Runners up on El Piramide

After gallantly retreating from the Avellano Valley, it was time for Will and John to head for home. Dave and I had another week left in Patagonia and Dave had a suggestion. I was starting to feel pretty burnt out with adventure, having been away from home for 5 months at this point, and so I was looking forward to some nights sleeping that were not in a tent, eating lots of steak, and whacking the thermostat up so that I no longer had to wear multiple layers of coats every evening. Conflicting with this, I also desperately wanted to do some climbing, as the nearest I had come to doing any proper climbing was a bit of ledge shuffling at the bottom of the Avellano Tower. Dave craftily exploited this thread of motivation and suggested that we go for a four day visit to what is colloquially known as The Pyramid (I say colloquially, but what I really mean is that is what Dave John and Jim Donini call it, as they are the only climbers who know about it. The locals undoubtedly call it something else). I was promised good quality rock, splitter cracks, lots of new route potential, and guanacos set in the "semi-desert" to the west. "Semi-desert?" I enquired. Dave assured me that there are "only three days of precipitation per month", and when he was there before it was always sunny and warm. I tested this guarantee by asking him what clothes he would pack, he replied "definitely my light gear, I'd bring some light-weight trousers but I only have these thick ones with me". If you have been following, you will already know my answer by now. I said yes and packed my light-weight trousers.

We did a brief tour of the mini-market in town, although I had to make all the boring decisions (such as those relating to how much food to take) because Dave was in a grump as he needed a poo. In all fairness though he did busy himself though by picking up some rum and a bottle of cheap tequila (the reason for which will become apparent shortly). We arranged for an adventure company to taxi us by 4x4 to a specific although seemingly arbitrary point along a minor road heading into nowhere. Our driver did seem a little concerned at this, but Dave managed to persuade her that we were indeed "experts" and we definitely "knew what we were doing".

Dave walking in to the Pyramid

The walk along the track was uneventful for the first couple of miles until we made it to a gate. As I have found to be par for the course when climbing with Dave, there is a clandestine element. Dave had already briefed me that the landowner had previously appeared a little displeased at the presence of Dave John and Jim when they had set out to climb here the previous year. Well, displeased or confused, Dave was not quite sure. Either way, the farmer had been successfully won over by John's enthusiastic explanation of what on Earth they were up to (in miming format, of course), and a bottle of tequila. In lieu of John's charm, we just had a bottle of tequila as a bargaining lever. Fortunately it seemed that no one was home as we passed. We walked a further two hours to just below the cliff, which indeed did look stunning. We settled down to bivvy on a nice flat spot next to a spring and after a quick dinner went to sleep.

It rained overnight. This seemed a little bit at odds with Dave's cast-iron guarantee of good weather, but as the morning brightened I decided to let it go. My legs ached from yesterday's hurried approach and a general weariness from too much walking with heavy bags in the past month. But today, for the first time in ages, I would get to do some proper climbing. We hiked up the final slope to the cliff. Given the fact that we couldn't really remember how to do rock climbing, we decided to warm up on a couple of single pitch routes that end on a large ledge with a lower-off. Dave had already explained to me the precedent of bolted-belays at this otherwise trad-protected venue: It is intended to make sure that any sport-climbers who might find it realise that its been climbed by some proper-climbers already so that they don't go and bolt it. Of course it feels great to be climbing again, although the wind is taken out of my sails slightly when I remove a brick-sized lump from a crack. I keep my calm and casually tell Dave that I'll just throw it out of harms way. Fortunately Dave has little faith in my throwing ability and moves well to the side. This is just as well as it lands just where he was stood and chops through the neatly stacked rope. I boldly claim that climbing on a 40m rope is way better than a 60 anyway as there's way less rope to pull through. We're both feeling the cumulative effects of the past few weeks so after a couple of routes we decide to play the tactical game. We're both experienced trad-men, we know how to make the best of the time available to us, we'll play it savvy... we'll scope some potential new routes then get a good rest for the remainder of the day - no more climbing - so that we'll be fresh to cruise our new route tomorrow. We find what looks like the best unclimbed line here (Dave has climbed all the existing lines already, usually on the first ascent), up the front of a leaning prow part of the face. Excited for tomorrow, we head back down for an early dinner. As a remote precaution, we relocate the bivvy to a steep sided boulder.

The view from the bivvy on evening

It rains overnight, again. By the morning it has turned to snow. I curse Dave and his warm trousers from the discomfort of my light-weight ones. The wind whistles through my insubstantial rocky wind-break. Dave keeps warm and jolly by moving loads of rocks to build up his bivvy site followed mine. I just sit in the cold, wearing every item of clothing I have with me, feeling ill-tempered. Dave jovially advises that "you should move some rocks around, it'll warm you up." He might be right, but I'm too cold and grumpy to acknowledge that he's right so I sit still and glower at the snow and at Dave's feigned high spirits. Dave eventually finishes our new deluxe bivvy site and I get into my sleeping bag and bivvy bag, still wearing everything I have. Dave goes round the other side of the boulder to read in his warm trousers. Eventually the skies brighten although it remains cold. It's new years eve so I feel compelled to drink lots of rum and stay up until midnight, but in a flash of genius Dave realises that it is the turn of the new year in the UK at 9pm local time, so we tunelessly sing Auld Lang Syne three hours before midnight then go to sleep.

Bivvy bags in the snow

The next day dawns much brighter and warmer, so we stick with the plan and hike up to our new route-to-be. It's our last day before having to walk back down and make our way back homewards, so the pressure is on! Dave leads first, initially up easy ground, and then he finds a bolt. Which came as quite a surprise to us both. He thinks the next bit looks hard so takes a belay on the bolt and a wire and I come up to join him. We discuss our situation. Given our failure to climb anything in the past month and our imminent departure we decide to push on with this route rather than waste time changing objective, accepting that we will have to abandon our first ascent hopes. It seems that Jim has probably told one of his friends who were here last week about the place so we have been beaten to it.

I find some holds to climb the tricky section and after just a few meters arrive at a bolted belay on a ledge. The next pitch looks quite intimidating, so I tell Dave that I'll just belay here. We have only got 40 meters of rope after all. The next pitch did indeed have Dave's name all over it, being on crusty rock and requiring a bit of a maverick attitude. I got the pitch after that, which was a 40m stunner (although I was glad it wasn't much longer) of cruxy moves between good footledges, alternating between a left arete and the groove on the right.

