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spyork
Social climber
A prison of my own creation
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Jan 29, 2008 - 12:56pm PT
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Wow sounds incredible, and scary! I will be waiting to see the rest of the story...
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Matt
Trad climber
primordial soup
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Jan 29, 2008 - 01:00pm PT
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wow, crazy.
what else can this even be compared to?
lloran krop(sp?) comes to mind.
(that swede who rode his bike, towing al his gear, from sweden to everest and then successfully climbed solo, no porters, no sherpas, no O2, then rode his bike back to sweden).
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Shack
Big Wall climber
Reno NV
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Jan 29, 2008 - 01:27pm PT
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Wow Dave, that sounds totally sick.
Congratulations!!
Can't wait for the details!
You did take pictures I hope?
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Oakville, Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Jan 29, 2008 - 01:29pm PT
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Nobody has made a continuous solo ascent of a Grade VII big wall. I believe a solo ascent has been made, but the climber had to bail, and then return later to finish it. Dave knows, and can fill us in.
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Echo
Trad climber
San Diego, CA.
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Jan 29, 2008 - 01:45pm PT
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Sounds like an amazing ascent. Congrats Dave, and I can't wait to hear the entire saga in greater detail.
Cheers,
Jonas
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deuce4
Big Wall climber
the Southwest
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Jan 29, 2008 - 02:22pm PT
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Great work Dave!
Show us your line!!
(photo from a trip I made in 1993, before any routes on this magnificent wall were climbed).
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WBraun
climber
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Jan 29, 2008 - 02:40pm PT
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That took a lot of courage, Dave.
Congratulations ....
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James
climber
A tent in the redwoods
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Jan 29, 2008 - 02:48pm PT
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Nice name. See you in the Valley.
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Climbswithtits
Social climber
Fresno
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Jan 29, 2008 - 03:10pm PT
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You make those valley campers towing crabs up the rock look like a bunch of big wall weenies.
Congrats!
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deuce4
Big Wall climber
the Southwest
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Jan 29, 2008 - 04:05pm PT
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Speaking of Forteleza, who knows more about that brilliant route up the left arete?
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flamer
Trad climber
denver
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Jan 29, 2008 - 04:21pm PT
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A very proud and inspiring climb/trip/adventure.
Good sh#t dude.
josh
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wayne w
Trad climber
the nw
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Jan 29, 2008 - 04:25pm PT
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Dave really makes his friends proud of him this time!
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crøtch
climber
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Jan 29, 2008 - 04:28pm PT
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congratulations. looking forward to the full story and pics!
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DaveT.
Big Wall climber
southeast face portaledge
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 29, 2008 - 04:53pm PT
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first, thanks a lot to all of the positive responses that this thread has provided. its good to know that a lot of people are psyched to see something like this go down.
it has been a very long journey to get to what i have just pulled off. for over six years i have been training in the valley so that i could take the next level like this. ever since seeing el cap, reading about polar sun spire cerro torre, and similar peaks, i knew that i wanted in. this climb was the first of its kind i believe as pete stated. and i am going for another one this winter here in september. but first i must explain this one a bit...
i arrived here in patagonia this last november 15th, after dragging five haulbags down from my home in sacramento. just an adventure and challenge in itself! i was robbed in buenos aires which led to a dramatic fight in the terminal, but i eventually made it to puerto natales with all of the gear, thank god. i was bringing down the full rack and alpine kit, a few hundred pounds and about 70,000$ worth of the best gear available. all of my gear was brand new, and i came up with some good ideas and modifications to my systems as to be able to guard against the unbelievable strength of the constant storms down here.
the approach to the wall is 12 miles from the roads end, and i made this 11 times before i started the climb for a round trip total of 264 miles of load carrying, of corse only half the time with weight, and some loads being lighter than others. in the end two americans, walker and LB, helped a bit to get some of the gear from campamento japonese to the glacier camp at the foot of the east face of cerro escudo. luckily i had a 60 gb ipod to help crank out the miles with two solar chargers.
so my climbing plan was pretty simple; or so it seemed! i showed up with two 70m lead lines and one double length static haul line, and decided to climb it in alpine style and not use fixed ropes or any other steps back into the style of the past. one person, one wall, with only the summit as an acceptable outcome. nothing was going to stop this dream from coming to fruition except for what we put in the back of our mind and dont talk about. for being alone on such a wall with no chance of rescue, every move had to be assesed and executed as if i was just doing another hard route on el cap with the handy yosar chopper on the ready. of course it wasnt, but i needed to be willing to go for it none the less.
so this wall alredy had one route on it, to the right side, put up by three americans- brad jarret, chris breemer, and cristian santilices. they did make the wall, but not the summit. but dont let this fact throw you off- they were bad ass for going for this wall, and much respect from me is focused their way. this ascent came 13 years ago and i believe it took this very talented team of three something like 23 days or so to climb to the summit ridge. a few other minor attempts were logged on this wall as well, but nothing close to making a route.
