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wildone
climber
GHOST TOWN
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Mar 29, 2009 - 02:00am PT
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Thanks Philo. You articulated some of my thoughts more succinctly than I could on why I feel good about my role in putting up GU. I've read every account of all the bad-asses in Yosemite. I lived in El Portal for almost a decade. Climbed with some real legends. Look up to all the ground up "heroes". Respect them all so much. All my FAs until GU, were ground up (and to be honest, I was Sean's partner for trying to free Harding and Rowell's South Face, which we got turned back on at around .14a, and then I was his partner for all the climbing of the arch (trad, bolted belays).
And I went down the upper face with him on the preview, but didn't help him on that half of the route or place any of those bolts.
I don't feel bad about those choices we made. Different? Yes.
I still see southern belle as a pinnacle achievement in climbing.
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Mar 29, 2009 - 10:50am PT
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Coz,
One more try to speak to your being "just killed inside" by the route I helped to construct. Philo rather brilliantly outlined how I see our vastly different artistic statements hanging on the same wall.
I meant no disrespect to you or to the South Face of Half Dome. And I firmly believe that Growing Up not only takes nothing away from Southern Belle, but actually enhances by contrast what you did up there. And it answers in part your sadness that so few will ever experience SB, by opening up a parallel opportunity for many to taste the unique and otherworldly stone of the South Face.
Far from tagging, we created a different art up there, one more accessible to modern eyes. But I for one never lost sight of the Mona Lisa, watching.
Thanks again for your story: open, honest and brilliantly told.
Much respect,
Doug
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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Mar 29, 2009 - 02:12pm PT
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Thanks Scott,
I too want not to get into ethics again. And style. We've been over that and over that. So I totally agree, leave it.
I love it that in this thread we can talk about the climbing.
But I will say a little more about perception. I am not lying to you. My honest perception of the part of the wall we were on is that ground up it would have been way beyond Southern Belle as a runout. It's a different part of the wall, with different qualities. I am not presuming to say what it is like over on Southern Belle because I haven't been there. I trust what you say about it, don't doubt any of it. And it's certainly confirmed by the Iron Monkey, by Caylor and by Dean Potter and Leo Houlding.
You haven't been on the part of the wall where Growing Up goes. It is hundreds of feet away. So I ask you to respect the possibility that Sean and I with 3/4 of a century of climbing between us are saying honestly to you and the rest of the climbing world what our perception is of the wall we were on.
Are there stances on Growing Up? Sure, but not enough of them to keep it from becoming a worse death route than Southern Belle. We had the same sort of thoughts as you, imagined the same sort of sadness at no one ever -- or only rarely -- repeating the climb if it were run out so far. So we took a different tack.
It's based on our perception of our part of the wall. Even looking at Clint's blowups it's easy to see that Harding and Rowell were following a more featured part of the wall. When Walt soloed their line he spotted the Belle, which runs up that same relatively featured corridor.
Now look on the same blowups at our part of the wall. Even at that distance it is smoother and blanker. Different, that's all.
I ain't lying.
Doug
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Jello
Social climber
No Ut
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Mar 29, 2009 - 03:14pm PT
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Coz, my respect and admiration for you grows everytime I check back to see how this thread is progressing. Your absolute committment to the truth in representing your actions, state-of-mind, passions and ideals is as inspiring as your climbing skills, and those are obviously of a very high order, indeed.
Back in the late-80's, I had formulated a plan to do a climb on that beautiful big south face. I was going to solo my line first, aiding and placing bolts where necessary (ground up, naturally). Then I would recruit a strong partner to go back and free the climb. Problem is, just when I was ready to go, I found out that Walt and Dave had just completed Southern Belle, which was the exact line I had planned on trying. Dratt!!!...and Whew!!!...now I don't have to do THAT one, at least. Guess I'll go look at that line on the Eiger, instead...
DR, you know you've always been a mentor to me, and my admiration for Coz's impassioned lucidity here in no way undermines my respect and gratitude for the ideas and values you've introduced to me, and the climbing community in general. I haven't read but a fraction of the thread on GU, because I could see early on that no one was being convinced to change their perspectives from those they had brought with them to the party - like most of the "discussions" on this forum, as well as in everyday contemporary life.
Thank you both for being the amazing, honest people you are. You guys make me proud to call myself a climber.
-Jello
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philo
Trad climber
boulder, co.
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Mar 29, 2009 - 04:08pm PT
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Coz, my illustration on art was also metaphorical.
