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Michael Hjorth
Trad climber
Copenhagen, Denmark
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If you want to learn traditional climbing you need to put whole life into it.
Otherwise
You'll just end up being a climber and reading and thinking all this climbing garbage.
Traditional climbing has nothing to do with rock, alpine nor ice climbing.
Werner, that's one helloffa qoute! It has been filed accordingly!
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Rockin' Gal
Trad climber
Boulder
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I learned to climb in the Valley. You either get good at what's there or go home.
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mooch
Trad climber
Old Climbers' Home (Adopted)
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...gear in pounded out flared splitters is great for beginners
Ain't that what Aliens are fer, Moby Dick?!
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PellucidWombat
Mountain climber
Berkeley, CA
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along these lines of learning and the safety of falling, does anyone have recommendations of some good 5.9s and 5.10a's for first leads? I'm pretty familiar with the SuperTopo guidebook at this point, but you can only tell so much from a paragraph description & route topo.
I'm pretty solid on 5.8s at this point and have lead a few easier .9s (Jamcrack P2, Commitment, Grants Crack) and felt pretty good, and I've been TRing up to 5.10c finger cracks clean without a problem. Frankly, as I start moving into these grades, especially where you might be placing pro without a nice stance, I'd want to be on climbs that aren't 'too' sustained or committing (initially) or where the falls are reasonably clean (e.g. a slab slide rather than ledge bouncing and pendulum bashing). I haven't fallen on lead yet, and while I'm not looking to take whippers, it is nice to stick your neck out in safer terrain before getting into the more serious stuff.
More OT, I stayed away from the Valley for learning the easy stuff in the earliest stages mostly because of the crowds - better to hog a line at a less crowded crag where you don't have the pressure/guilt of others following or passing you.
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steveA
Trad climber
bedford,massachusetts
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Learning how to climb, primarily relies on Desire. Some people are driven by that desire, in such a way, that any good climbing area would suffice.
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greyghost
Trad climber
Las Vegas, NV
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WOW...been so long ago, I kinda forget - was the pro hard to get... hmm, I'd been climbing about 3 years when I first visited Yosemite. Climbing mostly at Squamish and Leavenworth.
Remember being in really good shape - 6'4" and 185 lbs. Seems I had a lot of enthusiasm and not real well honed technique. Still we got up some 9's and a lot of 7 and 8's in EB's with not too much whining about gear.
Yeah, flared pin scars were a pain in the ass and sometimes just nothing would fit. That was before friends.. Now with cams something like the first pitch of Serenity Crack becomes somewhat protect able last I climbed it.
Popular routes sure have gotten a lot more polished..least in Tuolomne. I was surprised how slick South Crack was, but the gear was OK.
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von-gee
climber
crockett, ca
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I think he just meant that the gear placement and body positioning techniques are different than most other places. If you have 1/2 a brain i think yosemite is the perfect place to learn trad. Just dont plan on climbing at your gym level. In fact you could probably safely assume that youll be knocking a couple numbers and letters off of it. A 5.9 yosemite crack feels a lot like an 11a-c in the gym to me. Take it slow, and if youre that nervous, use cams instead of nuts.
And granite is ALWAYS better for placing pro than sandstone. esp the weeks/months following rain, sandstone is a death sentence in terms of breaking strength of the rock
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Captain...or Skully
climber
My ready room
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Very little in the World is "ideal". Get used to it.
Or cry in yer cornflakes. That don't confront me.
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mattly trent
Trad climber
bear valley
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This has got to be the one of the most outragest posts i've ever seen! Yosemite not a good place to learn Trad climbing!!!!!!!!????????? Seems some folks need to get out of the gym or sport climbs only mindset and find the inner strength to learn and experience from dedication to one's own experience and not for the look at me/facebook posts they wish others to comment on. My personal experience with learning the craft in Yosemite was a phenominal education of perseverence and sense of worth. So many great routes, at the time(mid 80's) not alot of sport climbing so maybe that had something to do with the trad/ground up style. I remember that if you fell you were lowered to the ground, you untied, pulled the rope and started again. The sport revolution helped climbing move foreward in a huge, great way but some have never really experienced that somewhat small net of safety rather than closely spaced gear. All styles of climbing are truely awesome and no matter what direction you take, don't rip the Park people!!!!! Kauk, Bachar, Bard, Graham, Chouinard,Robbins,Becky and so many others would cringe!!!!!