as far as other grade sevens go pass the pitons, yes, i believe jim beyers solo of the west face of mount thor is the closest anyone has come to soloing a grade seven by a new route. but yes, he scrambled off the big ledge that splits the wall, leaving all of his stuff up there, and returned next year traversing back on and finishing. again, this gets so much respect from me, as i know jim, and showed that it could be done. maybe.
after fixing the first 130 meter slab with not so bad difficulties to 5.6R A3, i started to haul the bags up and prepared to blast, never willing along the way to fix more than two to three pitches at a time. while hauling some bags up one at a time, the sun came out on the wall full strength(rare!) and all hell started to break loose from the summit. ice, rock, and snow was ripping all past me so i went down to the pile of my bags at the base, un harnessed, and went to camp five minutes away for lunch to let the wall cool down before returning. when i came back a few hours later, i had a nice surprise from the wall. a nice basketball size rock came down at full speed right onto my harness at the base. my aiders, daisies, mini traxion, some biners, and a loker were absolutly destroyed. and worse, the harness had it´s swami cut through about 50% and had lost two gear loops, and another was threatning to fall off!i had some extra aiders and daisies, and sewed some new gear loops on. but the yates harnesses are so stong to start with, i just went with the cut up one for the whole climb. i did not have the extra money to replace it, and it is just about impossible to do so down here anyway.
eventually i was able to blast after a few big storms rolled through, on december 23rd. i was knowingly going to be spending christmas, new years, and my birthday up there. one pitch above the large ledge, i made my first of many portaledge camps, tying down the ledge to many pitons and tensioned hooks to keep it down. the updrafts on the wall were almost funny, as they would lift even the haulbags! yes, i tied these down too!
so i guess i should touch on the hardware before i continue. this first bivy anchor, as with half of all the belays on the route, were entirely natural. i absolutely kept the drilling to a minimum on this climb for many reasons. and when i did drill belays it was two shorty hangerless 1/4 inchers. yep, old school style and sketchy. but they were quick to drill, lighter, and there arent so many. i highly reccomend the second ascent team(or soloist) to take a bunch of real bolts up there and strengthen it up. but keep the natural belays just that. as for the pitches, they averaged 65 to 70 meters each, usually with between 0 to 6 holes per lead. two pitches had 10 to 12 holes on them. not sh"t when you think about how long, and overhanging the climb was.
i am not going to explain the details of the pitch by pitch beta spray, but i will say this. i have climbed a fair amount of routes over the years, and hands down this is the hardest route yet i have touched. nevermind the difficulty, this is the best climb i have climbed, ever. pitch after pitch of sustained thin overhanging cracks never ended, and the climbing was on excellent rock in a stunning location. and believe me, there are a few sections where you will take some long whips and/or crush yourself on the way down. yes, i took a few of these. and yes again, they hurt. but luckily i avaoded all serious injuries, but did have a few close calls.
the crux of the route came at about one third height. a few solid pins off the belay (with a small ledge to hit of course) led into about 12 to 14 beaks, not the longest stretch of beaks on the climb, but i ripped many out testing them on the way through the pitch, and all but two i cleaned with my fingers!
a few falls were logged when things went wrong, and some blood was lost, but nothing so bad i had to deal with in a deperate way.
my second camp on the wall saw an enormous storm, just pounding. two and a half days of continous wind and snow left my 80cm wide belay ledge(the only ledge of size on the route) with three meters of snow on it. i wouldnt believe it if i wasnt there! i have photos of it all and will try to post them but i have no idea how(advice?). the ropes were trapped in three inches of ice, which i learned that jugging on is quite hard and really sucks. at this point it was only about day 8 of 34. the pattern of bad weather continued more or less for the first three weeks of the route, which was the first half of the route. the second half fell in only two more weeks, as i recieved better weather, even though it was steeper and more sustained climbing. i have a few pics where i am rapping down to clean the pitch i just led, and i am an honest 20 to 30 feet from the wall.
the steepness of the route was quite impressive to me, and it gave me a false sense of security. i thought that everythging that fell, or most of it, would fall out from me. sure, lots of the time this was the case, but not always. i would hear it coming and stop what i was doing and watch it come for me. i would stay quite still and calm, loosen my dasie chain, and then shift to the left or right in my aides to let it do past. jokingly i was refering to it as ´dancing´! but my ledge didnt dance, and it took many hits. the worst was when a fist sized rock went through my customized double wall triple pole fly system, through my puffy jacket as well, and came to a rest in the pile of sleeping bags inside. luckily i was up climbing the pitch above the ledge, as it landed where my head is when i sleep. more repair work insued, a constant job task on a wall as pist off as this one.
