My Leap into Fame

Why not stop for a selfie?

I became famous in Yosemite Valley during my last climbing trip. Not for climbing 5.15, freeing an old aid route, or performing some epic solo. I did something unbelievable, but not quite impressive or inspiring.

On our third day of climbing the Salathe Wall on El Capitan things were going quite well. Andy and I were in good form for climbing, had our hauling system down, and had the right amount of food, water, and gear to make an honest bid for the summit. Andy had volunteered me to lead the notorious Hollow Flake pitch, and I was happy to punch the hero card and act as rope gun. After climbing to a fixed piton, I lowered and swung into the flake. Over a thousand feet off the ground, I did my best to wedge myself into the crack and begin working my way up. The term I would use to describe my movement is "udging", very physical, awkward, and slow. To minimize rope drag and make it easier to clean, this entire pitch is done without leaving any protection behind. This means a fall would by very big. I carried a #6 cam with me and pushed it up the crack as I progressed, which provided something to pull on as I "udged" my way up the flake. I battled my way inch-by-inch, up the crack until the tipped out #6 Cam no longer fit in the widening crack, and I would have to run out the last 25 feet to the anchor. Frustrated by the mass of cams getting in my way, I decided to reorganize for the last push to the anchor. I pulled the gear sling off my shoulder, clipped it to a sling on my belay loop and let go. The gear went taught on the sling for a fraction of a second, and then it continued to fall. The sound of over 20 cams dropping into the hollow flake was the realization of one of my greatest fears. I yelled, "ROCK" followed with, "that was the rack." I had just thrown a couple thousand dollars worth of equipment, and my chances of accomplishing a major life goal into the belly of El Capitan. Not only that, I was still unprotected for an entire rope length and 25 feet from an anchor. I wanted to throw up, I wanted to cry, I wanted the gear back, but I needed to finish the pitch before I could do any of those things. I fought back the feeling of devastation, and tried to focus on climbing. Beaten, sweaty, and afraid, I "udged" up the chimney, pulled myself over the top and clipped into the anchor. At that moment, the weight of what had just happened, settled on me like an elephant sitting on my chest. I fixed the rope so that Andy could ascend the line to me, and began pulling up the haul bag. I went through these motions, but my mind was a million miles away. All I could think about was the sound of equipment disappearing into the crack, and how I could have let this happen.

Even as I write this, three weeks later, I am sick with grief. I spent hours fishing with ropes and hooks trying to recover the equipment, but the chasm seemed to extend to the center of the earth. Andy, waited on the ledge, certain that our trip was over, dreams smashed, and defeated by El Cap (again). As I lowered and pulled up hundreds of feet of rope, I knew the equipment was gone but a glimmer of hope began to form. Maybe, between the two of us, we could scrape together enough gear back at camp to finish the route. I gave up fishing, got back to the ledge, and told Andy my plan. We would leave our equipment, fix ropes down to heart ledges, and rappel fixed lines to the ground. Without any of the specialty offset cams, and micro stoppers, it would be hard to climb the route, but not impossible. We agreed to not give up just yet. We spent the afternoon descending, and after returning to the car, we immediately took stock of what we had. What we lacked in micro stoppers, and offset cams we would make up for with aid climbing shenanigans and stubbornness.

A quick stop at Sentinel Beach to jump in the Merced River provided some relief from the stress of the day, and allowed us to wash the aluminum oxide off our raw and swollen hands. A massive pizza in Curry Village helped to fill the hollow feeling in my gut, and then we prepared to get back on the Salathe early the next morning. By the time we were finished packing, it seemed like everyone knew what had happened, and thus began my rise to fame as "that guy who dropped the entire rack into the Hollow Flake". I was not ready to laugh about it, yet, so it was mostly embarrassing. Going back up there, with a minimal rack, helped me keep a shred of dignity, but the days ahead would prove a hard row to hoe.

View from above El Cap Spire

Day 4 was a big day. We ascended back to our high point (over 1,000) feet in about 2 hrs. Then we had 7 pitches of free climbing to reach a bivy at El Cap Spire. Besides the 90+ degree weather, everything went really smoothly, and by the early evening, we were cooking up dinner on a spacious ledge and watching the sunset on Yosemite Valley. We did not wake up before dawn, and did not beat the British team to start climbing, so we ended up waiting till 9:00 before we could start climbing. This wasn't a big deal except that we had 10 pitches and a lot of aid climbing to reach the next decent bivy ledge. The free climbing right off the ledge was amazing, and we moved quickly all morning. Then, we got to Andy's lead on some tricky aid climbing, and things slowed down a bit. At one point on pitch 26, Andy reached a spot where it was not clear how to traverse over to another crack system, and the topo recommended cam hooks or micro nuts (two things we didn't have). After taking a fall on a bashie (literally a piece of metal hammered onto the rock that looks like chewing gum), he asked me to give it a try and returned to the belay. I found a very sketchy nut placement, and mustered the courage to make some free moves over a ledge and finish the pitch. Andy managed to salvage his block by leading the next aid pitch, but we were starting to run out of daylight. Now, reaching the headwall, I needed to navigate the hardest pitches, with marginal gear, and waning light. I made many moves off gear that did not match the manufacturers recommendations. Very rarely did I have all cam lobes in contact with the rock, and the need for efficiency demanded some extreme run outs. Just before midnight I pulled a few free moves and arrived at Long Ledge, where we would spend our last night on the wall. I fixed the rope for Andy to ascend, hauled up the bag, and collapsed on the 2'x10' ledge that would be home for the night.

Andy peering 3,000 ft down from Long Ledge

We were visited and photographed by climbers rappelling down from the top the next morning, and as much as we enjoyed our little home, we were ready to finish the climb. I took the lead for the last 4 pitches including a really hard aid crux (I used a couple fingers in a hole where a bat hook would have made life easy) and a phenomenal hand crack that I freed with some significant effort. In the early afternoon, we reached the top, ate the rest of our food, drank the rest of our water, and packed up for the descent. Being the one without chronic knee problems, I took the haul bag, a rope, and a surprising amount of trash, and began the journey down to the east ledges. The bag probably weighed less than 60 pounds, but it was still a challenge to negotiate the downclimbs. We made it to the rappels without incident, and continued down to the parking lot where we were greeted by our friend Leah, and some curious tourists. Leah managed to charm some Koreans into sharing Kim Chi with us, and we swapped stories about pooping, being angry at our partners, and how El Cap always humbles us. With hips raw and chaffed from hauling, kidneys aching from hanging belays, and the still sensitive subject of the lost gear, we took some hard earned rest, and spent the next couple days not climbing. The words of Warren Harding after his first ascent of El Cap are quite relevant to our experience. He said, "It was not at all clear to me who was conqueror and who was conquered. I do recall that El Cap seemed to be in much better condition than I was." This sums up the experience quite well, yet, for some reason I can't wait to go back for more. There was more climbing, more evidence of being conquered, and some pretty spectacular moments up on the granite faces of Yosemite Valley. For now, those stories will have to wait. Thank you for reading, and feel free to contact me to share stories, donate cams, or offer suggestions on how not to lose gear. Signing off as the now famous, Calvin "the guy who dropped the rack" Laatsch

Cheers

On the top of El Capitan, with Half Dome beckoning to be climbed in the distance