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Greyhound
Trad climber
London
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You guys are absolutely right - El Cap is committing climbing and not the sort of place to find out you're worried about the gear. I'm learning trad in the UK right now and taking advice from guys who know and who I trust. I'm climbing well within my limit on nothing more difficult than a VS (Very Severe - about 5.8 US) and we're lacing it with gear to make sure we concentrate on getting our placements bomber. If anyone can place more than 11 pieces of gear in a 15 metre route, I'll be impressed.
Next trad trip is South Wales and 60 plus metre multi-pitch - big adventure for my buddy and me but probably boring for the likes of Chris McNamara. However, getting out on the rock is what's it's all about - small steps. It's always about the challenge but it's not about the grade, it's about having a honking good laugh.
I've got a family, mortgage, etc and I may never get to El Cap but I'm sure as hell going to enjoy the journey trying, wherever it takes me. My ultimate dream is El Cap or something similar but it's all about the journey and not the end game.
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TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
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hard to believe no one is mentioning Tahquitz
where Powell, Harding, Robbins, Frost, Chouinard, Kamps, Higgins, and others learned many of their skills
it's still my favorite area; along with Yosemite, Tetons, Wind Rivers, Gunks, and Bugaboos
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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why the outrage?
cmac's judgment is one that folks have made for decades. the valley is not an ideal place to learn trad because of the limited number of well-protected easy routes. for many years, folks recommended tahquitz and leap as places to learn how to lead technical climbs.
i see no reason to change that judgment. can you learn from the floor in the ditch? obviously. is it "ideal"? hardly.
i can think of a half-dozen places within a two hour drive where i'd be happier (and have been happier) to take a first-timer.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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KLK is right. This isn't about Yosemite being a good place for trad climbing or for learning intermediate or advanced trad climbing....
It just ain't a good place for somebody who has never climbed to jump into traditional climbing or for a 5.6/5.7 sort of climber to jump into leading.
Lots of exceptions to the above
Peace
Karl
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WBraun
climber
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Why would placing gear be hard anyways.
You just stick it in.
What's so hard about that .....
:-)
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WBraun
climber
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When taught my wife how to aid climb with pins I just handed her the rack and said get your ass up there.
Just stick em in and stand up.
She didn't have a clue at first and started naming lost arrows "flat heads".
It's easy to teach trad, you just throw them in the pool and hope they don't drown .....
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WBraun
climber
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Coz
I never forget that rescue we did at the end of that freezing ass storm on Half Dome.
LOL
Just you and me standing around up there going the WTF
Hahahaha
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Lots of people can learn to trad climb in Yosemite. I did. But I was strong, 20 something and started at 5.8/5.9 and had strong mentors
Not everybody has that going on. Look at the guidebook at the 5.0 to 5.5 category. Some guidebooks are packed with em. Yosemite has Jack for the uber-noob. It just that you guys are speaking for yourself and not for joe blow or his kid
Peace
Karl
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Seamstress
Trad climber
Yacolt, WA
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There are a lot of places worse than Yosemite to start out. When you are struggling to put together your rack, the place you can drive to that has any easy or moderate climbs is great. Maybe we went about it all wrong, but we learned a lot about gear placements by aiding cracks we couldn't climb free.
The Gunks are great - mid week if you live there. The pressure of the line will drive you crazy. However, those New Yorkers will generally move along to anther climb or wait rather than climb all over you. In my limited number of visits to Yosemite, the impatience of "better" climbers really struck me. If you are so damn good, why aren't you doing a harder route? you just like crawling all over the ladies and showering them with dirt?
Half of the fun of learning to lead was seeking out the obscure crags that had a great 5.5.
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ontheedgeandscaredtodeath
Trad climber
San Francisco, Ca
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There are now, in modern times, two different kinds of beginner climbers- one, same as it ever was--nothing is more important than climbing and nothing can stop me, and two, it's kind of a fun cool sport and I'd like to learn more about it, but I'd like to hedge my bets but be in a super cool place and not die or have a terrible time. I think the supertopo book comment was aimed at the latter.
It's not gym thing (I climb with folks that were raised in gyms and are now totally solid and go for it) or a sport climbing thing, it's just how things are.
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