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As my two partners, Sean Courage and Miles Smart, and I were
racking for an ascent
of The Zodiac, I found myself drawn into such a conversation with a
Valley local named Brian.
Brian had the look: tall, wire thin, sporting a ponytail, baggy Gramicci
pants and well worn
Garmonts. He sauntered toward us, pausing to inspect our disorganized
mound of gear.
"How's it going?" I offered, as I assembled a rack of free
'biners.
"Good. So what route are you racking for?" he queried.
"The Zodiac," I replied nonchalantly, knowing a moderate trade route
wouldn't interest him.
"Great route, you'll really enjoy it."
"You done it?"
"Yeah, a few years ago."
"How was it?"
"Pretty casual, lots of fun. I mean, it's a total trade
route. The guidebook calls it
A3+, but the new wave rating is A2+. Tons of fixed stuff; it goes
hammerless. Gets almost as much
traffic as The Nose these days"
"Any pitches that are really sketchy or difficult?"
"Nah. I mean it's a cruise". Just bring a medium rack and
you'll walk it. Have fun."
As Brian continued down the road I began to question everything. Did we
have too much gear? Was
40 liters of water excessive? We were taking this thing too seriously? I
pulled my partners aside to
discuss the situation. Fortunately, Miles, who had spent the entire
spring in the
Valley, was not so easily drawn into Brian's distorted orbit.
Miles informed Sean and
I that Valley local Chris McNamara (who at the age of 19 has done 35
ascents of El Cap) had just
"cleaned up" The Zodiac, replacing old bolts and extracting about half
of the fixed gear. Miles
contended that the route was now closer to its first ascent condition
than it had been in years, and
recommended that we bring a comprehensive rack. Sean agreed. (And when
your partners'
last names are Smart and Courage, you don't argue). The hardware
rack grew.
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"The Zodiac continued to challenge us, but our mindset changed. We
focused on the quality of the
climbing instead of dwelling on its difficulty..." |
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The evening sun dimmed on the upper part of The Shield while we crammed
the unruly heap of gear
into our A5 Grade VII haul bag. As we humped our load to the base of the
route, headlamps dotted the
vertical landscape like a sparely lit Christmas tree. Sean and I
searched for a bivy spot while Miles
led the first pitch in the dark. The huge shards of granite at the base
of the route yielded no
comfort, so we opted for our PortaLedges, hanging just a foot off
the ground.
At first light Sean blasted up the fixed line and led the second pitch,
calling it "attention
getting," a rare assertion coming from a no-hype guy. His remark
made me wonder about
pitch three, my first lead. Would my modest aid climbing experience be
enough?
About 100 feet into the pitch, standing on a wobbly Chouinard hook, I
found myself deliberating
between a quick Leeper Cam placement and a slow but more secure Lost
Arrow. As I pounded in the
Lost Arrow, I scolded myself for having no balls and reflected on
Brian's assertion that we
would "cruise" the route. The climbing wasn't desperate, but it
was thought provoking and
time consuming. I reached the belay after two long hours, wondering if,
by Brian's
standards, I'd "cruised" the pitch. As Sean cleaned and Miles
hauled, reality sunk in: for us,
The Zodiac would be no cruise. Success would require an old fashioned,
dawn-to-dusk,
try-your-hardest, take-it-seriously effort.
Plodding up the seventh pitch, the last of day one, I was
confronted by a steep
headwall bisected by a flaring, quarter inch seam. The topo indicated
this section was fixed.
Looking up the headwall, I was surprised to see that the next piece of
fixed gear was in fact the
belay, more than 50 feet above me. I quietly thanked Miles for loading
up the rack and got to work.
The climbing was steep and wonderful tiny HB offset nuts, an
occasional Leeper Cam, a
few double zero TCUs, but it was no cruise. "How's it going
up there?" queried Miles
as I was inching my way toward the belay. "Oh, fine, this pitch is a
cruise," I replied. My sarcasm
was obvious. It was a sporting pitch more than I bargained for.
Flat on my back in the portaledge, I awoke as the 5am sun illuminated the
upper pitches of the Dawn
Wall. Since today's first lead was mine, I stood up to examine the
pitch. "Wow, it looks
steep," I mused as I slowly organized the rack. Miles sensed
procrastination. Setting the tone for
the day, he nudged me and quipped, "Hey, it all goes." I thought to
myself, he's right, it does
go, and all I have to do is get my butt in gear and start leading. Up I
went, taking it one placement
at a time. The climbing was outrageous massive, clean features,
beautiful rock, relentless
exposure and went from just plain steep to in-your-face steep. As
I closed in on the belay
anchors, I realized day two was different. Fueled by a whole new set of
expectations, I was
climbing with more conviction and confidence.
The Zodiac continued to challenge us, but our mindset changed. We
focused on the quality of the
climbing instead of dwelling on its difficulty. When faced with a dicey
move we'd simply
recite our new mantra: "Hey, it all goes." Our interactions became more
positive. We joked. We
were having fun. We were getting "dialed in."
My hardest lead came on day three. As I was getting to the business of
the thirteenth pitch, the
wind shifted, redirecting spray from the nearby waterfall right on top
of me. Water poured over
the rock; I was soaked within minutes. What should have been 20 feet of
straightforward free
climbing turned into a sequence of tricky hook moves in a downpour.
Earlier in the climb that lead
would have sent me into an endless harangue. But after three days in El
Cap's celestial orbit
I was surprisingly unfazed by the whole affair. Sean cleaned the pitch
with characteristic
efficiency, arriving at the belay within minutes. "I bet that wet
section was sketchy", he allowed,
as if to compliment me for a bold lead. "Nah, it was fine", I replied
casually. "I mean Sean, it all
goes". Building on the momentum, he grabbed the rack and started leading
without saying a word.
As Sean blazed ahead, Miles and I realized we were going to top out
before dark. We also
realized we weren't the same team that started this route three
days ago. The climbing
hadn't changed, but we had. Nothing seemed to faze us anymore. We
took everything in
stride: sore hips, swollen hands, too much sun and not enough sleep. Our
communication became
breezy, casual, understated. Success now seemed inevitable. We sensed a
transformation taking
place. Were we too entering El Cap's reality distortion zone?
Miles finished leading the last pitch around 6pm. Instead of racing down
the East Ledges, we opted
to bivy on top and descend in the morning. Once again, I slept in the
portaledge, this time hanging
from a fragrant Mariposa tree. After ten hours of uninterrupted sleep we
packed the haul bag for
the last time and headed for where else? the meadow at the
base of El Cap. As we
sorted gear on our trunk-side tarp, two aspiring big wall climbers
walked by. Glowing with pride,
they informed us that they had just completed their first Grade V wall:
the ever popular South Face
of Washington Column. And now, they decided, they were ready for a route
on The Big Stone. Our
fresh-off-the-wall look made them curious.
"So what route did you guys just do?"
"The Zodiac," I answered.
"How was it?"
"It's a great route, really fun."
"Was it hard?"
"Nah, it's pretty casual you know, it's a trade
route."
"Do you think we could do it after doing the South Face of the Column,
or should we warm up on
The Prow first?"
"Oh, do the Zodiac for sure, you'll cruise it."
Mark Kroese, Mountain Zone Contributor
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