defense industry. He'd raised a family, been elected as a Democratic state assemblyman in the late 60's, become disillusioned, gotten divorced, started smoking pot and entered the world of lowbag southern California climbers, finally becoming Ruby Votel's sidekick, joint roller, driver and belayer. But in the world of climbing, nobody cared who you were or what you did as long as you climbed, or at least hung out and pretended to boulder, with one exception. You had to have ethics, which in the early Joshua Tree days, meant not using hooks.
Before rambling over to Site 12 in search of Emrick, Ruby warned his buddies, still digesting their dinners with trips slowly coming on.
"Are you guys heading out to The Astrodomes? Don't use hooks or I'm gonna hike out and pull yer bolts, I promise," he said. Then he blustered off in search of Emrick.
Dee, Crell and I looked at each other .
"Do you think he'd really pull our bolts?" Crell asked.
"I think he's serious" I responded. "I know Ruby, and he thinks he's the ethics police."
Saturday dawned crisp and clear, the resiny desert air a fresh respite from the miasmic grime of the metropolis. Throughout camp, plans for the day were being formulated. My brother Al, a teenage absent-minded professor/hippie climber/comic genius, was advocating half a hit of acid for the hike out to the Comic Book, and half a hit on the climb.
"I don't know about taking acid man," Steve worried. "Last time I did it I panicked and I was half way up a hand crack in sneakers and it was a first ascent. But I guess I could just do a quarter hit," he considered over an open-faced peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
I walked over to Crell and Dee's camp and found them looking slightly worse for the wear.
"How ya doin' Crell," I asked, noticing his bloodshot eyes.
"I'm kinda tired, and sorta still trippin'. Didn't get to bed 'til 3 or so."
"Are you sure you wanna go out there Crell?"
"Yeah let's go, I'm feelin' great."
The Torino had bad traction on the powdery road, but the V-8 powered through. As we bumped across the potholes, washboarding our way to the Barker Dam lot, we stopped to chat with a group of boulderers beginning their mid-morning warm-up circuit. Smoke wafted up from the bong in Dick Shockley's hand. The sh#t talking had already reached a fever pitch as Largo, Bachar, Ricky, Graham, the Lechlinskis, Bullwinkle and Shaun Curtis described last night's escapades soloing The Eye while tripping on two hundred "mikes" of acid.
We left the boulderers to their bullshitting and by the time Crell's first bowl of weed was dust, we were at the empty Barker Dam lot. We loaded up our packs and slogged out across a long wash, a long monzonite spine and finally the Astrodomes rose above everything else in the Wonderland. Our adrenal glands surged as we stood atop a small crag and silently gazed at the North Astrodome.
"Fuuuuuck", Crell and I both said in unison.
Though Crell and I had completed Such A Savage several weeks before, the specter of this seemingly blank wall was overpowering. I didn't think it could be climbed, but we still felt we had to get up on it for a try. Crell opened his pack and flaked out the rope at the cliff's slabby base.
"You wanna go first?" he asked me as he handed me a freshly sharpened drill bit and a few quarter inch bolts.
"I guess so," I answered, staring straight up at the very committing wall. "So, do ya think we head to the flake? I hope it's solid 'cause I'd hate to pull it off in yer lap," I said while tying my swami belt and feeling a little bit trembly.
Always encouraging, Crell blurted, "C'mon Spicer, this is just your kind of route. Once you get to the flake it'll all be over."
"I don't know about some of those stances, I said. "Not many footholds and I'd hate to take a groundfall from below the flake; that Cholla would kinda hurt."
I started up the pitch. The first holds were grainy and loose. I used my hand to clear off some broken flakes and gravel, and stepped up on what was left, a few white, dirty edges. I made a few more moves onto a larger sideways shelf and graded the hammer. "I'm gonna throw in a bolt here Crell."
As I drilled, I remembered bouldering with Crell and Ruby a few weeks back. Unable to nail a nearly horizontal roof problem, Ruby had suggested that we use a small loop of shoelace as a "cheat" to hook onto a microscopic nubbin. It had worked, and later on, celebrating as the sun went down, Ruby brought up the new route at the Astrodomes.
"So, no cheating allowed at Josh, right?" he had taunted.
The sun was beginning to illuminate the canyon and soon I would be in the sun. I set my feet and began drilling. Bang, bang, bang, bang.
"Whoooo" I moaned, my shoulders were already getting pumped.
I let the hammer and drill hang on their slings and shook out my arms. Bang, bang, bang, bang. Finally, the hole was deep enough for the tiny buttonhead and I carefully tapped it in and clipped in.