Dave on the third pitch

Again Dave on the third pitch

Dave lead a good steep jamming pitch, and then for reasons which can only be described as 'mischievous' (actually, then can be described in far stronger language than that although I'll leave those words to your imagination) he opted to belay beneath a nasty offwidth. The alternative belay was beneath climbing which looked much nicer and much easier and would require no deviation in line. You know the game he's playing. I grumble and grunt my way up the offwidth, which at least justified us having carried our friends 5 and 6 all this way. We tag the summit and surf the scree back round to the bottom. It was great to do some climbing, which given the dearth of information (or even knowing if it was possible) felt akin to the excitement of doing a first ascent but with the convenience of bolted belays. Pretty ideal really.

The Pyramid on our last night: In a valiant attempt to finish the rum I was pretty pissed, so fortuitously I woke up in the middle of the night to see the sky like this

Not The Avellano Tower

I first met Dave about 5 years ago. Our conversation skipped any niceties beyond the briefest of introductions as he cornered me by the desk at the Works and started telling me about a 350m sea cliff off the Shetland Isles that had only seen one ascent. Despite our position causing an obstruction to anyone wanting to actually pay to enter the wall, Dave's description piqued my interest. And I felt slightly intimidated by his wild-eyed gaze, an expression I would come to know all too well. He invited me on holiday with him to try and climb this cliff. Not knowing any better at the time, I took the immediacy of his invitation as a compliment and reciprocated this warmth with hearty agreement. Had I known (or more precisely, had I thought more carefully about this) that this "holiday" would involve climbing the loosest terrain (I can't bring myself to use the term 'rock' here) I have ever encountered, whilst taking direct hits to the face from fulmars, and being soaked to the neck on an insufficiently tensioned tyrolean whilst accessing a virgin sea stack, I may not have been quite so fast to agree. By the end of two weeks with Dave, I had already become accustomed to, and to slightly fear, his wild-eyed look. Subsequent days climbing with Dave proved that this first impression of him was not atypical. It has since occurred to me (actually, I think he just told me straight)  that the main reason he invited me was that he thought I might be foolish enough to say 'yes', whereas everyone else he knew had already been wise enough to say 'no'.

Dave demonstrates his wild-eyed look even whilst dancing

Now that you are privy to the nature of how our friendship began, it may surprise you to hear that when Dave told me about an unclimbed 800m high tower in an unexplored corner of Patagonia, I unquestioningly agreed to join him in returning to the region to try it. The more shrewd readers of course, will not be surprised by this in the slightest, recognising as they will, that I am still foolish enough to say 'yes'.

Dave had attempted the North face of the Avellano Tower in January 2014 with his friend John, but they had underestimated the difficulty of the climbing they would encounter, and been unprepared for the scale of the thing. John is made of the same adventurous mettle as Dave, but as he also got Will (who is a bit more sensible) to join us, which goes to show that Dave definitely has the knack of persuasion.

The Avellano Tower, with Will and John

Dave and John had previously taken a day & a half to approach from a valley extending to the North-West, but described it as tough and time consuming terrain. As we intended to take pretty much everything we could think of (three weeks of food, aid racks, portaledges, kitchen sinks...) this would make their original approach impractical. Dave conceived of an alternative approach, by getting a boat across a nearby lake on the South of the valley and casually wandering up what Google Maps promised to be a gentle and pleasant stroll. We had no idea if this would work, because as far as we know no climbing team had ever been up this way. Two days before leaving the UK Dave and John were put in touch with Pascual, our local fixer.

I met John and Will at Santiago airport and we traveled onwards to the town of Coyhaique. Dave had meanwhile managed to commit himself to life-stuff at home and was going to join us a week later (by walking the original way on his tod, in order to avoid a costly boat trip on his own), by which time we should be established underneath the wall and raring to go. Whilst in Coyhaique we added a ton of food to our already excessive pile of gear. Given the plans for the coming days, I tried to avoid verbalising the phrase "enough kit to sink a boat". We waited for Pascual to collect us (he was only late twice for one pick-up, however that works) and were kindly driven down to the edge of Lago General Carrera, from where he would take us over in his boat to be met by a pair of local gouchos he had contacted via radio.

It is no exaggeration to say that Lago General Carrrera is a big lake. It would be even bigger except that half of it lies within Argentina and half in Chile. The Argentine part is named Lago Buenos Aires. Despite having two names, to me it just looks like one big lake. It is at the confluence of a myriad of mountain valleys, all funneling a turbulent set of winds across the water. Patagonian winds, of course. Suffice to say, it is not known for its millpond-like qualities. Which partly explains my surprise at how small Pascuall's boat was when we arrived at the shore at 6am. This didn't seem to perturb John however, who busied himself by bailing water out of the boat. It had only been used the previous day and it hadn't rained overnight, so I opted to not think too hard about where this water may have come from.

John bailing out the boat whilst Pascual attaches the outboard motor

With all our bags and four people in the boat, the bottom of the hull now bottomed out in the small bay where the boat was moored. Pascuall handed out long sticks and so began some enthusiastic punting (although in all fairness, this phrase could be used to describe pretty much all of my climbing activities). We go nowhere fast, and it feels like bedlam as Pascual's manner escalates from incomprehensible instructions to barked commands. None of us speak Spanish well enough to understand a word. Pascual knows this but it doesn't seem to stop him from shouting at us with increasingly frantic orders.

Eventually we're in water deep enough to start the large outboard motor. Which Pascual did with great success for about two minuts, when the engine stopped. Despite Pascual's repeated pulls on the starter cord, nothing happened. Now I'm no mechanic, but I know how what to do in this kind of situation. I told John to fish out the duct tape, which was passed to Pascual. Within two minutes we were going again.

