Hollow Flake and General Applications (O.W.)

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Oleg Fecanin

Trad climber

Frisco

Jul 22, 2011 - 11:46am PT

I did Salathe last month and let me tell you couple of things about it:
As Peter Haan said above, HF is only one of the challenges on Salathe Wall. Not talking about other stuff, you want to be especially good at chimneys and offwidths. I would try some chimneys and offwidths on smaller walls in the Valley before I would start on Salathe. Did I do that? Did I climb some other chimneys before Salathe? Of course, not. So, why I am recommending it? Because I have been there and with that experience I would do it now. I am from Europe originally and I am climbing for some 30 years, so I have climbed some crags already, but I have found that Yosemite offwidths are totally different animals than anything else you can find on the face climbing, and also the Yosemite granite is totally different than limestone or other rocks, even different then granite elsewhere. Why I am saying this? Because if you regularly climb 5.11 on limestone crags, that does not guarantee your success on climbing 5.7 - 5.9 (old) offwidths or chimneys in Yosemite Valley. It is just different. Even 5.10c finger crack or 5.10d slab on “Freeblast” is easier for “face climbers”, than 5.7 chimney above the Hollow Flake Ledge without protection (or with few pieces).
So Skywalker, get in the shape, climb some offwidths in Yosemite, and then you can do it. Well, you can even protect it. I would have not climbed it without protection, no matter what. I had one #6 camalot, one #3 Big-Bro and two #4 Big-Bros.
This is how I did it:
I did pendulum on our hauling rope (yes there is a fix rope for pendulum, but what the heck). I have lowered down and get into the HF crack. Then I started chimney-ing for a while until the chimney was too narrow. I protected it with camalot #6 deep inside in the crack on our climbing rope. There was no drag on the rope since it went straight to my friend at the belay. (BTW: there is no bolt on this belay – actually was, but now it is broken). Then I have climbed offwidth for couple of meters and I have truly walked #6 for couple of moves, but offwidth was so difficult that I went out and climbed it as layback instead leaving #6 there. I have climbed outside up to the first “little horn” and placed Big-bro #3 as high as I could. Then I’ve climbed offwidth to the second little horn (no layback here) and placed #4 Big-Bro. Again I have climbed couple of meters and now I’ve realized that I’ve used 3 of my 4 pieces on 35 feet and I was left with only one Big-Bro#4 for remaining 10 miles. So, I screwed the Big-Bro as high as I could and stared up with combination of chimney-offwidth-open corner technique. What is that? Well, something like “godjustkeepmeontherock” style. To keep my pans dry, I have unscrewed Big-Bro and moved it higher, and from this point I was able to “climb” to the top.
Was it hard? Hell, yes. Could I climb it again? Yes, and probably little bit calmer and without moving my chickenshit piece. Can you retreat from HF? I can’t imagine how. Maybe you can, but to me it looked like one way street and that what’s doing HF so intimidating. You are there with few pieces of protection (or non) and you can see this awfully long wide crack above you, so you really want to be amps up for that.
So, again like Peter Haan said, be in pretty damn good shape and I would say, be in pretty damn good mental shape as well. He (Peter) probably has not thought about mentioning that mental shape since he is in a different league than we are (Skywalker and me) and as everybody knows he did first solo on Salathe, back in seventies. I guess he is still climbing pretty damn excellent.

And tahoe523 is right about the Ear. Even though I have not climbed but cleaned the Ear pitch, from jumars it just looked much worse than HF.

scuffy b

climber

dissected alluvial deposits, late Pleistocene

Jul 22, 2011 - 11:51am PT

BRAVO!!!

climber

Jul 22, 2011 - 12:58pm PT

Oleg,
Nice shot. Brings back, uh, fond memories! I remember liebacking with no pro for some ways, then desperately slammin' myself inside the fissure, realizing my exposed position. The only thing I was able to get for protection was a #10 or 11 Hexentric stacked with a Tube Chock...and that was it for a long way. Props to Peter for goin' it alone on that!