I stepped up onto a cleaner looking series of edges leftwards. One move, then another and now a third. Finally a rather committing move separated me from what looked like a good drilling stance. I looked up, then down, then up again. If I blew it here I would probably hit the Cholla, or worse, hit Crell. At the least, I'd probably hit the broken blocks and break my ankle. I looked up, then down, and then up again. My calves were starting to get pumped.
Okay" I said softly, and stepped on a sparse edge, with not much for my fingers. I was starting to feel a bit concerned. The heat shimmered off the rock face and beads of sweat trickled into my eyes.
As I shifted my weight to make my move, I caught sight of something out of the corner of my eye. I looked over to see a spider-like creature with crab legs skittering around on the rock face about fifteen feet away, and it had Yabo's head on it. Yabo was a maniac free climber of great renown, who at this very moment was in Yosemite with his bloody fists likely jammed into some gnarly granite crack 200 feet off the ground.
"F*#k," I shrieked as I shook my head to try to clear the salty sting from my eyes.
Yabo was smiling and doing a Groucho Marx thing with his eyebrows. He had a big gash on his forehead. No blood but I could see his skull.
"Make the move, bro," he said and scampered closer. "Ain't nothin' but a little thang. If you peel, no biggie, it ain't so bad. The pain, the fear, it's all in your head.
"What the f*#k, Yabo. What the f*#k you doin' up here, l…l…like that?" I stuttered. "You a f*#king flashback or something? I didn't even drop last night."
He just grinned and skittered closer to the spot where my next move would land me if it was successful. "Make the move, get the groove, bro. This is where you separate yourself from those little bong hit pussies bouldering down there, bro."
"OK, Yabo, I'm gonna do it, but please don't f*#king' haunt me like a specter. I can take the fall, but I don't think I can handle anymore of your f*#ked up head clamped onto that spidery looking sh#t anymore. So let me make my move and get the hell out of here, won't you?"
I shook the sweat from my eyes again and he was gone. I wasted no time and reached up with my right hand, feeling a little edge I could clamp onto. It was sparse but accommodating. Moving up again, my feet found a gravelly sloper and then the stance. I took a deep breath. Crell said something below that sounded like "put in a bolt."
"Whew," I said, though only 30 feet off the ground. I was worked.
Crell yelled up, "Wanna see if you can get to the flake"? I looked down and saw him loading a pipeload with his one free hand.
"Should I tell him about Yabo," I wondered. What would I say? 'Hey Crell, guess what? I just saw Yabo up here but he had a spider and crab body and a big gash on his head. Pretty f*#king cool first ascent, eh? You should come up here and see if he appears for you. You're the one on acid.' Naw, better to keep quiet and hope like hell that it was a one time deal, like old Marley appearing to Scrooge.
Crell yelled up again, "You deaf or somethin'? Are you gonna try for the flake?"
"Okay Crell, I'll see if I can get to the flake. Have you got me?" I asked, a little concerned.
"Yeah Spicer, I gotcha, I gotcha."
Hammering and drilling while simultaneously clinging to the rock on miniscule hand and footholds left me exhausted. The scent of Crell's smoldering pipe wafted up to me as I lifted my right foot for the next tenuous move. Stepping up again with the right and then the left foot enabled my right hand to barely reach the bottom of the flake. I tapped it with my knuckle to see if it would sheer off. It remained intact.
"Seems okay," I said to myself. I stepped up again so I was standing on the bottom part of the flake, my toe in a little gap, like we used our feet on Yosemite finger cracks. My left foot found purchase on a loose looking flake out to the side and it seemed prudent to slam it a bolt there.
"I sure hope this doesn't f*#k up," I said, looking out into the Wonderland.
Bang, bang, bang. Arms and calves pumping out. Shakin' out each arm, then each calf, Bang, bang, bang. Then tap, tap and finally I clipped the quarter incher.
"Okay Crell, wanna lower me?"
"What?" chortled Crell from below.
"Lower me dude, lower me," I implored.
I could see Crell setting down his pipe, then grasping the rope with both hands and lowering me to the ground with a practiced hip belay.
As I untied my painfully tight EBs, Crell unwrapped one of the sandwiches his mom had made for him, always turkey and mayo. He devoured half of the thing, set it down and grabbed his huge EB's and stuffed his feet into them.
"How did it look after your last bolt Spicer?" he asked while still chewing his sandwich.
"Sketchy," I responded, "very sketchy!"
With the rope hanging down from my last bolt, Crell tied the rope into his swami and I prepared to belay him. He flew through the lower moves, hesitated at the second bolt and then suddenly weighted the rope. "Shit", he exclaimed, as he slipped off the edges.