For the most part, the journey across the lake would have been a very cold, wave-soaked, windy and nauseating journey which took us about 2 1/2 hours, but fortunately there were some memorable moments to break up the monotony. As well as taking turns to bail out water from the boat, Pascual also needed help refueling the motor. The tank read "turn off engine and remove from boat when refilling" but as this was written in English it was of little concern to Pascual, nor was the copious amounts of diesel I spilled into the water sitting in the bottom of the boat as I poured from one container to another and the boat bounced over the waves. We managed to test Pascual's calm exterior some more when Will offered to help Pascual fish out whatever it was that he was trying to find in the murky water  by his feet. Will's hand landed on an object, which he helpfully pulled out. Pascual's expression turned from that of appreciation to curiosity, to abject panic. The reason: Will had just handed him the drain plug from the bottom of the boat. Needless to say, water was pouring in from under the hull. I watched, slightly speechless, as Pascual quickly reinstalled the plug. Oh how we all laughed! Will went back to bailing out the water, a bit more urgently than before.
My feeling of nausea, caused by the boat's incessant pitching and rolling but added to by the exhaust of the motor, was disturbed yet again when the motor fell off. It didn't take me long to work out that we were too far away from either side of the lake for me to swim, so instead I just sat dumbly as Will dived across to help Pascual wrestle it back from the brink and reattach it to the edge of the boat. It was slightly unbelievable to watch, and it occurred to me that I would have found it very funny if it wasn't that I was in the boat and I thought I might drown. But again, after the event, we were all very amused.

Eventually, upon reaching the lake-side end of the Avellano Valley, we were greeted by Louie and his son Christian, with half a dozen horses. It was only 9am but I felt like I had aged 3 years already in that day. We were fed "chiva" from their stove in a hut, and John used an advanced form of charades to determine that we were eating goat (John's translation skills involve a replacement of a broad vocabulary with enthusiastic acting and making animal noises, which was surprisingly successful). Louie loaded up the horses whilst his son, excited by the fact that we were the first visitors to their valley since 1992, entertained us. Most unexpectedly by beat-boxing.

Louie, some horses, John and Will, heading up-valley

We walked the rest of the day to their farm part way up the valley. It looked like a picture-postcard idyll, especially as the sun was out and by now I had recovered from the trauma of the morning. Louie asked what we wanted for dinner, and having no other vocabulary to rely on I suggested more chiva would be wonderful. I thought that giving the easy answer would save John from having to engage in more amateur dramatics. Ten minutes later John strolled round the corner of the barn "they're killing your goat" "I beg your pardon?" "The goat. They're killing it."  Within a few minutes it was skewered and the fire was burning down to coals nicely. Louie managed to commandeer a box of our wine that had been damaged in transit and together they wasted no time in getting pissed to celebrate the presence of the first foreigners in twenty years. Despite the language barrier we learnt a bit more about their life in this valley. Louie has a wife and daughters but they opt to live in a nearby town, which leaves only three other people in the whole valley. We asked if they ever feel lonely here. Louie pointed at the incongruous Stihl calendar replete with semi-naked model brandishing a chainsaw. "Christian" he said, "he wanker!"

You better watch out goats, you might look cute but you're pretty tasty

The next morning was a typically slow South-American start, so by late morning we left the farm with just Louie leading our pack-horses today. We walked for several hours along well used single-track horse trails, used for cattle herding by the valley's five inhabitants. Unprompted, the ever adventure-thirsty John said "these trails are nice to walk on but it would feel much more adventurous if they weren't here". With prescient timing, Louie rounded a bend and proudly announced our arrival at the end of the line. We were still 7km from the base of the wall, but this was as far as the horse trails would go. Darn. We waved good bye to Louie and hoped that he wouldn't forget about us in the next three weeks, and spent the next day and a half ferrying heavy sacs up-valley, mostly through rivers and smelly bogs. It was whilt re-packing the bags to leave behind anything that was not entirely essential that a major split in expedition philosophy became apparent amongst the team: Will wanted to leave behind the rum. He tried to justify this policy by stating  "look, no expedition has ever failed due to a lack of alcohol". Fortunately John was quick with his riposte "And I don't want us to be the first!" We packed the rum.

 We made our basecamp amongst a big pile of rocks a short way from the wall. So far the sun had been shining almost all the time since we had waved good bye to Pascual. We spent a day getting our climbing gear to the base of the wall and scoping out a line. With only a little faith for blank sections we could make out a continuous series of features from bottom-to-top on the proudest part of the tower. This was exciting and intimidating in equal measure.

We were joined by Dave who wandered up to the tents one morning, having had his own adventure walking into the valley on his own over two days. It took us three days to fix all of our static ropes 250m up the wall, slowed down by surprisingly slick Yosemite-standard granite, muck-filled cracks and occasional drizzle. At the highpoint the crack had run out and would require some free-climbing to reach the next crack. Dave and Will believed it to be un-aidable but probably free-able in dry weather.

A token climbing shot. John leading and fixing rope.

We had our haul bags packed at the base. I made one quick call on the sat-phone to Tony, sat at work in Sheffield. He checked the forecast. It was bad. But it's Patagonia, so of course it's bad. We'll just sit it out.

And that's pretty much where the story ends. We stayed in the tents for two days whilst it rained and snowed, the river rose, and the tent leaked. When the maelstrom abated and we could sneak a peak at the wall through the clouds it was hard to see any rock for the amount of snow left on the face. The snow stayed there, too cold to be melted off fully, but warm enough to make the face wet for the remainder of our time. We played chess, or at least Will and I played chess. When Dave had previously asserted "I'm not playing chess, the only thing I'll do is listen to techno!"

A big rockfall came down on our fixed ropes and damaged them one night. Obviously we were all pleased that we weren't on the face when it had come down, but Dave was particularly proud that his plan of bringing me along as the 'rockfall magnet' had kept him safe. Dave and John retrieved our fixed ropes the day before Louie duly returned, and we retraced the route back to civilization.

It wasn't always sunny like this, honest! Will and I hanging out in between rounds of chess whilst Dave and John listen to techno

In the UK I have had the experience of 'taking my rack for a walk in the rain'. This seemed like the Patagonian version of this: 'taking my portaledge and every conceivable piece of outdoor gear I own for a walk'. Nice views though.

The South Avellano Tower at dusk

This trip was very generously supported by grants from the BMC and MEF, and with some excellent gear from Rab. 

Freerider 2

A week and a half has passed since we got down. Waiting for my elbow to heal and the weather to cool down. We were in no way certain of trying again when we first got down, but slowly the thought grew into an idea, and then a plan. Yesterday I experienced the now familiar dread and ate too much, and then my alarm woke me at 2am. This time we've packed an extra few litres of water and some food, which allows a contingency day if we need more time on any pitch. And most pertinently, the forecast is about 20 degrees cooler. The familiarity of the first pitches helps speed things up, Freeblast goes smoothly and we both manage the 'hardest move on rock' first go, and make it up to the Monster in good time. Unlike on our last attempt we have plenty of time here, so I eat drink and carefully tape the fresh pink skin on my elbow.

