Sunburnt, dehydrated, exhausted and way too many blisters. My knuckles are cracked and bloodied. My lips are chapped and my hands can barely hold a water bottle. My brain is on slowmo and and my body aches like creaky floorboard. This is what we get. No pictures, no prize, victory drink.
3000ft in 3 days. Thats how long it took Kyle and I to climb the The Nose on El Capitan. We packed everything up in our haul bag and started the first day at 1:00pm. This was supposed to be the easy day but we didn't get to the bivy spot at Dolt Tower till midnight. We learned a few things from the first day. One it is HOT during the day! Two we drink way more than we thought. Three climbing in the dark is really cool. And four this rock is really big!
The next day we got a late start. We began climbing around 9am and moved pretty slowly all day. I scored the "King Swing" pitch, which consists of getting lowered 70ft below your belay and swinging from side to side to reach a vertical crack system. I know, it doesn't seem like a difficult thing but when you are 1500ft off the ground and swinging back and forth can be kinda scary. The worst part happened when Kyle was cleaning the route. Kyle had to do whats called a "lower out" so he wouldn't take a huge swing of his own, which consisted of lowering himself slowly off the previous anchor. But once he was half way his rope got stuck. He started to climb back up that rope to fix the stuck rope and as he was going up the rope popped out of the crack he flew through the air bouncing against the rock backwards and upside down. He turned out okay though he had a few cuts and scrapes he was mostly shocked at the giant swing he had just taken. That was it for the excitement of that day though we did stop to watch the sun set over the surrounding mountain tops. We climbed a bit more till 9pm and bivied at Camp IV ledge. My bivy spot was at a sloping angle so I put my feet in the haul bag and set it up so if I slipped at night I would slip into the haul bag.
Nights on the capper (short for captan) are the best parts about being on the wall. Given you never sleep that well on the wall it is the most beautiful thing you'll ever see. Full moon and a clear sky just added to the wonder. The 2000ft of exposure made it just scary enough to get your endorphins up.
The next day we got a late start again even though our plan was to wake up at 6am we did not get up till 8am. Kyle started off the day with the "Great Roof" pitch, which is a classic line that only a three people have freed to this day. Everything that day went pretty cruiser except that we were running low on water and before a haul I forgot to screw on the cap for our last water bottle. Half of it spilled in our bag and we were left with a liter and a half do drink the rest of the day. Major mistake! The rest of the day we were conserving water and parched at best. We summited at midnight with a sip of water left. Our bodies were wrecked and our mental energy was moving at a snails pace. Luckily I saw my old friend Danny Ulman at the summit and he gave us a nice swig of wine and water before our grueling 3hr hike down.
We got back to the base around 4am. Aid climbing is hard and unforgiving. But even with all the tough work it was all worth it. And now we know a little bit better how to push our limits and what our bodies and minds can handle.
3000ft in 3 days. Thats how long it took Kyle and I to climb the The Nose on El Capitan. We packed everything up in our haul bag and started the first day at 1:00pm. This was supposed to be the easy day but we didn't get to the bivy spot at Dolt Tower till midnight. We learned a few things from the first day. One it is HOT during the day! Two we drink way more than we thought. Three climbing in the dark is really cool. And four this rock is really big!
The next day we got a late start. We began climbing around 9am and moved pretty slowly all day. I scored the "King Swing" pitch, which consists of getting lowered 70ft below your belay and swinging from side to side to reach a vertical crack system. I know, it doesn't seem like a difficult thing but when you are 1500ft off the ground and swinging back and forth can be kinda scary. The worst part happened when Kyle was cleaning the route. Kyle had to do whats called a "lower out" so he wouldn't take a huge swing of his own, which consisted of lowering himself slowly off the previous anchor. But once he was half way his rope got stuck. He started to climb back up that rope to fix the stuck rope and as he was going up the rope popped out of the crack he flew through the air bouncing against the rock backwards and upside down. He turned out okay though he had a few cuts and scrapes he was mostly shocked at the giant swing he had just taken. That was it for the excitement of that day though we did stop to watch the sun set over the surrounding mountain tops. We climbed a bit more till 9pm and bivied at Camp IV ledge. My bivy spot was at a sloping angle so I put my feet in the haul bag and set it up so if I slipped at night I would slip into the haul bag.
Nights on the capper (short for captan) are the best parts about being on the wall. Given you never sleep that well on the wall it is the most beautiful thing you'll ever see. Full moon and a clear sky just added to the wonder. The 2000ft of exposure made it just scary enough to get your endorphins up.
The next day we got a late start again even though our plan was to wake up at 6am we did not get up till 8am. Kyle started off the day with the "Great Roof" pitch, which is a classic line that only a three people have freed to this day. Everything that day went pretty cruiser except that we were running low on water and before a haul I forgot to screw on the cap for our last water bottle. Half of it spilled in our bag and we were left with a liter and a half do drink the rest of the day. Major mistake! The rest of the day we were conserving water and parched at best. We summited at midnight with a sip of water left. Our bodies were wrecked and our mental energy was moving at a snails pace. Luckily I saw my old friend Danny Ulman at the summit and he gave us a nice swig of wine and water before our grueling 3hr hike down.
We got back to the base around 4am. Aid climbing is hard and unforgiving. But even with all the tough work it was all worth it. And now we know a little bit better how to push our limits and what our bodies and minds can handle.
