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Living Up to My Handle: A TR by blyslv
A climber's first visit to Yosemite is always a special thing - how could it not be? Mine was no different, a plateau shattering four day crack fest with undertones of slab. I had hooked up with Karl Baba because I wanted to learn, to improve, and not waste any time wandering (although that is generally one of the charms of climbing).
So I met Karl, he sized me up and off we went to the Pee Pee Pillar. Woo-hoo, my first Yosemite crack! He led the right side, then we top-roped the left side. This was a good plan, because by now The Central Pillar of Frenzy was open, so we were able to jump on the first two pitches of that. Every 5 feet or so there was a nickel or dime sized spot of dried blood, reminding me to think about my jam placements to avoid the scabby syndrome. Now I'm not the world's strongest climber, but I actually managed these all with out any falls. Maybe Valley climbing is my kind of climbing.
Karl B wanted to check out Bishop's Terrace, to see if Karluu was there and to finalize their arrangement for the next day. While there we jumped on the climb, watched Karluu play with his new Soloist, then decided to declare victory and end the day feeling very, very good.
Contrary to Whymper's assement of guides being 'great consumers of meat and drink' Karl Baba is mostly vegetarian and a virtual teetotaler. This creates a reasonable expectation that a 6-pack will last more then one night. I crashed in the trailer, awoken only by a bear wandering through.
Saturday was one of those days where self-conceptions were shucked off like a wet beer label in the hands of a horny teenager. 'I'm not a crack climber, I can't follow 5.10, wah, wah - wah wah wah.' Sometimes my internal dialog sounds like Charlie Brown's teacher. But I ignored it. What choice did I have? This wasn't a safety thing, just a question of my own confidence. Karluu wanted to lead his first Valley 10a and I was privileged to follow. He wrote about it in his laconic TR 'A Gymbie meets Serenity Crack.' It was truly a day of breakthroughs. Insert toe, torque - just enough, but not too much - pinch the pin scar, step up and repeat as necessary. Hand jams and even one fist jam were thrown in. I blew the sequence halfway through the first pitch and fell. But I got to the anchors in relatively short order. The next pitch I cruised, with a big smile. On the 10d final pitch I learned that I have a lot more to learn about locking off.
Karluu's smile and his sense of accomplishment at the top were wonderful to behold. For no good reason, we all affected the accent of a Brahmin speaking English. I thought that this might be a good opportunity to mention I was looking for an IT project manger or sales position in the Bay Area, but he is an engineer, (which may partly explain his economy with words) and was looking for highly technical types. He had to get back to his family, so Karl Baba and I got slab happy on Maxine's Wall (10a) and Fire Fingers (10c) which are right next to Serenity Crack. I learned the difference between various letter grades when I cleared the first and hung twice on the latter. We finished with a rip-snorting good time on Peruvian Flake (10a). For the rest of the evening I would occasionally break out into a huge grin and say something profound like 'wow'. Every single pitch was absolutely stellar from the first move to the last.
Sunday the mercury was rising so we adjusted altitude by going to Tuolumne Meadows. We jumped on Crescent Arch (9) a five pitch route. I remember thinking that the first pitch looked very easy, but it made you think and actually piece together some sequences. But the meat of the route were the next 3 pitches. Nothing harder then 5.9, but nothing easier either. The opening mantle, the liebacks, the half face/half jam moves in the dihedral had my hands shaking after I finally clipped in. It was strenuous, but my smile muscles also had a good workout. There's a nice ledge at the top of pitch three where we could just sit for a while and watch the sun go by. I don't think it will take me too long to get used to climbing in California, it can be a lot more relaxed then a typical day in the Sandias of New Mexico.
Up to this point I had been the belay slave. Conventional wisdom holds that one should follow lots of leads above one's normal climbing abilities to get better, but one must also jump on the sharp end. So my last day we went to Fresno Dome. I led two pitches of 5.7 face climbing with no problem. The last climb, Looking Glass was a 3 pitch 5.7 dihedral. With the 70 meter rope we were using I figured we could do it in two pitches.
The guidebook shows an arrow straight line, with scant detail. The climb itself, at least the first ~180 feet is a broken series of smaller, indistinct dihedrals one right next to the other, offering plenty of route-finding challenge. I went here, I went there. Baba got all Socratic on me - 'Do you think <that> crack leads anywhere …?' I used all the tricks in an intermediate leader's small bag of tricks
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