On the M.O.

Once again, Dan has lead the last 6 pitches and hauled the bags so that I can be fresh. With a certain inevitability, the time comes. The traverse goes well and hurl myself back into the familiar wedge shape inside the crack. I don't know if it's my memory, or if I'm doing something wrong, but it feels even harder than last time. I'm wasting energy and before I'm even at the first rest the familiar panic sets in. The ratio of udging up versus sliding down passes a critical point and again I fall out of this goddam stupid crack. "This goddam stupid crack!" I vent. "Why am I so crap at climbing this goddam stuid crack!" I lower back to the ledge and we discuss options. We can either aid our way up, I can have another go, or Dan can try and shimmy his way up the Monster. This will be Dan's fifth time climbing this pitch, and he's got it well dialled. My previous highfalutin ideals of leading the pitch myself in order to settle a score can get stuffed. I hand Dan the two big cams and put him on belay. I might have made him do all the strenuous hauling already today, but in spite of this he gets stuck in and wedges his way up in about twenty minutes - pretty slick!



Which means its my turn again already. Oh dear god I hate this. Dan puts me on belay, and I start climbing. The traverse in goes well, and pretty soon I'm uncomfortably wedged at the bottom of the next 50 hellish meters. I look up the length of the pitch and ask aloud "how on Earth am I going to climb this?" It's a fair question I think, based on recent experience. I consciously decide to avoid thinking of anything more than what's in front of me, and climb to the mantra of 'one move at a time, one move at a time'. This frees me of the intimidation and pressure I felt last go, and so slowly I make progress, eventually making it to the final rest. My anxiety is high as I start the final section. My tiredness from the previous 19 pitches, and worse, the last 40 meters catches up with me, and I can see the rising tide of panic is only a few moments away. My ankles are tired, and my feet are slipping. I know what this means... not again. Just before critical levels of exhaustion I lean out the crack, there's nothing for it now... I'm going to have to layback. The passive observer part of my mind can clearly see that this is a stupid idea which will work for al of ten seconds then I'll fall off with no way of getting back inside the crack, but such rational thinking is being overwhelmed by fatigue and panic. Just before I commit to laybacking the crack, with almost comedic timing, Dan shouts down "stick with the technique!". Part of me just wanted to fall of, to put an end to the physical pain, the strenuous climbing, everything horrible about it. But Dan's clear sound advice forced me to keep going. In that moment I despised Dan. The brief pause half out of the crack has rested my ankles. Back in the crack I go, back into pain on my shoulder, elbow, heels, toes, ankles and shins, heavy breathing and slow incremental progress. But given sufficient time, slow and incremental progress is all it takes. Finally the crack gets easier and wider, until eventually I'm on easy terrain, still panting and struggling, having fought harder than I can honestly remember fighting before. It takes me a while for it to sink in, but I'm at the belay with Dan, and Freerider is still on. "Take that El Cap!" I yell, my body full of adrenaline and my mind full of hubris.

Monday morning oats at the Alcove Bivvy

Monday
Today is all about the Teflon Corner, which we've decided to try as an alternative to the Boulder Problem pitch. The first pitches are straight forward enough, and just like last time, we get to the hard climbing just as the sun comes onto the face. Quite unlike last time however, it's about 20 degrees cooler and windy - great conditions. The Teflon Corner is slabby on one side, steep on the other, and unsurprisingly, quite slick. There's not much in the way of pure stemming corners in the UK, but this evidently doesn't concern Dan as he onsights it. This is a brilliant effort, and fills me with confidence that I'll do it in no more than just a few goes. I fall off on my first go, and my second. Then the third, and the fourth. After that I lose count. Eventually I pull on gear past the crux to join Dan and the haul bag for a rest, food and water. I'm starting to get a bit concerned - what if I just can't do it? I borrow a left shoe from Dan. He thinks that it'll help as it's so soft for smearing, but I'm just banking on his shoes being imbued with some kind of mystical McManus footwork magic. I lower back in to the pitch and sure enough, whether its the rest or the shoes, something is working. I surpass my previous high point, karate kicking footholds and falling into presses, lucking out and skidding upwards with my heart in my mouth. Yet again, it's still on!

A dirty pitch takes us back up to the Block. We reminisce about the entertainment provided by Butter Fingers, while Dan makes us liste to political and economics podcasts.

Dan on his way towards the Teflon Corner

Tuesday
The past two days have each had their main event, their big pitch which either makes it or breaks it. Between them I've had to put in a full-on effort, and I've fluked my way up a slippy corner. I've been kidding myself that today is without any major obstacles. Although we're above the two cruxes, the reality is that today still has 7 tough pitches followed by another two more moderate ones. There's a whole bunch of pitches which could give us a hard time today, but fortunately they're all classic bits of granite climbing in their own right, so I decide to think about this instead.

Dan leads us off for the first three pitches. Sous le Toit goes well, then he fights his way up both enduro-corners. I use the time-tested strategy of getting all the beta I can and then leaving all the gear clipped to the rope as I take it out, unable to take a hand off for long enough to put it on my harness. I'm nervous because a slip would mean lowering back down, and the resultant waste of time and energy. I don't normally suffer too badly from a fear of failure, but I'm find every pitch up here stressful. This is what it's all about!

We have a quick break at the Round Table ledge, which I can only assume was named ironically as it is neither round nor a table. This part of Freerider stays in the shade for much longer than most of the face, and up here the wind has picked up from the afternoon thermals caused by the sun. The past 5 weeks in California has obviously left me soft, as I lead most of the next pitch shivering. These top pitches are blighted by fixed ropes from top-roping scondrels who have ab'd in from the top, tick marking each jug and generally getting in the way. This not withstanding, one more short pitch brings us to the most exposed belay on the route, and the start of the Scotty-Burke offwidth. Last time around I didn't even try this pitch, given that my red raw elbow and psyche deserting me.

