Ascents in Southwest Face

Just another route to add to the list of things that might make you a believer. I had the pleasure of jugging/climbing/shenaniganing behind Sam on his glorious 22 hour all free ascent of El Corazon (the El Coraziad).

Brittany, Victoria, and I jugged to Mammoth the night before to try and maximise our sleep then the next morning Adrian and Sam simuled to Mammoth and collected their pre-rigged belayers (Brittany and I (Victoria just came to hang out and talk shit bc she’s a legend)) and Sam and I started romping while Adrian and Brittany chilled on the ledge to give us some time to create a gap so Adrian could start his attempt without us being in the way. Pretty classic scenes on the big stone if you ask me.

Highlights included: - Listening to multiple Lorde albums in full - Jugging the Nietzsche chimney and being rewarded with a lie down on Babsi’s portaledge - Taking a whole bunch of fucked up pendulums cleaning Sam’s gear to save time (“should i lower out or just take the fall?” “nah you’ll be fine there’s nothing to hit just take the whip”) - Sam firing every pitch like an absolute machine with only one fall on the Beak Flake - Jugging with two back packs - Down aiding the end of the roof pitch because Sam forgot to back clean his gear and i couldn’t lower out and also did not want to take the 15mpendulum whipper into the Tower - Having a chorus of 10 or so people from different routes cheer Sam on as he sent the roof traverse as the sun finished setting - Arriving at the tower and being handed a cup of tea that had been made by Miska and her partner who sent Golden Gate - Honestly just the whole thing. Supporting your friends to achieve their dreams is the fucking coolest thing ever.

I won’t forget this day for a long while. Thanks Sam.

Ground up over seven days and then we camped on top and hiked down on the eighth day. We pre-hauled to Hollow Flake Ledge, took two rest days, and then went up the route. Some nice Germans fixed the lines off Heart to above the Hollow Flake for us so we didn’t climb those pitches on our pre-hauling day and preserved our ground up as much as we could. We also didn’t do the Free Blast before our ground up attempt which was cool and definitely added to the experience. I top roped the Monster because I got tired of whipping from the move into it all the way back into the Ear in the dark at 5am and then gave the reigns to Jesse who fired it and then I followed. I top roped the Enduros because we didn’t do them first go and I also took the stance at the no hands ledge on the move off heart. These are my asterisks, do with them what you will.

I will probably write something more when my brain and body decide to work again.

Best thing i’ve ever done!

4 days and 3 nights in the wall (el cap tower ->great, camp 4 ->crap, camp 6 -> super slippery) with prehauling to sickle ledge. Amazing and exhausting experience!

Unfortunately didnt get a chance to get further than 6 pitches up the shnoz this season. Anthony and I did a 'dolt run' to practice speed climbing. I went with antons 'intermediate clove hitch' method of breaking up the death loop as opposed to the self belay because im not stoked about lead falling onto a device im wearing. The only sketchy moment was forgetting to undo one of the cloves and pulling a nut out from above. It was my only piece and i couldnt place above so i had to shimmy down and replace the nut. After that i just waited for tony to get up and put me on belay. Ultimately more research on this as well as the route itself would be needed for the holy 'niad'. A 3 or 4 day ascent might be a prerequisite.. Or 2 days with hammocks and only bars and drinking peoples piss off the wall to avoid hauling? Still stoked to get up on the 'best rock climb in the world' and look down the dawn wall with howling wind to juice up the exposure even more.

First lap I had one fall on the sixth pitch then onsighted the rest. Sent second time round. Felt flowy. Really enjoyed this

The Freeing ended after the freeblast then it turned into Aidrider ! Absolutely mega adventure and I feel like I learnt alot along the way.

Day 1, stuck behind an aid parties initially. But just climbed around them and their gear. Sent all of the free blast. Got the rope stuck twice on the half dollar. Then fixed to the hollow flake and slept on heart ledges. "The move" felt absolutely mingin.

Day 2, hauling these pitches was exhausting. Then straight into the hollow flake. & it was just as terrifying as I thought it would be. Need Todo more othwidth climbing bumping two tipped number sixs leaving one and then another before questing 15m above them without any gear felt pretty out there. Then Shane threaded the anchor and started the downclimb taking two falls. Then when he climbed up further I threw the rope down for him to retie back in. Then he untied and I pulled the other line. And the sound I won't forget anytime soon. Metal rattling into the abyss. Shane "was that the six ?* ... " That was both of the sixs" Then we sat on the ledge contemplating if we could climb the rest of the route without any number sixs. Fixed the next two pitchs and stayed on the hollow flake Ledge that night.

Day 3, onwards and upwards. Anxious about our position but psyched to be moving. The ear was something to experience. Sadly or happily we skipped the monster and aided the salathe. Made it to the alcove for lunch then climbed to the Spire and fixed two pitches above.

Day 4, I think I slept a Total of one hour. Not sure why I decided to sleep on the slopping ledge ahaha. Boulder for breakfast. Such cool movement on this thing ! The crimp before the Gaston thumb move felt pretty spoogy. Gave the moves a few goes but didn't spend too long on it. Sewer pitch was filthy. Shane got the snorkel on for that. Sport lose flake pitch was pretty nerving but pretty sweet climbing. Boom enduro corner. Alot more sporty than it looks weird kneebar stuff and sick laybacking, final pitch of the day and the most exposed pitch of the climb. Wild traversing over the void.

Day 5. Pretty dismal free climbing effort on this day ahaha. Those sliver jugs were just too good Frankly I felt pretty destroyed. & Was just happy to be on the summit !!

