My friends have heard this story before, but I wanted to post it here, just because it was a hell of a deal.

The year was 1979, and Michael Paul and I were on day 4 of the nose route on El Cap. It was our first big wall, and we had made every rookie mistake along the way, but now we were 2 pitches from the top with daylight running out. I led the pitch up to the base of the summit overhang, and I couldnt get a good anchor in the horizontal cracks there. Back then there werent bombproof anchors at every belay like there are now, and I only had one 1/4 inch bolt and these awkward cracks. So i burned most of the remaining daylight screwing around with the anchor, and darkness was falling as Mike took off on the overhang. It got dark when he was halfway up the first overhang, so he lowered a loop of rope and pulled up our only headlamp.

Mike started complaining about rope drag as he turned the second tier of the overhang, and by the time he got to the lip he couldnt pull the rope any more. As it turned out, he had clipped every bolt as protection rather than every third or fourth, same as i had done on the great roof - so no wonder he had such bad drag. So Mike yelled down that he had some anchors and was going to setup a belay, because the 5.7 slab wouldnt be possible with so much rope drag.

So i hung there in the darkness forever while Mike set up a belay. It was a pitch black and moonless night, and I couldnt see my hand in front of my face. Finally Mike yelled down that he was off belay. We decided that it would be safer for me to follow the pitch on belay rather than jug the fixed line, which would mean taking the ascender off the rope and putting it back on over and in the dark. So Mike took up the slack to put me on belay, leaving a long loop of rope hanging from the belay. We had been lowering the haul bag out with our spare rope the whole way, but i decided to just let it swing this time, and i did. This is where our real problems started.

Unbeknownst to us, the haul bag was circling round and round the hanging loop of slack as Mike hauled it up, and when he got the bag to the belay there was a beach ball sized knot on top of the haul bag. He had to really crank to get the bag high enough to clip in, and in doing so pulled the knot into the hauling rig and cinched it tight. Mike yelled down that he had a huge knot and couldnt get it undone. He tried to untangle it for a long time, then the headlamp died.

I had been hanging in this belay for hours and told him to bring me up and we would figure it out. He put me on belay and i started out the first overhang, feeling for the bolt ahead, clipping, stepping then feeling behind me for my other aider. It was slow work, all by feel. I had just clipped the last bolt on the second overhang, and when i stood on it, it pulled out. I fell backwards about 12 feet and came to a stop with my head lower than my feet and spinning like the second hand on a clock. I was completely in space, and as i turned in circles i saw the distant lights of yosemite village then black rock. Twinkly lights, black rock. Funny thing is that we used hip belays the whole way. We didnt even have a belay device, so i was hanging off Mikes waist.

Mike was making horrible grunting noises as i clipped my ascenders to the rope and jugged back up to the next bolt. When i clipped in and unweighted Mikes waist we both heaved a sigh of relief. I will be forever indebted to Mike for that life saving belay. I climbed up to the belay and took the light from mike. It was dim but worked, and when i saw the anchors i about had a heart attack. We were on vertical, featureless rock with our haul bag, and the entire anchor was three 1/4 inch bolts, only one of which had a hanger. Mike had used wired stoppers to clip the other two hangerless studs. I set to work trying to undo the knot, but it was hopeless, then the light died again.

We hung there in the dark with our big ol knot as the seriousness of our situation settled in. If i had been thinking right I would have unclipped and had Mike belay me using the free rope that i had just come up on. But we were both a bit frazzled and somebody had to do something, so i pulled up the rope loop and tied the end to my harness in a big granny knot, and gave the double rope to mike to belay me. I stepped onto the haul bag, then mikes shoulder, then i stepped onto the slab. Its probably 11pm by now and im standing in pitch darkness at the very lip of el cap, wearing a pack and my worn out vasque ascenders, climbing on a double rope hip belay off a manky anchor. I turned on the light and it gave me a poof of light and died, but i could see a line of scoops leading up and left, so i followed them by feel to where the rock steepened. Another poof of the headlamp and i saw a flake, then liebacked it in the dark. I was now way off the belay with no protection, so gripped i thought i would barf. Once on top of the flake another poof showed a low angle slab, and i started sketching my way up it in the dark. It was probably 5.6 but felt like 11d, greasy and without holds. I still hadnt found any protection and was at my wits end on this slab. I got to a point where i could use the light again and poof....i saw it, the most beautiful sight in the world, a little tree maybe 4 feet tall, with a trunk about as thick as my wrist. I knew if i could get to Mr tree we would live. I also knew that if i fell i would pull the belay and we would take the long ride.

The last bit of slab seemed extra greasy as i inched my way up in stark terror. Then i grabbed mr tree and tied him off. The relief was indescribable. I fixed a rope to Mr tree and used an ascender to get back down to mike. So how were we going to get the haul bag up with no haul line? We decided that on the count of 3 he would unclip it and i would pull it up over the lip. Dropping the bag would probably pull the anchors, mr tree and all, so excitement was running high right then. We counted 3, mike unclipped the bag and i swung it up with all my might, realizing in mid swing that i had nowhere to put it. so I swung it up onto the slab behind my legs and held it there with the friction of my shoes, the toes of which were over the lip and pointed at the void. Mike somehow unclipped and launched into a really difficult looking mantle, and managed to get onto my tiny stance, where we jostled like drowning men for secure footing.

Mike clipped his ascender into the rope and together we pushed and pulled the bag up the slab, with mr tree our only anchor. We passed at least 4 bolts on the way up that i had missed in the dark. When we finally got ourselves and the bag on top, we couldnt get to our bivy gear due to the knot, so we laid down in the coffin like cracks in the capstone and shivered ourselves to sleep. The next morning we saw that mr tree was actually only 6 feet from the lip, and we had been wakling all around it in our socks the night before! Aye twas the best of times and the worst of times.....