Dan finishing off the traverse pitch which takes you to the Freerider variation pitches

This is the last tough pitch, it's an offwidth (not again!), and a number of people have core-shot their rope by falling off laybacking the first part. Oh God! There's no way on Earth that I'm laybacking this, I'm too scared. So I get inside and reqacquaint myself with the same technique I used two days ago. But I don't get past the bulging part. This is for the very simple reason that it is an offwidth, and it is overhanging. There's no way on Earth I can avoid laybacking this. Throwing caution to the wind and clipping a long sling onto my cam, I lean back and layback up past the steep part as quick as I can, until at the earliest opportunity to get back inside the crack. Then once again it's time to recommence shuffling. And this is where the fear of failure crescendos. How would it feel to free El Cap to here, then mess it up? I decide against answering my own question. Fortunately this offwidth is more forgiving than the M.O., and with my anxiety mounting I manage to bridge across a three-way chimney system and onto the top. Much to my embarrasment I appear to have picked up some American vernacular, and announce to myself that "Yes! We are sending". Ironically, Dan decides to make a mockery of this statement by falling off the next pitch even though it's the easiest one all day, its 8 grades easier than the Teflon Corner, and he hadn't fallen off at all in the past three days. Needless to say, he got straight back on and within an hour we were topping out as the sun went down.

We bivvied on top and descended the next day, kindly picked up by our own welcoming party. Then we drank beer. Lots of beer.

Dan bivvying on top of El Cap

Freerider 1

For me, free climbing El Capitan is such a horribly obvious big ambition that it has probably been lurking at the back of my mind for the last 18 years, pretty much since I started climbing. Three years ago I had a really good trip to Yosemite with Dan which only made this ambition more immediately obvious. And now I've had the past two months climbing on granite, I'm in the Valley with Dan, and the forecast is for 30c and full sun. Good enough.


Tuesday
Today we pack and pre-haul the bag to Heart Ledges up the fixed ropes. A pair who are also hauling up the fixed lines drop their spare hauling device (who carries a spare hauling device anyway? only people who are likely to drop their hauling device...), and a team on an aid route above us knock off a basket ball sized rock which explodes into gravel just above us, but the trip to stash our bag is otherwise uneventful and we return back to camp 4 for a days rest.


Wednesday
The days rest is actually a days dread. I'm nauseatingly aware that in twenty four hours time, we'll be part way through a rather big day. Our plan is to climb 20 pitches tomorrow. This includes the slick slabs of the free blast, a bunch of chimneys, a couple of long down-climbs which connect features on the wall, and finishes off with the monster offwidth. The Monster Offwidth. That's right, as if a 50 meter offwidth isn't bad enough as it is, it is named to intimidate. As Dan has climbed it three times already he kindly offers me the priviledge of leading it. How can I refuse? (I didn't mean that rhetorically, I desperately searched for a way to refuse but the only words which left my mouth were 'yeah, great'. Idiot.)
In the village store I bump into Andy, one of the pair who was dropping gear whilst hauling yesterday. I ask him what he's doing down here, as they are meant to be aiding their way up Salathe and should be halfway up El Cap. Andy shakes his head and explains that his partner dropped their entire rack down the hollow flake as he was chimneying! Unbelievable. So they have temporarily retreated to collect their spare rack. Yep, an entire spare rack. Who owns an entire spare rack anyway? oh...

Thursday
Today is the day. It doesn't feel like any exaggeration to say that the combination of length, difficulty, and how much I want to do this route will make today the biggest day out climbing I've ever tried. Dan seems much cooler about it all than me, but then he's free'd El Cap twice already and knows most of this route already.
Despite all this talk of dread, as soon as we start climbing at 3am I'm immersed in the fun of it all. The freeblast goes smoothly except for a slip at the crux on my part (bloody granite friction slabs) and we even manage what James Lucas calls "the hardest move on rock". By 10am however the sun comes round onto our face, and for the next 6 hours we get fairly fried, drink more than our ration of water, and climb a lot of chimneys.

Dan leading the Hollow Flake pitch. There's a whole rack wedged somewhere deep inside El Cap there.

I'm surprisingly successful at blocking out the thought of the M.O., and so I feel a little surprised when I find myself racking up for it. My preconception is of its notoriety, but this is to miss out the fact that it is also an incredibly cool pitch. I step off the ledge and straight into a wild undercutting down climb to access the crack proper. Much of the route to here has been slabs, chimneys and grooves, which all offer protection from the feeling of height or exposure. No such protection here though!

Getting psyched just before the M.O. Climbing with Dan is always a serious business, and no pitch should be taken more seriously than this one

I feel so hyped up I just punch out the moves until I reach the edge of the crack and can throw myself as far inside the crack as I can fit. And so it begins. 50m of struggle, broken only by a few footholds. I find the first section a real battle, but Dan tells me to not worry as that's how it is meant to feel. Great. It's a beautiful evening, with the whole West side of El Cap glowing orange as the sun sets. For a short while things seem to go well. Painfully, laboriously, skin shreddingly and slowly, but enjoyable because of this. I get to the final rest foothold, but I know I'm tired. I'm really tired. It's getting dark, the moment of enjoyment has passed, and I'm scared of the possibility of failure. There's no such thing as trying again if you fail at the top of a 50m pitch which has just taken you over an hour already. With the dusk turning to night, I set off on the final few meters. The foot cams which seemed secure when I was fresh start skidding. I over grip with my arms, pushing and squeezing ineffectually. Panic sets in, and I helplessly slide out of the crack. Almost as a passive observer, I see my chance at climbing Freerider slip. I sit on the rope in partial disbelief. The exhaustion, tiredness, pain and dejection mix together. I don't want to be here any more. I hate this stupid crack. I want to be back in camp 4 with Lindy. I want to swear my head off but it takes a while before I can catch my breath and muster the energy to do so, but when I do, I start in earnest: "You BASTARD stupid fucking good-for-nothing piece-of-shit crack!!".
It takes me a long time to frig my way up the final 5 meters, and it's definitely nighttime as Dan seconds the pitch cleanly. One more half-pitch sees us at the Alcove, where we'll bivvy for the night. We eat and go to sleep straight after, but I wake intermittently through the night, usually having slid down the ledge into some rocks. It's a clear starry night, and the moon partially illuminates the Cathedral rocks opposite El Cap. It's a beautiful place to stir intermittently, but I can't escape the thought that I've fallen off the Monster and screwed it up.

My elbow the day after the Monster - ouch!

