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MikeL
Trad climber
Santa Clara, CA
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May 21, 2006 - 08:54pm PT
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I get route amnesia all the time.
Your detailed memories are amazing to me. Unless I immediately scribble notes in the route book, I can hardly remember any details to any climb within hours. A climb is more of a physical and emotional experience than a cognitive one for me; don't ask why. (I don't get it.)
-MikeL
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - May 22, 2006 - 12:05am PT
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Ouch! that is quite a flattering rendition of me... sort of an 80's twist, the tights that is.. and those ankle high boots (I can only wish!). I'm going to have to get a hat like that with a feather.
MikeL - after the amount of time I took going up the route I had no problem committing much of the details to memory. Usually I can picture the details accurately for a few days or maybe a bit more, then I remember the details, but not accurately. My friend Will from SLC always refered to it as "Climber's Alzheimer's," the advantage being that you are always climbing a route for the first time...
Gary's close to right on size... my hands are not so big... the biggest hands I know are TM Herbert's, so Peter must have a pretty good pair on him. I know my hands are larger than Melissa's...
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Melissa
Gym climber
berkeley, ca
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May 22, 2006 - 12:14am PT
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"the biggest hands I know are TM Herbert's"
They must be enourmous if they're bigger than abelgabel's.
It's fun to get my ego boost on the thin hands (and I do find it motivating to work that size!) and "ow's" that are the right size for me to get a knee in or crawl inside.. I've just had to learn to calibrate my expectations to the FAist...Like I mentioned, I've come to expect that you were a big guy, Peter!
Thanks for sharing your memories.
Also, fwiw, since it's getting a recommendation, rumor has it that the rap anchor on top of Wendy is a single rotting 1/4 incher. Caveat Emptor.
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Jaybro
Social climber
The West
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May 22, 2006 - 12:36am PT
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Ed, this "Will from SLC" ?
Maybe not, but I climbed Peter Left with this character.
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WBraun
climber
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May 22, 2006 - 12:43am PT
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Hahaha Peter, I remember that day when you got all pissed about the right side of Peter Pan.
But remember, .... Hargis also tried to steal Outer Limits from Bridwell.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - May 22, 2006 - 01:37am PT
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Jaybro, different "Will from SLC" ...
my friend and climbing partner at ORG:
Seems that a lot of my partners climb wide, here is Will again with his famous climbing pants:
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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May 22, 2006 - 09:20am PT
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Werner,
I had forgotten (Outer Limits/Bridwell/Hargis)! There was another story! Hargis for some reason decided that the thing to do was to feed off of other guys, rather than come forth with his own, new ideas. He was a good climber too which leaves him no excuse.
Here we were, 1970-1972, with literally thousands of incredible routes still to be done, as it turns out in retrospect, and this wraithlike oddity cannot do the personal work to see ANY of this potential all around him, but rather chooses to make his issue simply trying to outdo and "best" other men in a creepy, stalkerlike manner on projects that usually were shorter and not too important. He was real passive-aggressive, but now that I think about it, he had to be, since any one of the rest of us could have easily wrecked his BBQ and would have, had he been more direct in his intentions. His powerful brother,Tom, also weird, was at least more direct but similarly unfriendly.
But I guess the more significant thing for me was this was the end of my stimulating friendship with Schmitz. We had been climbing alot, really well, and I was just coming into my better climbing, 22 yrs old. He had been in the Valley for a few years, kind of sponsored my rise in the ranks, and even had me meet his legendary dad, Alla. But everything has an end, except sausages, they have two.
Best to you, PH
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asioux
Trad climber
pasadena,ca
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May 22, 2006 - 03:05pm PT
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I am leaving for yosemite tomorrow morning (Tuesday) very early. And "Peter Pan" is on my hit list of climbs to do. After bouldering at Stoney Point and talking to Bob Kamps about offwidths and chimneys, he recommened this climb to me. So in honor of kamps, I have been wanting to do this route. And finding this post today on Peter pan and all the info that I need motivates me even more to climb it. The biggest gear I have is 4.5, two 5 and two #6 cams and two bigbros #3 #2. Wish me luck. Armando (Pasadena)
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Patrick Sawyer
climber
Originally California now Ireland
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May 22, 2006 - 03:08pm PT
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Do you use jam on Peter Pan? ;-)
I've done Peter Pan but not Peter Left. I actually like climbing around that area of Cap - Wendy, JM Barrie, Captain Hook.
Peter, as has been mentioned on another thread, Ed Barry was pretty darn strong too.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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May 22, 2006 - 07:49pm PT
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Patrick,
No question, Ed Barry and his friend Joe Divera were/are both superstrong, and more importantly really masterful climbers, still are.
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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May 22, 2006 - 08:17pm PT
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In the Index Town Wall climbing guide, we gave the FA credit to the people who "did the work" (the people who found it and cleaned it, bolted it in some cases). So if someone else happens to jump the project and lead it the night before, they don't get any credit. It cuts down on the b.s.
