I'm quite the lucky kid, but I like to think some of my good fortune stems from hard work, thoughtful decisions and good attitude. One of my top ski partners Mike Dahlquist lives down in Oakland and seems to make weekly pilgrimages to the sanctuary of Yosemite Valley. I managed to find the time between classes and "life logistics" to fly down for a weekend, leaving Friday afternoon and arriving back in Seattle Monday morning at 8:30am just in time for class! Yosemite was spectacular! A trip I will remember perhaps the rest of my life. It puts a lot of things into perspective, made me think about the trajectory of my life and whats important! I came home with a renewed stoke for life and climbing. A huge thanks to Mike for making the trip possible and being somebody for me to look up to! NOW HERE IS THE STORY!
Seated in the passenger seat of Mike's maroon
SUV I stared up in awe through the sun roof as we drove through The Valley, massive rock walls exploded from
the valley floor and soared endlessly into the blue abyss of the sky. These
legendary faces scared me and captivated me, I had never felt as small or
insignificant. Part of me wanted to escape but another part of me was here to
satisfy curiosity. I was a decent rock climber back at home, I had some big
climbs under my belt but this was Yosemite. The birthplace of rock
climbing in the States, a place where climbing evolved and grew, the greatest
climbers who ever lived perfected their craft on these walls hundreds of feet
above this valley floor. Climbers from around the world come to Yosemite to become
the climbers they want to be. Myself included.
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| "The Captain" -Mike |
My first day in the valley Mike suggested we climb the Arrowhead Arete which featured fun and interesting 5.8 climbing with a pleasant alpine feel. This seemed like something I could handle so off we went crashing through the steep and scrambly underbrush to the base of the Arete!
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| Looking up at the Arete |
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| Mike following Pitch 1 of Arrowhead Arete |
I linked the first two pitches to a decent belay off a fixed pin, alien cam and a nut. Mike followed up and took the next pitch pulling easily over the sole 5.9 move on the route. I climbed up to Mike into the sun and into the looming presence of Half Dome across the valley
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| Half Dome! |
As we climbed higher and higher Mike pointed out the dozens of famous climbs and rock faces. Before long I was heading out across the ultra exposed knife edge ridge at the top of the Arete.
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| Mike at a cozy belay |
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| Mike following on the rad knife edge ridge |
Our descent down the massive descent gully was full of the typical shenanigans. We rappelled into trees, tip-toed down loose gravel and boulders hoping we wouldn't trigger a huge land slide. The cliffs above us attempted to crush our skulls with rock missiles, we managed to dodge them with ninja like agility. Not really, we ran around in panic.
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| Descent gully |
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| Epic Yosemite sunset |
My second day in The Valley groggily began with cinnamon rolls and the last of our coffee, we made some sandwiches for lunch and then headed off for the Regular route on Higher Cathedral Spire! We arrived at the trailhead just after another pair of climbers so we went into high gear to hopefully beat them to the base of our intended route, just in case they had the same idea. Within minutes we had our bags packed an were charging up hill with the steep faces of the Cathedral rocks and Spires looming above. Sure enough we were the first climbers to the base of the route!
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| The spire from below |
Mike led the easy first pitch in fine style and handed over the reins to me for the second pitch. Things got interesting, the route had multiple variations for the second pitch, one variation included a "powerful traverse move" and the other included a harder direct "steep finger crack". True to my usual self I opted for the harder finger crack, it was harder 5.10ish and went straight up over a roof, both good reasons to give it a go. I won't lie, it was hard and I whipped hard! But it was awesome! Everything worked just right and made for a clean fall, my second try I crushed it, pulling hard over the small roof which seemed to have no feet to a decent hand jam.
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| The Cathedrals from across the valley |
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| Mike following one of the coolest 5.9 pitches i've ever climbed! |
The Regular route on Higher cathedral spire is 5 pitches with 4 pitches of sustained 5.9 climbing with all sorts of different climbing! Steep with positive holds, chimneys, hand cracks, finger cracks and a freaking sweet summit! To top it off the incredible faces of Higher Cathedral Rock and El Capitan are in your face the whole climb!