eventually i started to get closer and closer to the top, with stacked pitches of A3+ to A4+ continuously lined up beneath me. once i was three pitches from the top i knew i would be going for the summit soon. i had one last hard aid pitch, two easier pitches up the right trending ramp, and then i would be on the ridge. the virgin ridge. i had no idea what to expect up there, as you cant see it from anywhere, at least you know one thing- it is sh#t rock up there. it changes from bomber granite to a nasty black shale which in itself is solid, but quite shattered.
on day 33 i decided to push up the last aid pitch to the ramp. before this, i had planned it out perfectly. i had an alpine pack packed with tech tools, crampons, puffy pants and jacket, bivy sack, goggles, gaiters, food and water, and all of the alpine goodies that go with the game. i didnt take it with me on that day as i was planning only on fixing my rope up to the ramp and going for it tommorow. but i made the ramp by 11am, and decided to go up it to have a look at the ridge. the tow pitches up the ramp went quick enough, but from the summit ridge notch i made it to, i couldnt see the ridge, as a tower was in the way. so i climbed this section out of the notch, the hardest part of the ridge, and was up on the summit ridge proper by 1pm. i had nothing with me. no food or water, pack, or anything. just a headlamp and my lead gear. a quick smile broke out on my face and i just went for it. weather was warm and clear enough, but a bit windy. i made the summit notch proper, tagged the top, and went back into the notch for pics and to suck the water from a trickle in the back of a crack. within a few minutes i was free soloing back down the way i came, rapping back down to the ledge on the wall proper, making it back by 10 or 11pm or so.
my dream had come true. no, i made it come true. i am not even going to try to relate how i felt actually doing what i had dreamt of for so long, but i am sure you have an idea. the next day saw one of my proudest pushes ever, rapping the whole wall in 18 hours in desperately windy conditions. on the second of many raps i lost some of my only good rope, having to cut it loose from behind a flake. so, about the ropes- i had my three cords, and just before i left the ground a fourth 60m rope was donated to me by the americans. it was not so usefull on the way up, as most of the pitches were 70 meters, but it came in handy on the way down.
it went like this. i would tie all of my ropes together ends to ends. then i would rap, down swing and aid, and do lots of tricks, connecting as many belays together ar the length of my ropes let me. then i would jug back up, and then bring down all of the bags at once with a special rappell braking system i came up with. then i would go back up the ropes again, and then pull them one by one as i made my way back down, again. i rpeated this process jugging the length of el cap one and a half times that day, until i was on the last rappel to the ground. another note- all of my ropes were completely screwed up by this point. core shots like a mother f er. as the last rope on the last rappell was being abused for the last time, it broke. i sick crack is what i heard, and i then i dropped. luckily after six feet of terror, the belay device stopped me. i looked up to see 2 meters of exposed core looking me in the face. then i smelled it. the overheated atc was burning the core strands through, as they cant take the heat like the sheath can. they started to go. i desperately looked for my knife to cut the load loose, but couldnt locate it fast enough on the back of my harness becaus of all the sh#t on my harness. so i did all i could do, and started to let the atc strip its way down the core, bunching the sheath up under it as it went. this was the burning of the core was distributed, and eventually it wasnt burning any more. but not the bunched up sheath wouldnt let the rope pass through the device, so i cut off my belay loop, and continued down un just the gri gri.
i made the ground a few minutes later, thinking light thoughts on the way down with the ridicously heavy load on my system, and let out a big monkey call when my boots made contact with the glacier. oh my god, i did it, and lived through it!
unfortunately i had to leave this rope on the route with all of the booty of the belay and a new dragonfly stove sitting next to the belay. i have been beating myself up since about this, as i really despise leaving this junk rope on the mountain. all of my friends here convinced me not to go up it to clean it off, but i am very sad that this perfect ascent left behind a rope on the wall. it is not on the line of ascent and i cant climb back up to it. i hope the winter storms sweep it off the slab, of i owe you some beers if you repeat the route and can remove it.
now i am in town relaxing between carrying down all of the stuff. trying to let it all sink in, of course with a big knowing smile on my face.
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tradcragrat
Trad climber
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Jan 29, 2008 - 05:11pm PT
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Fking balls out, man.
Awesome.
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Jan 29, 2008 - 05:21pm PT
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Epic, Dave! You did it!
Thanks for sharing.
P.S. Don't sweat the remnant of rope left behind. The winds will rip that thing to shreds and carry it off within a few weeks.
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marky
climber
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Jan 29, 2008 - 05:25pm PT
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not too shabby
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TKingsbury
Trad climber
MT
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Jan 29, 2008 - 05:28pm PT
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wow.
great read too
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yo
climber
The Eye of the Snail
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Jan 29, 2008 - 05:33pm PT
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Yeah, that was pretty hung out there.
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