Friday
The dawn of a new day brings with it an acceptance that I'm not freeing El Cap, a multitude of aches and pains throughout my body, and a dearth of skin on my elbow thanks to the M.O. Fortunately however, today only has 5 pitches to the next bivvy. These are mostly straight forward (although of course, they don't feel it to me given the beating I received yesterday), except for the crux of the route, the boulder problem pitch. Dan flashed this pitch when he was here in May, but today, in the scorching heat, he can't even redpoint it. Dan gives up on his all-free ascent of Freerider and we continue to the Block, where we chill out to the entertainment provided by Team Butterfingers, who are having a tough time aiding the pitch above us. We hear a warning shout of "rock!", but in actual fact it's just another cam being cast earthwards. Later, shouts of "man, why don't we have enough small cams" can be heard. It might be uncharitable, but I can't help thinking that the reason for that is pretty self-evident. Whilst chaos ensues above, we sit out the head wave. Later, as if we needed any confirmation of the suitability of their nickname, Butterfingers drop their hash pipe onto the ledge. The last we hear from them is a distressed shout of "man I don't know how to clean a pendulum, this is the kinda crap I wanted to practice on the ground!" followed by a whole lot more yelling.

Saturday
I'm still dehydrated and my finger skin is trashed, but we'll top out today. I pull on at least one piece of gear on almost every pitch. Free'ing an isolated pitch doesn't really matter to me right now, and my elbow is in a bit of a state. I just want to get down to drink some water. Where Dan is still energetic and pulls out some tough leads, I manage one of my worst ever on one of the enduro corner pitches.
We top out in the late afternoon. Frigrider it may be, but we've still topped out on El Cap, so despite my disappointment at not freeing the route I'm still chuffed.

The Needles

The Needles present quite a dramatic change from the climbing, and indeed being, in Squamish. For a start, they are located at about 8000 feet elevation (I know I know... 2,400m altitude), and nowhere near a highway. Having been at sea level for the past 6 weeks, the altitude had a surprisingly tiring effect. I visited here three years ago, and escaped benightment by the skin of our teeth (which I was soon to make a recurring theme, as I'll come on to).


Thin Ice
Lindy, very much by her own admission, is no bold hero. Indeed, upon being informed that something is 'fairly safe' or 'not too scary', she has been known to reply "well that's easy for you to say, but you don't have the middle name 'chicken'!" This not withstanding, I often find myself fascinated by her internal battles that often play out not so internally (climb up, climb down, curse, climb up, climb down, curse some more...). In reality, I think that even though a lot of her climbing-fears are more overt than say my own, the similarities are greater than the differences. Undoubtedly this would surprise her, but there are probably more universals than uniques in terms of climbing fears.
So, the route Thin Ice, Lindy climbed the first 30m of the splitter crack - steady away. But at the crux these psychological battles became more visibly evident, and obstructive to upwards progress. There was no resolution this time, except to lower off and ask me to finish the pitch for her. A blow to one's confidence if anything is.
The second pitch is a grade easier, but as is often the way on granite, the grade matters less than the price of fish. It's a flared v-slot (I initially intended to elaborate on the difficulties that this entails, but in reality, if you need to ask, then you'll never really know). Upon her arrival at the stance, quickly volunteered herself to lead it. What?! I have no idea where this reversal in her headspace came from; the willingness to put herself back into the firing line of the unknown.

Lindy halfway up the slot. If squirming progress can be measured in calories, Lindy has at least 2000 of energy expenditure left to go (copyright Andy Reeve)

Obviously Lindy had had a word with herself. Her climbing wasn't fast, and it wasn't pretty, but eventually she sqeezed her way to the top of the slot and extricated herself into the upper crack (and thereafter the summit, glory etc etc..)


(I'm not quite a) Romantic Warrior
At the end of my last post I said that we had managed to avoid any drama. Well, to rectify this I badgered Lindy into agreeing to second me on Romantic Warrior. If this route were anywhere else, it would be an oft-attempted testpiece. Much like the rest of Needles climbing however, it still somehow holds onto an air of mystique. As with the rest of the climbing here, information is harder to come by (the topos are sometimes wrong), other than about half a dozen routes the climbs are rarely attempted, and the area feels wild and remote. This slightly eerie feeling is both reflected and enhanced by the names of the individual needles: the Sorceror, Warlock, Charlaton...

Surprisingly, given that as far as we were aware no one had been on the route for the whole week we were there, we coincidently shared the route with another pair (Max and Emma) on the day we chose to try it. We climbed with grace and ease for three pitches (because they're easy, rather than any reflection on our ability), after which progress became somewhat less forthcoming. A technical groove pitch preceeded a steep foothold-less traverse which left me wondering how it can be possible to get so pumped on such big holds? (although I didn't have much time to ponder this question, as I sprinted for the ledge at the end). Lindy informed me she thought that seconding this pitch was "dreadful" and she "hated it", but this was more to do with her British-style aid technique of just yarding on the gear, getting pumped and scared of a penduluming fall, and being on terrain 6 grades above her usual standard. Of course, I had made her carry the bag again as well. A truer reflection of the quality of the climbing would be encapsulated by the word 'flawless'.

Another easy pitch lead us to the base of the 'Book of Deception' pitch. I love it when pitches are given their individual name, especially when it sounds forboding like this. I thought it was a bit of a misnomer however. It looks blank and holdless, and lo and behold, blank and holdless it indeed is. Well, not entirely holdless, as I did make some progress, but the main difficulty came from placing fiddly RPs whilst using a bewildering combination of smearing both feet on alternating walls, crimping the edge of the crack, opposition palming and a variety of other techniques for which I have no words. Pumped, in my arms legs and mind, and unable to hold myself still for long enough to place an RP (the best I could manage was to take them from my harness and put them immediately back again), I stuffed in a blue alien that I knew wouldn't hold a fall. This presented me with the dilemma of whether to try to rest on the cam which might just rip out, or to push on and risk a fall onto the blue cam which would then certainly rip out. Fortunately I did not have the time to become too anxious about making this decision, as I only had to climb one more move before I fell off. The cam popped out (it is, of course, reassuring to know that I can assess poor protection as being unreliable, however, rather than reflect on this at the time I just swore at the cam and swore at the rock).
Sat on the rope recovering, the way ahead was suddenly far clearer and what I should have done became obvious from the comfort of my harness. I finished the pitch with just one sit on the rope. Disappointing in some ways, but there's only so hard I can try.