In climbing we travel on the paths the gods gave us with the media as presented to us. Thus climbing becomes a performance art. With the performer and the primary audience being one and the same. Their are many styles to creating the vertical dance but the creative process occurs only once. Subsequent performances usually only endeavor to emulate. Often, as is the case with you on SB and your other brilliant test pieces, the artist will rise to the challenge of improving on the past. As you did by removing aid and Hank and Alan almost did by going for it in a day. Someday when the right artist is ready to perform at that level it may be soloed. But it will never be performed lightly or with disrespect. You assured that by your stellar performance in establishing the FFA.
To me the important part to me is to not degrade a route by altering the work as established. Or the media as presented. Stylistically it was always important to me to do a route in at least the best style it had ever been done in. So what really taints things for me is less the addition of the stylistically incompatible GU on the SFHD as it is the negative altering of existing routes, particularly the great ones. The now commonly accepted and seemingly endless addition of fixed gear and the enhancement or comfortization of holds has made a mockery of many a work of art.
And in a way that GU could never do to SB. I would be appalled if new bolts popped up on SB to comfortize it. No for that performance you better be able to suffer like an artist!
In my best years of good climbing and moral clarity I believed that bolts had only the most meagerly limited role in "modern" climbing and that bolt ladders were an abomination. I felt that the rock or mountain deserved preservation till a good enough climber could ascend without cheats, aids or taints. I also didn't use chalk, avoided clipping fixed gear when possible and went all the way to the ground pulling the rope if I failed. But that was then.
Climbing, being indifferent to my personal take on style and ethics, moved on. The juggernaught of growing popularity propelled the "lifestyle" into the "sports" arena.
Convenience over sacrifice became a compelling drive. The Urbanization of the sport was at hand. Routes of "dubious" styles sprouted everywhere. The sheer quantity of new routes was staggering. To me it seemed a sad Machiavellian manifesto. But the truly classic ascents remained for the most part undimmed by the progression of time and change of means. Except where they were cheated into submission.
Now, with the convenient excuses of being the decrepitly aged father of three with an 18 year old prosthetic knee, things are different. Now I relish a rope over my head. I wallow in chalk while phaffing away time wishing for more fixed gear. I bark like a French Free poodle when I am windging. And I have a harder and harder time convincing myself to start all the way over from the ground every time. But the climbs are not about me. Once a route is established only the style of my performance really matters and it only really matters to me.
What I am getting at is that by the standards of style from my time on stage a great many subsequent routes would have been called profane. Yet like changes in styles of art movements resistance to difference is to be expected. It is only normal. It is also normally futile. All anyone can do is make the best statement they can when it is their turn in this evolving art of performance. And hope their art stands the tests of time. This you have done with Southern Belle. Regardless of future developments no one is going to paint another Mona Lisa.
There are masterworks still to be created and performed. They will be done by those who come after. Having the benefit of monumental accomplishment to perform upon they will see a little further than those who came before. They will have their own visions. And they will create difference. But they just might feel the same about their performance, their art as those who preceded them.
Coz, you alliterate so well the experience of being in that zone of oneness that you attained on SB. I have known this transcendent state in the past. Of all the losses of time that is the one I rue the most. To have known it at all is to have entered that divine state where inspiration is found. Where artists find their voice. To never know it again is a sadness I am unable to express in any form available to me. I hope you can find yourself moving beyond the sorrows and unto the joy of the many rare performances you achieved. Peace Phil Broscovak
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Mar 29, 2009 - 07:23pm PT
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Bump it again.
More climbs.
More satisfaction
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Mar 29, 2009 - 10:13pm PT
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Scott said:
I like this thread because it was not about your climb GU it was about the SB and about climbing, not ethics. --- It's my hope we can go back to talking climbing, I think we all enjoy bringing back the memories of days gone by, as it is all an old climber has.
DR said:
I ain't lying.
Jello said:
(Everything that's in his post.)
Philo said:
No for that performance you better be able to suffer like an artist!
I’m just sayin’ ….
Would it not be so cool if we could have a thread which goes to thousands of posts, merely expanding upon, perhaps searching the truth and good tidings we find out there traveling on our fingertips and toes?
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Mar 29, 2009 - 11:04pm PT
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Roy, we do. We do have “a thread” of the sort of which you speak.
It is a meta-post. It is Supertopo Forum. Right? I think so. And I am thinking you see it this way as well.
best to you and "that hat", p.