"Crell, focus dude, focus, " I yelled upwards, slightly hassling him.
"I'm not warmed up yet," he reminded me as he got back on the rock.
Still on a toprope, Crell began to get serious. Now he carefully scanned the face for holds and accurately moved across them to my high point. With the flake in his hands and the top bolt at his waste he stared straight up silently for what seemed to be minutes. I wondered if he was having a flashback up there.
"Crell, how does it look?" I asked from my now warming belay stance at the base.
"Mmmm, grmm, mmm" was all I heard.
He worked his way to the top of the flake and stemmed over to some hold on the left.
"Mrrggg, brrrggg" he said.
I watched him grab the hammer with his right hand and the drill with his left and start pounding. Bang, bang, bang. Bang, bang, bang. I scanned the horizon, looked over at Such A Savage and a few new route possibilities. Bang, bang bang, bang, bang, bang. When he was finished, he carefully arranged the buttonhead and tapped it in.
"Nice job Crell" I exclaimed with a deep breath.
Crell stood atop the flake and looked around for his next move. The wind began to blow and make verbal communication even harder than it already was. I pulled out a bag of nuts and munched on a few. Then I heard some voices from the blocks downslope. It was Dee Estabans and Jim Angione coming to join us.
"Hey Dee, hi Jim, how you guys doin?" I asked.
"Pretty good" Dee said. "Stayed up pretty late last night." Dee and Jim's eyes were completely bloodshot and they sounded very spaced out.
"Wanna give this a go, Dee?" I asked.
"Maybe," Dee responded. "It looks cool."
Jim looked confused and very sleepy. "Are you guys using hooks?" he asked, almost too quietly to hear.
"Well, we might have to," I responded, trying to keep a good eye on Crell. "Ruby said he'd chop our bolts, or worse, pull us off." Do you really think we would?"
"Never know with Ruby," Dee said. "You know the way he drives. The f*#ker is sorta crazy."
"I'd be concerned about him chopping bolts, though," Dee said. "He's trippin' today and no telling what he might do!"
The three of us watched as Crell left the security of the flake, stepping off to the right. Now in a spread eagle posture, like a human X, his fingers explored virgin flakes, edges and slopes. He moved right, seeming teetery for a moment. He took two more steps right. Then both legs started jerking up and down uncontrollably, the dreaded Sewing Machine Legs.
Craning our necks upwards at Crell, our pulse rates tripled as we watched a terrified Crell Fro sixty feet above our heads in a feverishly unstable position with a big loop of rope sagging between him and his last bolt. Then Crell calmed down. His feet found purchase and the three of us sighed in unison "ahhhhhhhhhhh."
"Hey Crell, how ya doin? I shouted.
Crell said nothing. Bad sign. He didn't move and nobody said a thing. Then he sidled even farther towards some larger hold, and grabbed on.
"How is it Crell? I shouted.
"I'm worked," mumbled Crell from far above.
Then he shifted his hips to the right, stood on a small flake and reached down for the hammer. Bang, bang, bang. Bang, bang, bang. Crell dropped the hammer and drill on their cords and began to shake out one arm and then the other.
"I'm pumped man, I'm pumped," he yelled, "Watch me, man, watch me. I'm pumped, I'm so pumped."
We watched quietly from the base. Bang, bang, bang, bang bang, bang. Then tap, tap, tap. Crell fiddled with the button-head, squirreled it in and clipped it.
"Hold me" yelled Crell from above. "I'm done, lower me."
I quickly lowered Crell to the ground.
"How was it dude?" I asked.
He looked at me, pale and sweaty, like he'd just been spooked. I wondered, but didn't say anything in front of the others.
"Nice f*#kin' job dude, nice job," exclaimed a very hung over Dee Estabans.
"Wanna give it a go," I asked Dee as I pulled the rope through my device.
"Maybe next weekend," said Dee.
"Jim, wanna try it?" Dee asked, looking over at the skinny blonde, post teen.
"Naw," Jim responded.
Then Crell, still panting, looked over at me again. "Spicer, wanna keep going?
I looked over at Dee and he looked at me with that "c'mon, you can do it" expression.
"Okay, I guess I'll put in another bolt," I said in a squeamish kind of way.
Just as Crell untied his swami belt, I grabbed my EBs and started to cram my feet in. "Dee, wanna belay?"
"Ah, sure, sure," Dee seemed very spaced out, and reached for his swami and started to tie in.
