Sea of Dreams Queens
During the end of the summer of 2024, Keiko and I made what has become an annual pilgimage to Yosemite. The route on deck this time was the Sea of Dreams. I had been having some general doubts and had been struggling with my level of psyche leading up to the trip, but, when we were about two weeks out, I re-committed to the goal and was ready to focus up. Jami met us in Yosemite during the days when we were on the ground, fixing pitches and shuttling loads, which added a bunch of laughs and delicious pizzas to the mix. The route was super steep, super sustained and a bit looser and harder to find than what I had grown used to on El Capitan. Both of us trundled a large block while on lead. Keiko was climbing the A4 pitches like it was no deal, which was super inspiring. I took a few minor falls and also took a hook to the face, so spent most of our time on the wall completely covered in blood. Upon summitting, I felt wrecked both physically (my hands simply would not work) and emotionally (it is exhausting to work that hard for something that you were not that psyched on from the outset).
Some Gal Pals Climb the Old Man of Hoy
The four of us - me, Ellie, Sasha and Jami - set off from Glasgow in my brother's little car, which we liked to refer to as The Clown Car because of its miniature size. Jami had the idea to climb a Scottish sea stack to celebrate her getting her Masters from Stanford many months prior. Fran and Crusher had told me that climbing the Old Man of Hoy was a must given that its remoteness made you feel like you were climbing at the edge of the Earth, so everything had aligned for our adventure. I was thrown up on by some seabirds, we had about no food and booked a ferry which wouldn't let us drive our Clown Car onto it, which we were counting on. Despite this, things ran smoothly. We met Albert, who showed us around the island. We found a bothy to sleep in. We climbed the route before the rain came in with minimal rope shenanigans and we saw a totally spectacular sunset. I am not sure I would totally recommend climbing the Old Man of Hoy in a party of four with only one leader, but, if it's your only way to get up on top of that spectacular tower with your gal pals, then it is certainly possible.
Marital Bliss on Sunkist
When Keiko and I had got down from Sunkist on El Cap, Mash asked us if there had been any tension or drama or high running emotions, and when we explained that our climbing duo had never experienced those types of relational issues, we became Team Marital Bliss. We climbed The Freeblast one afternoon then returned to the ground. A few days later, we hauled our stuff to the Grey Ledges in the evening (that haul was so hard) and then started up Sunkist proper the next day. It was weird spending the first night on the wall so high off the ground. The golden headwall was epic and we were sure to put glitter on our faces for that. We had to dump a ton of water again... but I guess it's good practice to haul way more water than you need. This wall we had no severe burns and no core-shot ropes, so we'll call that a win.
Some First Ascents in the Red Canyon, San Rafael Swell
Crusher had found an area with some mostly unclimbed towers out in the San Rafael Swell. We spent a few weekends in the fall of 2022 driving to Hanksville and then hiking the 3 miles back to the towers and putting some work into them. With weather, COVID and some other obstacles, we managed to put up 3 different routes on 3 different towers. It was pretty remote out there and the stars were awesome. There was lots of good rock-hunting to be had. Crusher more thoroughly documented the climbs here.
Mescalito and The Nose - Learning from Keiko
Keiko and I headed out to Yosemite Valley for a long-ish trip during the summer of 2022. We had planned to climb Mescalito on El Capitan. Other than a few major errors that I made in the early days on the wall (a burned foot and a core-shot rope were the impacts of my mistakes), we moved a bit faster than we were accounting for, so we dumped a lot of water. Then, after a few days of resting in the meadow, we noticed that The Nose was empty, so we decided to do a quick trip up that route also. I had never climbed a wall with Keiko before (in fact I had done very little climbing with Keiko at all) and it was such a joy. I felt like I was up there with a total master. The theme of our trip came from something that a tourist had said to Becca and Kate while they were climbing up to Dolt, which was: "Does your mother know you're up there?".
Some First Ascents in the Utah Desert
One week in late November, Keiko and Joe took Pete and I out for a sandy kind of Thanksgiving in an area surrounded by all kinds of towers deep in the Utah desert. After carrying multiple loads out to our spot, we looked around, chose our towers and established two new routes on two new towers. Other than a minor mouse invasion, it was nothing but giggles and pecan pie.
|
Climbing that Big Rock they call El Capitan - Zodiac
After a month or so mostly free-climbing in Yosemite, Pete and I decided to do a couple of routes on El Cap. It was a pretty simple routine on the wall: haul, jug, eat, sleep.. Lots of time to ponder the vastness of the rock. I felt even tinier in the world when I considered how slowly I could move at any moment. I can't tell what was the more exciting moment: climbing over the lip onto the summit of El Cap for the first time or a bag of chips being dropped from high above landing in my lap. These are the real questions.
|
A Windy Wall in Zion
Momo and I headed out to Zion after work on a sunny spring Friday and drove the ~9 hours to Zion. Momo inspired the youth to study astrophysics on route. We biked into the park with all our gear and started up Touchstone Wall. Turns out climbing in 50MPH winds is more about rope management than it is about climbing. To quote Momo: "every minute spent coiling a rope now is a gift to yourself later". We bailed after the fourth pitch with only the easier climbing left to avoid getting our ropes stuck. Gave myself a bit of a mullet-esque haircut on the way down (my hair got caught in my belay plate as I made the final rappel). But, again, to quote Momo, it "looks good".
The Leaning Tower
Jami, Eric and I had made some Google Sheet plans to climb the overhanging West Face of the Leaning Tower. It was Jami's first ever experience aid climbing and Eric's first ever big wall experience, so we were doing a lot of active learning and having a ton of active fun. Both Eric and Jami were total superstars with Jami doing the majority of the hauling and cleaning one of the most complex pitches and Eric taking his fair share of the leads. I took a bit of a whip back to the belay owing to not paying enough attention. Ending up back beside Jami, I asked her if she was okay, to which she responded: "totally... I didn't even drop my cigarette". Other than that, it was a relatively relaxed 1.5 day jaunt - the descent in the dark was probably the most intense part! We saw no other climbers, which was a dream given the popularity of the route. An absolute highlight was cooking and sleeping on the luxurious Ahwahnee Ledge, our laughter soaring out into the valley below - certainly the most comfortable night I have had on the wall to date!
|