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mooch
Trad climber
Old Climbers' Home (Adopted)
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Sep 30, 2010 - 11:38am PT
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We have some routes on that side with nothing on them, maybe a rap sling here and there, but makes you wonder if you are FAing.
Anyone convicted by this statement? Hmmmmmmm!
I'll throw this out there (throw me under the bus later)....
Do your "homework" first beforehand......nahmeen?! ;)
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Grahm Doe
Sport climber
Just South Of Heaven
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Sep 30, 2010 - 01:20pm PT
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Nate - I have been meaning to contact you actually about Shuteye history. Would you be interested in writing the Shuteye climbing history section for the guide? I think you have more info and contacts than anyone else in this regard.
I think a good guide takes a tribe. Sure I could bang out a quick guide to the area but Shuteye has touched my very soul. Like others I feel a strong connection to it. Justin calls it the Holy Land. An accurate description. Shuteye deserves a quality guide with awesome pics, history and stories from those who have communed there. Most everyone has been very helpful in providing info about their routes. Shawn Reeder and Tom have also both pledged amazing pics to the project. It is slowly taking shape with everyones help. Its tough just keeping up with all the new routes. This year will probably have over 50 new routes alone.
Speaking of adventure, Leo and I are getting ready for a 3 day float trip down the San Joaquin this weekend! We are hiking into Ballon Dome to do some climbing and then floating down the river to hopefully fa some new walls on the way to Mammoth Pool. We are bringing 2 ropes, a rack, float tubes and fishing gear. I am taking the camera so hopefully I can post up a good TR when its all done.
Check out our boats: http://www.flyfishusa.com/float-tubes/fishcat-float-tube.htm
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Nate D
climber
San Francisco
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Sep 30, 2010 - 02:09pm PT
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G,
I don't consider myself much of a writer, and I'm also a nobody, so I won't help sales, but I suppose I could take a stab at a history. I still feel like there's so much research to be done, it's kinda daunting. To mooch's comment about doing homework, sure, you can try all you want, but even when you do find out who's delved in these places, sometimes memories are blurry or they'd rather keep quiet (for better or for worse).
Very envious of your upcoming adventure w/Leo into the wilderness. That place is extra sacred, so IMHO, preferably don't share a public TR. Talk to Sean Jones before you head out. Email me.
Cool little story, Roger!
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Grahm Doe
Sport climber
Just South Of Heaven
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Sep 30, 2010 - 02:15pm PT
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Not really worried about sales. I bet you can do a great job. Just a rough idea of who was climbing out there and when would be more than we have now! Even if only hundred copies get made, (something i am considering is a limited print run) at least the routes and some of the history will get documented for the future.
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bluering
Trad climber
Santa Clara, CA
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Sep 30, 2010 - 02:17pm PT
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That fishing trip sounds like fun Grahm. Be sure to share some pics afterward. Have fun!
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susu
Trad climber
East Bay, CA
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Sep 30, 2010 - 02:38pm PT
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Nate you are a shoe in.
Micronut nice thoughts and pics...
Grahm trip sounds incredible!
Roger, enjoying your stories! Capacity to be humble definitely important - may help keep us balanced, honest, and at the very least, still breathing.
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Doug Robinson
Trad climber
Santa Cruz
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I wrote this to go with a photo story of Shuteye in Climbing Magazine a few years back. It's just one version of a fragmented history. I doubt that anyone has the full picture.
Grahm, I'm stoked that you might publish updated beta! If you want to include any of this, be my guest.
Hinterlands Expeditions
By Doug Robinson
Royal Robbins first turned me on to the Hinterlands. In the early 70s when he had taken to soloing in tennis shoes, Royal veered south from Yosemite. Between the park boundary and the deep gash of the San Joaquin River lay two hundred square miles, or probably more, of rolling forest sequestering the occasional granite dome. Like the South Platte country in Colorado, with dirt roads meandering through. Twenty-five domes cropped up in just the first few years. But Robbins wasn’t the first to get there. Not quite.