I stepped back onto the rock and moved through the now familiar lower moves on top rope to Crell's high point. Just as I was reaching Crell's final bolt, new rapid voices emanated from the boulders. It was my brother Al and Steve Emerson. Al did all of the talking and Steve seemed to add a few mumbles. I could hear Dee and Al go back and forth about campground gossip and heard that Steve had taken too much acid and freaked out after soloing several 5.10 cracks, again in his sneakers.
Click. I snapped the oval beener into Crell's top bolt. The next moves looked very, very dicey. Crell and Dee were shouting to me but the wind obscured their voices. As I tried to get comfortable on the crumbly edges of Crell's last stance, I took a glance out over the Wonderland. The mineral scent of the rock reverberated in the heat and filled my nostrils. Then suddenly, I noticed that his last bolt was actually only two-thirds of the way in. He had rushed the placement and failed to drill the hole the full one-inch needed to secure the shiny buttonhead.
"Shabby work, wouldn't you say?"
I looked to my right and there was Yabo again, just like before, but he had a smoldering joint in his mouth. He noticed me looking at it and asked if I wanted a hit.
"The bitch is, it's hard to climb and smoke at the same time, even when you've got six legs," he mused. "Sure you don't want some? Acapulco Gold, man."
"Look Yabo, I'd love toke up with you later, but I need to get out of this alive, so maybe you can scramble up ahead and give me a few pointers."
"Sure, no problemo amigo," he said and skittered effortlessly up the vertical face. "First, go left there. There's a nice line of edges your left."
"You call these nice?" I asked. The moves were getting harder. One sparse edge and another and I really felt like my feet could pop right off with a rather unpleasant (and embarrassing) fall.
From below, I could hear Al telling a story's of John Long's new scary boulder problem in Hidden Valley, Sean Curtis's un-repeated mantle at the Asteroid Boulders and the gossip about the one beautiful college girl form LA who had showed up in camp that morning, already successfully hit on by Largo. The voices comforted me as I struggled with not one, but two, daunting faces.
"Hey, waddaya want, bro, this is the big time," replied Yabo. "Go left some more, then reach up. There's a small ledge."
I sidled myself upwards, squirming and reaching with my right hand. Feeling for an edge with my fingertips, sensing the texture from right to left across the face above. The sound of the wind swirled across my head. A pair of swifts sliced the air past my left ear and then I heard the sound of my own heart beating loudly.
"Spicer, how's it feel"? Dee yelled from below.
"Thin Dee, it's thin," I moaned while reaching as high as possible and finally clamping onto a quarter inch flake with the tips of my right fingers. Cool. I yarded myself upwards and positioned my right foot at the top of the vertical flake.
"Now, about ten inches up, there's a little ledge. You gotta grab it," commanded Yabo.
I noticed a series of small edges down to my left, right where I wanted to place my food. They were sparse and if I greased off, I'd take a twenty plus foot fall. But I was getting tired and my right calf was pumped.
"Use those ledges you're staring at, bro," he commanded as he sidled down closer for a better view.
So I did. I lifted my left foot and perched it on the flakes and stood very quickly while reaching for the stance. Just as I grabbed the thing my right foot teetered into space, my body barn-doored and my hand clamped with a vice-like death grip I was not gonna release.
"Fuuuuuck, I got it."
I levered myself up and over and got on top of the somewhat sloping, yet big enough little ledge. Below I heard five voices all shouting up encouragement and breathing sighs of relief. As I fumbled for a buttonhead in my shorts pocket, a couple of new and irreverent voices rumbled up from the base. Glancing downwards, I saw the red ponytail of Ruby Vogel and the graying mop of Jim Dutzi clustering with the others.
"Use any hooks dude"? Ruby called upwards.
"Not me," I swore.
The boys chattered as I tapped in a bolt, clipped it and asked Dee to lower me down.
"Lower me Dee," I shouted down.
I looked up one more time and Yabo was sucking on the now roached out joint, grinning at me.
"Nice work, bro. See ya next time when you finish this little f*#ker up. Maybe you'll name it after me, eh?"
"Yeah, sure, We'll call it something like Yabo the Crab-Spider No Acid Hallucination," I joked nervously.
As I reached the ground Ruby started in on me.
"I heard you guys used some hooks," spouted Ruby, with Jim Dutzi nodding yes in agreement. "You know I'm gonna have to chop those bolts," he asserted in classic Ruby style.
"C'mon Ruby, don't start a war. A couple of those stances were too steep to drill," Crell begged.
"Spicer, I really liked this but it's just way too long. Cut it in half, get rid of most of the bolt placing scenes and we've got something really fun and cool," suggested Ruby.