A regular occurence at the Needles - a fighter jet about to fly over head whilst Lindy sorts the ropes on Romantic Warrior (copyright Andy Reeve)

By the final pitch I was burnt out. Physically and mentally (I wanted it to feel easy, but it wasn't, which in an ironic and peverse trick of the mind always makes things feel even harder than need be). To make matters worse, I hadn't made Lindy carry enough food or water in the bag, so I was parched and felt weak. This, I like to think, is a great exemplar of getting in one's excuses early. Yes, you may have guessed, I fell off again (like I said, I was very thirsty and very hungry remember.) The only reason I continued to the top of the pitch was that it was the fastest way down.

Our friends Max and Emma had obtained their information on the descent from a different source, and so carried all their kit up with them and were now gayly abseiling down the other side of the pinnacle to the trail head and an easy walk back to camp. In a stern rejection of common sense in preference for the information we had read online (I still can't believe we didn't just work this out for ourselves), we on the other hand did some awful pain-in-the-neck abseils back down the route, over bulges and back across the big traverse, all against the clock as the sun was already under the horizon. In a repeat of my first visit here, we barely made it back to the base and our stashed kit with any daylight left (I like to think there is a lot to be said for consistency). This was a much less pleasant a way to finish, with the added anti-bonus of a curse-inducing slog back up the gully. Feeling somewhat less than fresh, the level of coaxing I required from Lindy on this uphill part increased from verbal prompts to hands-on physical pushing me upwards on the steepest parts. Thanks Lindy!.


A few more photos

Two climbers on Atlantis on the Sorcerror (5.11c). Thin Ice follows the crackline about halfway between them and the left edge (copyright Andy Reeve)

Lindy making her way through weird blobs as she follows the top pitch of Spooky (5.9) on the Charlaton (copyright Andy Reeve)

Lindy reading in the tent at the Needles campground in Sequoia National Forest (copyright Andy Reeve)

Squamish 1

And so a new trip begins...

...in Squamish. We have so far avoided any major epics (probably because Lindy's here), which I'm sure most people would consider a good thing. For the unfortunate reader of this blog however, no epics means no stories. As a result this will be a bit light on drama - in return for a few snaps. Until something goes horribly wrong or I get in over my head, when normal procedure will resume (by which I mean having a torrid epic and blaming it all on Dan's ungrounded confidence in my ability.)

Squamish seemed to be a slightly strange blend. On the one hand, the town is surounded by rock. Crags sit all around it. The other side of this however, is that the crags are surrounded by the town. Which also means buildings and roads all around. Surprisingly we became well accustoned to this accustomed to this after a few weeks, so even the noise of the highway and the docks of the logging industry fades into the general background mileau. This is with the exception of the slow bellow of the trains' horn (every 15 seconds, throughout the duration of its slow passage through town, at any time of the day and night), which is somewhat more difficult to become accustomed to. This proximity to civilisation, whilst making for a considerably less wilderness-like experience, brings with it a lot of convenience: supermarkets, friends, a friendly climbing community and 1 dollar samosas.

Climbing wise, the Stawamus Cheif's Grand Wall is the area showpiece. The crux pitches are graded 5.11a (about E3) so Lindy made me lead them. In return, I made her carry the bag (I definitely got the better deal). 

Lindy on the Split Pillar pitch of the Grand Wall

Lindy's big lead of the route was the Split Pillar, a 40m jamming corner which she climbed steadily and confidently. This same level of composure and fluidity was slightly lacking later in the trip when Lindy lead the classic Exasperator. Finding herself psyched out by the crux, only by verbalising her inner dialogue could she muster the gumption to keep going. All I heard from the base of the route was Lindy mumbling to herself; it later transpired that her words were "come on you stupid cow - just get on with it". I suspect that this would not have worked so well had I offered her the same advice.

Lindy seconding Perry's layback. With rucksack, obvs.

My favourite memory of the Grand Wall is the escape across Bellygood Ledge, entirely because of Lindy's shriek when she saw how narrow the ledge gets. Her initial words went along the lines of "Reeve... I'm not doing it". Faced with the stark choice between completing the crawl or staying there for the night... well her choice was obvious, as below

Lindy feigning having fun

and finally

Me on the Scimitar (11b)

Longing for the chains

Having mocked Lindy enough for one post, here's a picture of me in uncomfortable extremis (read: struggling embarrasingly on an E3) to make up for it. As you can see, I found this desperate, but all the same my efforts were put to shame by Lauren, who tried so hard that her shouting even drowned out the noise of the train.

Lauren, not trying hard enough

Slab and Crack

Choosing what to climb with Dan follows a familiar pattern: I will suggest something I consider feasible; Dan will dismiss it as too easy and suggest something I consider too hard; We’ll try it in spite of my reservations; Dan will somehow drag us both to the top (or at least to a safe escape). To make matters worse for me, Dan remains happily unaware that being over-ambitious is even possible, leading to an even bigger discrepancy in our proposed objectives. I wanted this pattern to change. I wanted to out-ambition Dan.

So on a Saturday in November, Dan and I already driving towards the Peak, though not yet having discussed what to climb, I took my opportunity to think big. One route came to mind that I would love to climb, but I’ve always rejected it as being too difficult for me. Even better, I knew that Dan was intimidated by it too, and so he wouldn’t be in a position to over-rule it. Barely able to contain my fear, excitement, and smugness at beating Dan in this stupid game of route-suggestion one-upmanship (that only I was playing anyway), I put on my most casual offhand manner and I said it: “how about err, oh I don’t mind where we go really. Ahem. How about Slab and Crack?”

“Ooh!” Dan looked shocked. For a moment I felt proud – I had done it. I had thought big. Bigger than Dan. Then, having recovered his composure, he got the last laugh, Dan agreed we should try it. Oh shit!

Needless to say, neither of us are Ryan: Neither of us flashed it. Indeed, we were far from flashing it. Which is fine, as that was not what we expected. Rather, I have had about a dozen goes spread over the past two weekends. Dan topped out yesterday, just before rain stopped play. Perhaps out of kindness, perhaps out of a sense of obligation, or maybe from a sense of team completion, Dan is here at Curbar with me again.