Sometimes there are rare cases where the route is cleaned and then the person is unable to lead/free it. But usually the cleaning is the hard part and the actual climbing is not exactly state-of-the-art.
Similarly, for some very hard climbs, repeat ascents are also worth noting in the climbing history.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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May 25, 2006 - 05:52pm PT
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Here is photo of the crux, with the late Pat Savageau just above it, taken from the belay in 1999.
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Zander
Trad climber
Berkeley
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May 26, 2006 - 12:21am PT
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Peter,
Nice picture. I gotta get up there. Ed thanks for starting this one.
Zander
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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It is a great line, a beautiful location, and a tough 5.9 (Kamps rated it 5.8, which made it into Roper's Red guide).
In 1972, I was allegedly going to teach Vern Clevenger how to climb offwidths, after introducing him to the pillars outside Eschelman Hall at Berkeley. He ended up leading the whole climb, while I followed like an obedient puppy.
John
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rgold
Trad climber
Poughkeepsie, NY
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Just came upon this thread---brings back memories...I had an epic on Peter Pan BITD, perhaps this was what Peter was referring to when he wrote "Richie...displayed a level of power that seemed only fabled. And then he would get spanked on 5.8 and 5.9 cracks sometimes." I did lots of Yosemite routes from 5.8--5.10 in the early seventies, and had vast and various problems with 5.10 offwidths, but Peter Pan was the unique route under 5.10 (I think it was 5.8 at the time) that burned me.
I don't remember much of Peter Pan, but I do remember a straight-in crack of fist size and larger that was the scene of my fiasco. This was in the days before nuts, and the "pin list" I had been given for this pitch had a single 4" bong and a 1" angle as the only protection. (The 1" angle went into some kind of flake inside the crack.)
So I'm thrutching my way up this crack somewhere above the 1" angle, wondering when I should place the bong, and putting it off as long as possible because I don't want it to be too low. A slight widening just barely allowed by to slip my knee in. Unfortunately, I hadn't learned about locking the knee by bending the leg back and bracing the foot outside the crack, so when I shifted a little weight to the knee, it slide down an inch or so and jammed.
Well, worse than jammed. As was the fashion at the time, I was wearing a pair of knickers, and this particular pair had a metal buckle just under the knee which rolled over a bone, into a slight concavity inside the crack, and locked my knee in place kind of like a ballnut in a pocket.
I was stuck. Totally stuck. Frantic thrashing seemed only to lock my knee tighter, and the pressure on it, which was increasing, was also causing it to swell. And hurt. A lot. I got kinda panicky, which made me forget for a while that I still had the 4" bong with me. But eventually it dawned on me that I had it, so I placed it and tried to use it to help with the extraction of my knee. At this point, I'm leaning on the bong, I've got the non-jammed foot planted flat against the wall, and I'm trying to raise the knee and extract it with all the "fabled" strength Peter mentions.
No doubt, what was called for was some calm, sensitive, careful maneuvering of the sort you'd do nowadays to remove a recalcitrant nut. But I was way too freaked out for that, and with great effort eventually managed to tear my knee out of the crack, leaving shreds of skin, knicker material, and the offending buckle behind.
A retreat was then in order, and I have never been back to Peter Pan in the intervening years. Even now I can conjure up the welling panic of that stuck knee, and think this is one climb I won't ever be revisiting.
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Zander
Trad climber
Berkeley
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rgold,
Thanks for the story. Sounds scary. Let me know if you want to go up for another go.
We'll take some cams and bigbros. Ha ha.
Climb on!
Zander
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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I noticed upthread that the link to the photo of Savageau just above the crux and proceeding into the long squeeze chimney was broken. Here it is again:
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scuffy b
climber
heading slowly NNW
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Mar 25, 2014 - 11:46am PT
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Wow, this is quite a thread.
I climbed this in 1975, I believe, with Rob Muir.
I mainly recall going a long long way in squeeze mode, and getting the rope
stuck on rappel. It just wouldn't pull, so I prussicked up, made a little
adjustment, I guess, and came back down. Identical setup, really, but the
rope pulled fine this time.
You're way up above the Valley floor.
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bhilden
Trad climber
Mountain View, CA/Boulder, CO
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Mar 25, 2014 - 12:18pm PT
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Our motivation for going way up there to do Peter Pan in the mid 70's was the cool Galen Rowell photo from Vertical World of Yosemite of the climber doing the undercling on pitch 2.
Tube chocks for pro?!?! Anybody every take a long fall on one of those and had it hold?
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martygarrison
Trad climber
Washington DC
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Mar 25, 2014 - 12:29pm PT
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I think this is a can't miss climb and the views are incredible. Normally hardly any folks up there to boot.
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