"I gotta take a piss," I said, looking forward to getting away from this conversation.
"Me too," said Crell.
We walked over to some bushes about twenty yards away.
"Weird sh#t up on the rock today," Crell said. "I think I was still trippin'."
My head whipped around. "Yabo?"
He nodded to the sound of urine striking the parched desert floor. We stared at each other for a while, and then simultaneously a shiver went up both our spines.
Then one word escaped both our mouths in unison.
"Fuuuuuuck!"
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MH2
climber
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Sep 10, 2009 - 03:45pm PT
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Quite the interesting archive.
I hear the advice to "give a piece of yourself." Good advice, but so is Shepp's, "F*ck the rules!"
Here writing I have nothing whatsoever to do with.
***
July 29/86
It's hard to say whether it was the garlic pancakes or our
philosophical differences with the snafflehounds, but for some reason we were horribly disorganized. We did, however, notice a helicopter land just below the summit towers.
Scott has a 100 metre rope of which he is very proud as there is
no knot when rappelling. So, after nine knotless rappels we were back on good old snow firma.
Also on the snow were two men, both Vancouver stock brokers. Evidently they were the stock brokers dropped by the helicopter we had seen earlier.
We introduced ourselves, got closing quotes from that day's market, and prepared to leave.
They detained our departure by asking the small favour that we
save their lives. "Without you," they added, "the chances of our
survival are zero to none."
We thought of asking what kind of odds we might get on that
estimate, but instead eyed them quizzically for what seemed like days, though it was only for 12 or 14 seconds.
Remembering, too, what our mothers had said about strangers,
especially strange stock brokers (and both our mothers had quite a few experiences with those), we said: "Yes we will help you, only first you must tell us what the f*** you are doing here and what is the unladen air speed of the African swallow."
The answer to the second question they knew immediately (even
though we didn't) and the answer to the first question was quite
involved. It turns out they were up on the mountain on a dare. Actually, if you really want to know the whole story, the two of them had been at a party and after copious fluid intake and much drinking, they had ended up making a substantial bet (this is all true) that they, two absolute non-mountaineers, could climb the Big Wadatorium within a month from the day of the bet.
They took a few rock climbing lessons and then planned
to be dropped high enough by helicopter that only the summit tower would have to be climbed.
Great plan, except to keep the weight down in the machine, two trips were required, one for supplies and one for them. Unfortunately the time lapse between these two trips was two
weeks and involved two different companies. Miscommunication was
no doubt responsible for their supplies arriving at the hut, while they ended up stark naked, comparatively speaking, at over 12,000 feet on the side of a sheer mountain.
We laughed non-stop at their foolishness 'til, in the excitement
of the hilarity, someone 'let one go' and then, giggling at our childish obsession with this basic human function, we took off fast. Besides, it was snowing cats and dogs and the occasional snafflehound, and we were very afraid.
But luckily I had some Skoal and so could leave a trail of brown
spitulants should we have gotten lost and had to find our way back up the mountain. Scott pointed out that this was very stupid.
Anyway, if you still care, it was a major epic getting the two city slickers all the way down to Rainy Knob. And also, because of their lack of equipment, we became fearful lest they lose their feet to frostbite. But bizarre things do sometimes occur; in this case it being their careful study of a survival book which strongly recommended carrying another pair of dry socks by wearing them condom-fashion on one's dink! We mutually raised our eyebrows as they changed and then mutually wondered if this was perhaps an older survival book they read, written before many women were in the mountains... or perhaps it was
written when chicks also had dinks! Thinking about this left us
confused and somewhat worried; as it is this kinky sort of baloney that we so often hope to escape by coming to the mountains.
Finally we got the pair down to Rainy Knob. We piled into
Scott's bivy tent only minutes after I tested the sharpness of my ice axe by poking a hole in that very same tent. Scott, by the way, offered to remove my liver with his pocket knife.
Next morning we herded the brokers up the hill to the hut, just
like two cowboys riding the exchange. Once up there we immediately dove into their food barrels and decided to have a party. Except inside a barrel is no place for a party, so we came back out, went inside the hut and threw a shindig that the snafflehounds will never forget. Imagine feeding caviar to snafflehounds!
Anyway, we patched up our differences with the beasts,
promising never to call them Falaffelhounds again. The wolverine
dropped by late, after finishing off another food cache on the Radiant.
The stockbrokers got sleepy and rather boring. The moon came out and the Coast Range was as beautiful an idea as anyone has ever had.
*
I believe the author is Dave "Fish" Fulton
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