The whole process of solving problems, bantering away the other’s anxiety and pooling our collective nerve had left me with a string of memories. In the way that friendships are built out of shared experiences, and Dan and I have certainly been accruing a lot of these in the past few days. I also felt an unusual affinity for the route. Different sections of rock acted as cues for memories that were intrinsically linked with a specific sense of place. Different moves holding an emotional intonation, reminding me of snippets of chat, kind gestures or overcoming feelings of intimidation.

Finally, having already undergone a great deal of barely necessary pre-route faff, I took one last look around. Maybe the duress of repeated attempts has left me in a reflective mood, but even the ground at the base of the route brought back good memories. The joking, the gossiping, the psyching up, the piss taking, the time Dan tripped over that deceptively flat bit of grass...

Somewhat forced, I leave the ground. The first moves are close enough to the pads to be climbed more dynamically than necessary – a playful hop taking preference to a boring reach.  Much to my amusement, Dan made a mess of this part every time. The easiest bit of the route, but Dan would always be in a tangle of limbs until told what to do, an unintended in-joke (it is actually really obvious how to do it, by the way).

The next part was a bit of a breakthrough for me when I first did it, as I couldn’t use Dan’s beta and I was starting to feel a bit stuck. Right now I love and loathe this part in equal measure, it’s my way of doing it and it works for me, but it leaves me with the unfortunate consequence of an awkward foot-swap. Every time I get here I’m grateful that Dan pulls the rope to the side, otherwise runs across the vital foothold. I didn’t have to ask, but the difference it makes is more than psychological.

Completing the long rock over leads me back to a familiar spot: Back to the pause just before the scary part. It’s become a familiar position, right here. It took me a long time to find that I could actually rest a little. Allowing my body to lengthen from my hands to my feet and spragging with my thumb. Breathe deeply but carefully, or the movement of my chest will push me out of balance. On paper  it sounds so simple. It didn’t feel simple the first time I was here, but the holds haven’t changed.

The next part is the scary bit, and I’m still not sure how I feel about it. Although I have jumped off from this slight rest a few times, I wouldn’t want to fall from higher up. And I could do, it’s not consistently easy enough for me to be certain. Cruelly, it’s the most insecure of all the climbing prior to the gear. It’s all slopers, smears and a sidepull, nothing you could catch yourself with. Last time it felt great – so easy that I convinced myself I have it dialled.

I launch up into the sequence, imbued with confidence from cruising it earlier in the day. But having lulled myself into this careless mind-set, it will not surprise you to learn that it now feels much harder again – oh dear! I don’t like having to try this hard up here.

It made me think of Dan spotting me. He always looked smooth on that part, despite using worse smears on his sequence than I dare. I always feel bad when I sketch up high, it’s awful to watch when you’re spotting. I felt anxious when spotting Dan, and he never looked sketchy on it like I do now. Sorry Dan!

Now stood on a stepped edge, I’m level with the gear, cheekily still in from yesterday’s efforts. Clip clip clip. Two RPs and a crap alien. By a fluke of taking turns, Dan had always got here first, and so had to place the gear. Of course, the strategy I employed was to makesure I went last on any given day, that way it was always Dan to go first next time.

A few more moves and the wall steepens slightly. Predictably, the crux. It’s protected by another RP, a completely blind placement that again, I never had the pleasure of putting in. This suited me perfectly, as it is pumpy enough to clip, let alone place. Fortunately for me, this also meant that Dan was always the first to test it too. I’m glad I didn’t have to!

I can’t even think of this crux without admitting to our complete punter-dom. I’ll come straight out with it, I’m going to blame Dan. You see, Dan placed three RPs in the top crack, although only one of them ever got weighted. The bottom one wasn’t very good anyway. And the top one was adjacent to the crux crimp in the crack. Between us we must have had a dozen attempts each with this setup, crimping the hell out of the edge of the crack, barely cramming our fingers deep enough to call it a hold. Until Dan took out that darn top RP. He’d blocked the crucial hold with a non-crucial wire. Obviously everyone does so occasionally, but we had both persisted for two full days like this. As I said, punters! Obviously it was Dan who placed it each time. He’d have been a lot less pumped if he’d left it out too.

Kind of disappointingly, the absence of this wire is actually what made the difference. Of all the combinations of foot positions, sidepulls, undercuts, and any other trick I had tried, none of them mattered much compared with actually having the actual hold available. Ah well. I set up for the move, heavy with the emotional baggage of past repeated failure, but light with the comparative jug now in my right hand. I trusted to luck on the right foot smear, and stepped my left foot towards the good edge. Here is where I’ve fallen before, but not this time. With a foot on the good flatty, I rocked over.

Again making use of the RPs Dan had placed yesterday, I stand in balance, sizing up the final moves.   The one good foothold gives some respite, but it doesn’t stop my escalating anxiety. Basically, I really don’t want this siege to stretch on any more. Fear of failure has got the better of me now, and I’ve allowed myself to get into the trap of pissing about looking for the massive jug that blatantly doesn’t exist.

Tiring forearms force me into action. Choosing the best of the bad bunch of crimps, I smear with my right, then smear with my left. A gaston is within reach, but in my urgency I mess up the slap and end up hitting the wall to the side of the hold. I’ve pushed myself outwards! I barndoor backwards, left hand and left foot arcing in mid-air. But my whole-body pendulum slows, and I swing back in. It is a slab, after all. I kind of fall back onto the hold. Compared with grasping at fresh air, it feels like a jug. No more mistakes here, I don’t so much smear on the next foothold, but weld my foot into the very grain of the rock.

With both hands on top, a wave of euphoria and relief engulfs me, although only for a brief moment. It passes and I feel strangely weak, as if my body has paced itself perfectly and now has nothing left. I wobble through the easy mantel onto the top of the crag, and standing in the wind, out of sight of my companions, everything feels slightly surreal. Not for long however, in the time I’ve undone the Velcro on my shoes the high has already passed. No more anxiety, no more euphoria, back to normal. It might sound a bit cliché, but topping out is all part of the process, and doesn’t seem any more important than the parts that came before.

Topping out offered a sense of completion, but my enjoyment of the route happened across the whole four days. Memories are intrinsically anchored to the physical place where they took place, and without a doubt that is a special place and a special route, but in many ways the route was primarily a vessel for friendship and challenge.

 The stopping point just before the scary section (Copyright Dan McManus)

Reaching for the good edge, at the start of the crux (Copyright Dan McManus)