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Gunkie
Trad climber
Valles Marineris
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How bad is the Falls trail from the top?
IMO, not bad. Did that with a haul bag 22 years ago because we topped out into a thunderstorm and opted to walk down rather than potentially get caught on the east ledges. It was 5 hours from beginning to hike off from the top of the Nose until we hit the gas station (RIP) at camp 4. It never did rain too hard, but the hike is beautiful and a welcome respite from being in a harness after most of a week.
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anita514
Gym climber
Great White North
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Thanks... I'm such a pussy I just want to hike down when carrying a big effing pig.
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Spanky
Social climber
boulder co
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Super sad to hear about this. I've done both the falls trail and hiked in from tamarack flat and they are both quite a bit longer than going down the east ledges. Which descent you take is also reliant on which route you did. Topping out on anything from the nose to the left you probably have at least a 1/2 walk uphill to the trail. If you do a right side route like the trip or zodiac that would add another hour uphill with a bag to the summit, so at that point hiking seems completely ridiculous. I have always thought the east ledges were sketchy. The loose rock alone in the gully after the recent rockfall sucked.
My only question is this: Every time I've done the east ledge rappels I rap to an anchor and clip into it, then take my rappel device off and rig the next rappel while i'm clipped into the anchor. When you do this you grab the rope coming from the anchor and set up the rap. So how did he unclip from the first line without clipping into something else first to hang on? Second, in order to mistakenly clip into the wrong rope he may not have been at the anchor when he switched lines. Maybe he rapped past the first anchor and since there was an overlap in the ropes he couldn't tell that he had clipped into the wrong line. It's all guessing obviously but I'm trying to picture what happened.
My condolences to his friends and family
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ontheedgeandscaredtodeath
Social climber
SLO, Ca
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The first time I did that descent it was dark and we ended up on a ledge you can walk around on. Don't know if it's the same one but that's one variation. Other times I think I went anchor to anchor.
Sorry to hear about this accident.
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Dapper Dan
Trad climber
Redwood City
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Just trying to understand how this might have played out:
Vale sees a blue rope "stuck in a flake" , but he doesn't verify that the rope is actually fixed or secured to anything ?? And it's dark , in the darkness, how does he know this blue rope even hits the ground, or next rappel?
RIP Chris....
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ß Î Ø T Ç H
Boulder climber
ne'er–do–well
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What with bouldering and fast ascents on Yosemite rock we are leaving and using fixed ropes like never before.
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JLP
Social climber
The internet
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Have any of you gotten up from in front of your computers sometime in the past 20-30 years and gone back to those 5.9 rock climbs you once haunted? It sure doesn't sound like it.
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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It's just unfathomable to me how the unknown culprit who left their bluerope stuck for several days(thus becoming litter) can just go on day after day, night after night knowing that their laziness was the root cause for another climbers death????
Someone out there knows the history of that blue rope and should take the human compassionate rte and stand up, or forever live on your knees!
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