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Lynne Leichtfuss
Social climber
valley center, ca
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Mar 29, 2009 - 11:17pm PT
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"searching the truth and good tidings we find out there traveling our fingertips and toes..." agree heartily Tarbuster. Although new to this forum I did spend years with the most excellent people that inhabit this world....climbers.
Climbers and the climbing community encompass a very special realm of living on this planet, a real and very separate reality. The traveling companions I've found here and reconnected with are like none other found on this globe.
Each climber may have a different life map, gifts and qualities...from a repeat beginner like me to the best of the best. But as Tarbuster said, finger tips and toes on the rock are a life touchstone for each of us, a compass pointing the way in life each one called climber wants to discover. Many facets of our lives are first discovered and then enhanced by climbing.
Bachar said in his dvd, (loosely quoted) "you keep going back to the mountain until you find out about yourself....."
And you sure do. But the experience includes the community, the friends and antifriends....that may later become friends. Diverse, unique, gifted, caring ....going for the hard line. Climbers.
Peace, Lynne
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Todd Gordon
Trad climber
Joshua Tree, Cal
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Mar 29, 2009 - 11:41pm PT
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Way cool read, Coz;.....I climb alot, but I never do stuff like that;.....but actually;...everyone has their climbs of "epic" proportion....each is different for the individual....each as exciting, dangerous, committing, and thrilling as the next;....only few do ones that are cutting edge for the whole climbing world;.....just our "own" little climbing worlds....You and Dave threw it down.......again;...excellent read, awesome adventure, and that So. face of Half Dome has to be one of the most beautiful pieces of rock on the planet. Bravo. Your committment to challege, adventure , and purity of line once again has me in awe and deepens my respect for what you have done as an individual, and for the climbing community.....
Also Doug, (whom I haven't seen for years, but had a few excellent days out cragging with years ago with some very beautiful ladies......thanks.....).....I do new routes too, and I do them in the style which I choose and which suits me;......it works for me, but others might not always agree........can get to be a pain in the ass, but thank heavens we do have these freedoms to explore and express as we seem fit......once we lose these...then we are REALLY screwed........
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Mar 29, 2009 - 11:44pm PT
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Peter & Lynne & Todd,
YES it is so.
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dogtown
climber
Cheyenne,Wyoming
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Mar 29, 2009 - 11:53pm PT
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Very well put Gordon !!
Bruce.
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Mar 30, 2009 - 06:28pm PT
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Bump this one back, cuz. . .it's real and it's GREAT!!!
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jbar
Social climber
Asymptote
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Mar 30, 2009 - 11:40pm PT
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Rebump cuz that rock really IS steep!
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johnboy
Trad climber
Can't get here from there
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Mar 31, 2009 - 12:55am PT
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This thread, and especially this last page is what makes ST great.
I'm honored to sit a the same campfire and listen to all the diversity acknowledged while maintaining a level of civility and respect that rises to the level of their climbing careers.
Thanks, I'm humbled.
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dogtown
climber
Cheyenne,Wyoming
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Mar 31, 2009 - 04:05am PT
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No it's not a free country but it is a free forum.(Last time I checked)
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john hansen
climber
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Mar 31, 2009 - 10:51pm PT
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Cosgrove, Robinson, Lowe.. Great stuff.
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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This is always worthwhile on the front page
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Mungeclimber
Trad climber
sorry, just posting out loud.
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great pic jbar, rad!
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wbw
climber
'cross the great divide
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In my dreams, I imagine an awe-inspiring face in a wilderness setting. A faint but long, distinct unclimbed line. I am fearful but because I am inspired I place protection only where the rock allows me to. The moves are very difficult, and often very runout, but I have elevated myself and my ability to the level of this amazing location. It is my own, personal journey and I understand that as soon as I try to express that experience to others, I have changed the experience. The rewards of such an experience are internal, I really don't care very much about what others think of my climb.
Sometimes it seems that the new generation of climbers do not look at our passion in the way that I describe above. Whatever; that's okay. But I know that for many of us that learned to climb in the 80's and before, my description above might represent the ultimate climbing has to offer. I've never met Coz or DS, and Walt only briefly, but I believe that they probably had this experience on Southern Belle. Me: I'm still dreaming of having that experience, but have not the skill, boldness or time to live the dream. Nonetheless, it is a dream that I live with at one level or another, every single day.
Wow, did you guys really inspire us! Thank you.
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