Climbed free up to 11a, aid the rest. We bailed at pitch 9 because of a hand injury.

When Henry and I first arrived in Yosemite, my stoke to climb much of anything was pretty low. Our campsite in El Portal was 40 minutes out of the park and offered all the social life that retirees in rental RVs could dream of. Oppressive heat baked every wall, and day by day the Valley seemed more like a concentration camp for hoardes of ill-informed tourists than a climbing destination.

After being cited by park rangers on our third day of climbing I was ready to throw in the towel, and had Henry not been on this trip I probably would have.

Nonetheless, the pile of aid gear we had both amassed beckoned to be used, and with some inspiration from Nick and Dave (and assurance there’s no rangers hiding in the stovelegs) we set off.

I should note that both Henry and I wanted to climb pure alpine style, that is without fixing and hauling to Sickle. In hindsight our early arrival at El Cap Tower meant we could have done this, but on Nick’s advice we compromised by hauling every pitch (including Pine Line and first four) but fixing lines from Sickle and sleeping on the ground. Personally I think this is a big concession in style, but it possibly avoided an epic and got us ahead of the crowds, so I'm happy we did it.

Day 1: Jug to Sickle. Henry led every pitch to arrive on El Cap Tower at 5:20pm.

Day 2: Mini epic on the Texas flake. Originally Henry was to take the first block, but we swapped for me to lead this pitch. Didn’t die. Henry flashed the King Swing and I recovered from a pretty bad bonk to lead from Grey Bands to Camp 5. The Great Roof was seeping with slimy algae, which made backcleaning the entire thing (so that Henry could lower out) a pretty spicy experience.

Day 3: Bit of a slow start while 4 all-star NIAD teams passed us. Triple-crowners Nick and Danford, Connor Herson, Tom Herbert, YOSAR rangers… we felt like the only gumbies on the wall! I led the wild bolt ladder clipping 3 bolts in the top 30 meters and we followed the final NIAD team down to the valley floor.

Overall a pretty cool end to a pretty cool trip, and possibly my last log here. I've started to realise I'm not quite eloquent enough to express how I feel on bigger objectives in writing, and most often I simply don't want to. Back in Sydney in a bit

El capihoofa!! Finally on the big stone.. The first couple hundred metres but still felt like a 4 year old in a candy shop up in the sea of rock. Bringing sunnies up there would be good beta. That white rock reflects light like snow. Insecure and exciting low angle climbing but never full cheesegrater potential (for me cos shane led the sketchy 5th pitch). An el cap adventure wouldnt have been complete without some french free.. which was the only reason i grabbed the draws instead of sending. We lay on the mammoth ledge top out at 1pm staring up at salathe wall with slack jaws for 20 min before beginning the descent. Getting to rap fixed lines down to the ground for a 5 minute descent to the cars is also a luxury i will miss.

Flashed NIAD 9 hours. First time climbing The Captain

Dolt run. Averaged 50 mins per pitch until stovelegs traffic slowed us. Learned how to aid in a tree the day before.

Goal was to keep up with 3 French wizards who overtook us on the footstool (both their seconds freeing everything to Dolt). Mission was kinda accomplished.

1 and a half pitches.

Muir to the shield, rope solo aid faff sloth style. Clean (definately not hammerless). Wild.

Few days fixing to P6, then waited around for some replacement approachies that never arrived, 14 days on-wall, several days to get everything back down.

Rack brought for Muir->Shield (clean) June 2022

Hooks: -2*talons (only used 1) -1*cliffhanger (only used 1) -2*Narrow cam hooks (only used 1) -1*micro, wide (not used)

Pitons: -15 #3 peckers or equiv staight tomahawks (wouldn't have minded having 20, MVPs on the headwall) -2* #1 peckers -2 * #2 peckers -2 random size sawed angles (old booty, size unknown), would have been good to have a full set to use skeleton key style. Useful but probably not essential, only used twice, more #3 beaks likely more useful -Wall hammer -Mini hammer for nut cleaning on clean pitches -Funkness device (used for cleaning a few unnesessary fixed beaks) -Few random heads -No LAs -Few heads - brought but never used.

Nuts: -1 set standard micro nuts (barely used) -2-3 sets offset brass nuts (clutch) -1 set peanuts (completely unused - would not bring) -About 1kg of offset alloy nuts - very helpful esp gold/blue

Cams: -2*set of offset X4s (clutch, despite copping a lot of slack for the harder alloy found them pretty bomber in weird grooves within the SA scars) -1*Aliens black-green (didn't use much) -Triple totems set from black - grey (0.4 equiv), and mix totems/C4s triples to #3, double #4, double #5 (big gear most useful for the muir section, probably a bit over the top)

Misc: -3-4 large Wire rivet hangers (never used) -> some of the micro/piano wire size wire rivet hangers may have been useful instead of 3mm nylon -Few meters of 3mm nylon cord (useful for a few of the old RURPs -Few meters of ?11/16th webbing for fixed gear -Few leaver biners (bootied a few, used a few) -Sharp knife for cleaning off some tat, honestly in some spots I wish I had a narrow head locking pliers for getting some mank tat off. -Didn't bring an adjustable spanner - many, many of the quicklinks and hangers were loooose (At least on the muir pitches).

Crux aid pitches went clean as previous party placed a mashie at the bottom of the groove, without which would have been quite a challenge.

Cleaned a bunch of tat (but theres still a lot that really needs the chop), and a few beaks from the headwall pitches that were taking up nice beak scars that should go fine hand placed.