SFOTCIAD

My bigwall and aid history is a bit colorful with the spectrum mostly dominated by a lot of slow with a dash of consistent failure. This year, I decided there is no excuse to live this close to The Valley and not be a little more dialed. So it's with puffy chested bravado that I decided 2015 would be the year of bigwalling...and then I proceeded to do a bunch of skiing, alpine climbing, rock climbing, ice climbing, cycling and just about everything BUT bigwalling... Not to be deterred, as one ski trip was canceled, one bigwall climb was planned. Due to my incredibly consistent track record, I was certain that the only reasonable objective was the easiest climb I could find. Of course it still needed to be a "bigwall," even if only just...There was but one option: The South Face of Washington Column V C1 5.8.

I've always found it a striking piece of rock. Here is North Dome and Washington Column. Our line is basically just left of the sun/shadow boundary.
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-Q...o/IMG_3114.JPG



I've been looking forward to getting back on this one for the last few years after a spectacular failure-to-launch on day 2 of my first attempt.

We decided the best way to avoid that problem on this attempt was to finish in a day!

The alarm was set for 3:15am

Breakfast was enjoyed, walking to the base from Upper Pines started at 4:15.

Climbing began at 5am!

Pitch 1
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-K...o/IMG_2801.JPG

We mostly free'd the first 3 pitches.

Looking up pitch 2
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-8...o/IMG_2818.JPG

Looking up pitch 3
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-1...o/IMG_2836.JPG

nice views of half dome from the route

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-5...o/IMG_2828.JPG

There was one other in-a-day party in front of us. When we arrived at dinner ledge we found quite the crowd. Irish Jane and her partner were kicking around practicing some A2+, a couple friends of theirs were there just to chill, one party got started up the route early and another party slipped in front of us behind the other in-a-day party. Our fellow in-a-day'ers had gained a bit of a lead on us by employing short fixing and generally being fast... So I think that means there were at least 8 people on dinner ledge the night before. Cozy...

Dinner Ledge with a great photo bomb from Irish Jane:
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-a...o/IMG_2839.JPG

Looking down on dinner ledge from the Kor Roof:
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-l...o/IMG_2869.JPG

The follower of the party now in front of us sorting out the Kor Roof. After cleaning this pitch, they decided they had received enough punishment and went down. This meant we had a clear shot to the top as the other parties were now far ahead. GO TIME!:
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-r...o/IMG_2850.JPG

Irish Jane getting ready for a long stint at a hanging belay:
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-Y...o/IMG_2861.JPG

Starting up pitch 5:
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-d...o/IMG_2930.JPG

Executing the pendulum on pitch 5:
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-Y...o/IMG_2960.JPG

Irish Jane's partner learning aid on pitch 5 of southern man (now that's jumping in the deep end!):
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-E...o/IMG_3014.JPG

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-2...o/IMG_3064.JPG

Half Dome
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-2...o/IMG_3094.JPG

Looking down pitch 7
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-m...o/IMG_3089.JPG

Look up pitch 8
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-N...o/IMG_3090.JPG

Pitches 9, 10 and 11 passed with only two things of note: 1) I kicked my partner in the mouth (SORRY!!!!) and 2) the last pitch isn't as horribly loose and sandy as it is made out to be.

Oh, and somewhere in there we ran out of water.

Summit! 8:35pm after 15.5 hours of climbing.
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-N...o/IMG_3111.JPG

Now we had a decision to make: Rappel the route or do the north dome gully descent. I had never done either but supertopo says dont do the gully at night. Sorry Chris, but I had been thinking about this one all day and my gut was saying north dome gully.

Honestly, the north dome gully was a great way to descend. I definitely understand someone new to climbing and mountains in general having a difficult time. However, if you've done your share of sketchy 4th class sierra descents, this will be right in line with your experience base. Of course, this is without a haul bag which was one of my primary motivators for giving the gully a go.

Although it was fortunately well under 80deg all day, having had only 3.5 liters between us on a south face in the sun, we became quite thirsty on the way down. We passed several small trickles but none of them were really drinkable...Then we hit the mother load:
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-v...o/IMG_3112.JPG

Crystal clear, cool, refreshing goodness. THAT was awesome.

Just after 11pm, almost 19 hours after starting, we rolled back into camp, drank water, cracked a beer, ate a power bar and caught some much anticipated rest. It's official, I need to climb more big walls!

Phfft, if you ain't doin' the Dawn Wall you ain't doin'shit.;-)


Well done, that is a big day for anybody who hasn't done a lot of big walls (and that includes me). Biggest day I ever did was Royal Arches, but I have always looked at WC with longing.

As I recall the problem with the gully at night is it is easy to make a wrong turn and cliff out. Glad you found the route. We had a similar water experience after doing the Lost Arrow. Even the scummiest trickle is wonderful when that thirsty.

thanks for the story and pics. Looks like an awesome day.

phfft, Dawn Wall is for new school punks who aren't man enough to take their time, carry a bunch of heavy metal and top out thirsty! :FIREdevil

I had a very similar experience on Royal Arches. Started early, topped out at dusk. Except we rapped.

If you take a wrong turn on the descent, you're straight off a cliff. It's basically a traverse to the trees on the other side of the gully and then down steep, sandy kinda-trail. I think the best advice is if you feel like rapping, you just took a step in the wrong direction.

Yeah, the fact that I turned my nose up to the kinda nasty puddle indicated to me I wasn't THAT thirsty...

Single-handedly upping the game in the new TGR climbing forum. Nice work.

I pulled out my rack the other day to let the kids play with it and make sure it still exists. ;)

Did you make a movie? Californians always make a movie.

that is hudge.