As a warmup on the first day Nick and I climbed Birdland (5.7+). We all hiked in the relatively short approach together. Before we started the climb, I actually had the opportunity to try out a new wag bag, the Restop 2, which worked out great. Highly recommended. Nick and I climbed Birdland pretty quickly. I don't remember much about this route, other than that we had a fun time on it.
The next day we got up at 3 AM to give us enough time to eat breakfast and hike in to Epinephrine (5.9). Despite our early start, I don't think we got to the parking area until around 4:30 AM. The "road" to the parking area was rougher than I had expected. At one point I actually drove off the road and didn't realize my mistake for 20 yards or so. By then I had completely scraped the right side of our rental vehicle on a cactus. After doing a 10-point turn to head back the other way, I of course succeeded in scraping up the left side of the car on the same cactus. Go figure. When we reached the parking area, I could see huge, long scratches all the way down the sides of the car. With the auspicious beginning, we set off down the approach trail.
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| Nick starts up the very first moves of Epinephrine |
The approach turned out to be a bit tough in the dark. Yes, in the end it was relatively straightforward, but several times we wondered if we were supposed to continue up the wash, or whether we should leave the ditch for higher ground. I'm quite sure we didn't end up taking the easiest route, but we did find the climb finally. I had trouble seeing the lines of bolts up the face that should have been a clear signpost in daylight. It turns out we weren't the first party on the route, anyway. When we got there, another two guys had already started up the easy start beginning line a few minutes ahead of us. Soon another group of two arrived behind us. Uh oh. The last thing I wanted was to feel rushed on this challenging adventure, but that's exactly what ended up happening. Nick started up the climb at 6 AM, and at the top of the ledge, he and I waited for the party ahead of us to finish the first pitch. We had a good bit of time to converse with the other two behind us, too. They were clearly more experienced.
It must have been 15 minutes or so when one of the climbers ahead dropped a rope and rappelled down. What was going on? He informed us that his partner had developed a blister, and that they would not be able to continue on. He was shortly joined by this partner, and the two of them returned to the ground. All I can say is that, if a simple blister stopped them that early into the adventure, I hate to think how they would have responded had they made it to the chimneys. Nevertheless, their misfortune was our gain, because it cleared the route up for us as the party in front.
Nick again led the first pitch. I followed and immediately got off route onto some tough face climbing to the right. I was supposed to head left into a more straightforward crack, but Nick had run the rope out so far that there was not protection holding it in place over there, and I had followed the rope instead of my instincts. I downclimbed a bit, breaking a hold off in the process, and made my way back onto the main line. The climbing was especially difficult for me at this point, because I had a pack filled with 4 liters of water and a 70 m rope on my back. Nick also led the 2nd pitch.
The 3rd pitch was where the fun started. We had originally planned for me to lead the 1st and 3rd chimneys (P3 and P5?), but after climbing the first one, Nick announced that he didn't want to lead any of them. He was really struggling with the heavy pack on his back. We were using double ropes at this point, so at least that he didn't have a rope on his back, too, but the 4 liters of water and extra gear were really holding him down. In the end I led every one of the hard chimney pitches. The 2nd one in particular really scared me. The last one I climbed the face on the left, which probably had about three bolts, but these were very widely spaced. Luckily it was easier climbing at that point. I was definitely afraid in these chimneys. Yes, there was generally good gear in the crack at the back, but it was a lot of really sustained climbing, and I got very tired. The slick nature of the rock walls often led to my feet slipping off from the faces just when I thought I had settled into a good chimney position. Overall, I think we would have been more comfortable on the climb if we had been better prepared. I was unhappy with our management of the two ropes, and I felt that we had brought too much gear in a single pack. I would have preferred to do the climbing with a single rope, trailing a much thinner line for us to use if we wanted to rappel. And I think that we could have divided the gear between the two of us in smaller packs.
At last we reached the top of the chimney pitches. From this point on we generally swung leads. Near the top, my arms were getting so tired that I struggled to even haul the extra slack up after reaching a belay. But the climbing became progressively easier, and it was generally good crack and face climbing now, not chimneys. That made it seem so much more casual. After the final pitch of real climbing, Nick pulled in a good bit of slack into a coil, and we simul-climbed the last few hundred feet. This was easy climbing, but it still took some time. The final traverse was casual and yet exciting. I reached the end of it, pulled a few easy moves, and arrived at the lone pine tree.
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| Looking down at Nick beginning the final traverse |
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| Finishing up the final traverse, with the famous pine tree in the background |
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| A selfie from the top. Yay!!! |
I realized at the top that I hadn't taken a single picture between the first moves of the climb and the final traverse. I had just been too scared and tired to think about taking my phone out of my pocket for photographs. But I had least had the photo to prove that we made it the whole way!
The descent also took a good while. We started in daylight around 6 PM, but we had to put on our headlamps after a half hour or so. The trip back to the car was almost as big an adventure as the climb up the wall had been. I was giving thanks over and over again to the many previous adventurers who had left cairn after cairn for us to follow on the descent. Maybe it wouldn't have been so unnerving in the daylight, but both Nick and I really wanted to get back to the car that night, and we didn't want to get off-route on the hike down. We finally got there about 8 PM, where John was waiting for us after a relaxing day of hiking around in the canyon. Would I do it again? I'm not sure, but I'm sure glad I did it at least once.