A few of the faces stretched up over a thousand feet, especially on Fuller Buttes and Balloon Dome. Fred Beckey – who else? – had started sniffing around the western Sierra’s 400-mile “dome belt” in 1970. How did that guy do it? Here he was, a thousand miles from his home range the Cascades, running down the western Sierra bagging the first ascents of whole regions. In 1970 he opened up the Needles, not a bad coup, then pioneered Charlotte Dome for good measure. That put the heat on for Sierra locals. The next spring – April in fact, long before snow usually melts enough to make the dirt roads passable – Galen Rowell grabbed the first major Hinterlands route, the Eagle Dihedral on East Fuller Butte. Galen was motivated, working hard to escape being forever branded as “a former second of Fred Beckey and Warren Harding.” But on the virgin face of Fuller Butte, Galen hit a blank spot right beneath an overhang that forced his aid climbing to get creative. He began throwing a nut on a rope up past the overhang. Over and over he tossed it up out of sight. When it stuck, he went up the cord and – chuckling at the bewilderment of the next party – called it A3+.
You can sense the grapevine at work, the buzz in Camp 4, in what happened next. Barely two months later Fred arrived in the Hinterlands, and in typical fashion climbed a natural line on the area’s biggest formation, remote and beautiful Balloon Dome across the river. He also copped a route on East Fuller Butte, the first route on Shuteye Ridge, and ran up the longest line on Wamello Dome, before moving on. He never looked back at the slew of quite lovely but more modest domes.
The rest of the Hinterlands was untouched until Royal came along, with his Rockcraft climbing school in tow, beginning in the summer of 1973. Every week a fresh gypsy caravan of cars would line up, with Royal’s classic VW bus leading us up a maze of logging roads. I’d bring up the rear in an even older bus, an itinerant guide in huarache sandals, shuffling a circuit between Bishop, Ventura and the Valley.
Sometimes Royal took us to familiar crags, sometimes to new ones. There seemed to be a lot of rock out there, but few clear vistas in the rolling forest. Royal would set his apprentices to work teaching, say, clean climbing, then slip off to scout the larger faces in those Tretorn tennis shoes. Next day, he would point us toward fine, natural lines on medium-sized granite domes, up to six pitches. Then camping rough on pine needles or in pocket meadows a night or two before moving on. Wine in campfire smoke. We definitely sampled the eastern side of Shuteye Ridge.
After two or three summers, Royal closed down Rockcraft. I returned to Bishop and the Palisades. And it wasn’t until I moved to the coast late in the eighties that I remembered the Hinterlands and went back for a look.
Wamello Dome was an early favorite, so I stopped there first. It sported great position, with a broad face six hundred feet high, looking south into the sun and commanding a sweeping view. It’s reminiscent of Manure Pile Buttress in Yosemite. Five times as wide, though, with inviting climbing everywhere you look. I recognized the South Buttress, which I had guided onsight for Royal. Now two bolts marked a direct start, and a guidebook listed a FA ten years after we had bagged it. Still, there was almost no one around. We lingered.
One day I was coming along the base of Wamello (called Fresno Dome on the map) when a familiar voice called down, “Do you know what we’re on?” It was Royal, leading a group of Boy Scouts. The Scouts saved his life as a teenager, he figures, by turning him on to climbing. So he keeps up a steady effort to return the favor. Or, more like pass it forward.
“I was hoping you could show me,” was all I could reply. First glance, I assumed Royal was on his own route, Mule Train. But then I’ve never been sure where it went, really. The guidebook is long out of print and, well, there is a lot of rock up there.
Sitting up on Wamello’s summit watching the sun sink toward almond orchards and cotton gins, our view to the south is dominated by Shuteye Ridge. Hints of its bold outcrops taunt us. Mike Arechiga comes back form there with his eyes spinning. Topos go up on Mike’s website. No one seems to notice. Years go by. Sean Jones brings a new wave from the Valley to Shuteye. In Tuolumne, Royal and I catch a sizzling glimpse of these photos on Shawn Reeder’s computer. Clearly, Shuteye Ridge is new wave Hinterlands. We make a date to go out there in October. But a big snowstorm intervenes. Now I hunker down on the coast with rain on the roof thinking once again, maybe next season…
Why publicize this secret backwater? Expose a private reserve of fine granite? I’ve watched other hidden domelands slam onto the cover of this magazine. Calaveras Dome comes to mind. Locals whimpered and cried doom. In the end outside climbers nosed around for six months, got poison oak and left. That was about it. Still, many favor hoarding. So, a bit nervously, I told Royal that I was going to write this. His response was swift and sure and open: “The more the merrier!”
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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thanks Doug for that, it's a lovely place, but it requires a bit of work, and a lot of imagination to make it into the minds of most modern climbers... there are those who will go though, I'm hoping to be one of them!
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bluering
Trad climber
Santa Clara, CA
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Good stuff, DR!!!
SoYo is an awesome place that is indescribable. You gotta feel it, and be there to appreciate it.
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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That is a very nice recollection, Doug. Did you take any pictures from those early years?
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Grahm Doe
Sport climber
Just South Of Heaven
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Awesome Doug! Will definitely add it to the guide book. Thanks for offering it up!
We survived our trip down into the San Joaquin this weekend. Theres one huge wet Ballon out there ;-)
We made it back home last night. We ended up stashing everything down river and hiking/scrambling back up the South Fork trail after the weather got nasty. Lots of portaging and wet boulders made things dangerous and super slow. Had to go into survival mode. We slept in a rad cave Sat night. It rained all night and then all day Sunday. We are super worked. Got some amazing pics at least.
Glad we decided to turn around or we would still be out there in these thunderstorms and out of rescue range. Actually seeing how intense the river and terrain is down there I am completely blown away Royal got the first descent of the river, or that ANYONE can actually kayak that thing even with around 30 portages.
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Tork
climber
Yosemite
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Full on adventure Grahm. Can't wait for the full story and pics.
Glad you all got out ok.
Jeff
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Tork
climber
Yosemite
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Thanks for the TR Ed and the bonus pics Sue. Bummed I missed you guys that weekend. Had a project to finish. Nice to see folks enjoying Wanderlust.
Now you all got me thinking of warm Minerva Dome on this wet day off. Talk about classic moderates!
The wide chimney, Young Man's Fancy, and the arete, Middle Aged Man's Fancy Dreams, classic!
Great to hear more of the history out there Roger and Doug, thanks!.
That boat was parked there a long time hooblie and it is pulling out of the dock at a snails pace. One of my favorite lines out there, Eschers Way was just picked by John and Sue at the end of the season last year.
Jeff
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sneville
climber
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Jeff,
Has the right facing corner to the left of your arete climb been done? That corner is to the right of the wide thing you and john did. I was looking at it this weekend. I finished my project to the right of matt's route. Give it a go it is a fun route. Congrats on the house.
Sean
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Tork
climber
Yosemite
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Hey Sean! Nice job, when did you finish the project? Looking forward to giving it a go.
The corner to the left is an Old Mans Dream, another cool line.
We are excited about the house. Bummed we didn't make it over there this weekend due to the weather.
We need another Wawona Dome gathering here soon.
Jeff
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Nate D
climber
San Francisco
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DR,
Thanks for posting up your article again from the 2005 article. It's a nice broad sweep of the region's history. In the case of Shuteye, there are a handful of additional pioneers worth mentioning. But you are right that nobody has a grasp of all of the pieces in the history.
Incidentally, MIke's topos weren't up for very long, some people did take notice, and they were kindly asked to be pulled before your piece with Sean came out. (Not that they were the only topos to be shared publicly since the Spencer guide.)
G,
Glad you and Leo made it out safe and sound. Wild place's yield wild adventures!
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Slater
Trad climber
Central Coast
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Yeah, as Royal said in the last issue of Climbing... he never got much attention for the descents of some of the rivers he did. The guy was an animal, a true pioneer down to the core, in both kayaking and climbing. Most of us never get there in one sport/endeavor. He did it in two.
Grahm, can't wait to see the pictures. I bet they're awesome! I'll hold on to most of mine and save them for the guidebook etc. Here is one from a recent aerial recon of the region. Has the big rock on the left been climbed yet? A route through the heart looks like it could go...
Thanks to my buddy Doug Englekirk and his bush pilot skills.
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sneville
climber
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Jeff,
I finished the first pitch on sat before the rain came. I still have to take it into the knobs for a second pitch. Yeah we were talking about getting out to wawona before the snow comes. Did you fa that corner?
Sean
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Tork
climber
Yosemite
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That corner on Minerva is a Delk route.
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Slater
Trad climber
Central Coast
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Still waiting for pics Grahm... how beat up are you?
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