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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Original Post - Mar 28, 2016 - 11:14am PT
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There are a handful routes done in the Valley during the 80s and 90s, which have always stood out for me.
The Affliction is one of those routes. It's on the north face of Higher Cathedral Rock.
These free climbs haven't received much attention, but I believe they are significant routes of their kind.
Technically difficult challenges for on-sight trad climbing, they'll usually have runouts and/or scary and difficult to protect sections.
I had Scott Cosgrove annotate my topos for five of these routes. I've always been interested in the stories.
He said he had written about some of these climbs.
Here's the MUST READ story of The Affliction, FA Walt Shipley & Scott Cosgrove, July 1990:
http://sierrasplendor.com/2016/02/27/scottcosgrove/
From Don Reid's 1994 Yosemite Climbs, FREE CLIMBS:
Cosgrove's notes:
Four challenging Yosemite routes with Cosgrove annotated topos
Powerpoint, Higher Cathedral Rock
http://www.supertopo.com/climbers-forum/2789272/POWERPOINT-FA-Werner-Braun-Scott-Cosgrove-April-1986
Thin Line, Ribbon Falls Area
http://www.supertopo.com/climbers-forum/2788427/THIN-LINE-FA-Werner-Braun-Scott-Cosgrove-Sept-1986
Ribbon Candy, Ribbon Falls Area
http://www.supertopo.com/climbers-forum/2788451/RIBBON-CANDY-FA-Johnny-Woodward-Scott-Cosgrove-May-1988
Return to the Stone Age, Bridalveil Falls Area
http://www.supertopo.com/climbers-forum/2623375/Return-to-the-Stone-Age
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survival
Big Wall climber
Terrapin Station
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Mar 28, 2016 - 11:49am PT
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TarMan, always coming up with the goods!
Dirty, Scary, Loose....Hmmmm, wait.... here it comes..... AWW HELL NO!!
Too bad both of the FA men are gone. An incredible team.
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StahlBro
Trad climber
San Diego, CA
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Mar 28, 2016 - 11:55am PT
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That was a good read. I always find it fascinating to get a glimpse into the motivations that play out on these difficult, near-death routes, especially when you have the choice. Hearing about climbing on those giant, stacked flakes and loose blocks still gives me the willies.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Mar 28, 2016 - 12:00pm PT
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The North Face of Higher Cathedral Rock is one of the few Valley features I've never touched, but always been interested in. Thanks much, Tarbuster.
If I can get my aiding act together, I still want to do the Pratt/Hennek and/or the Pratt/Kamps/Chouinard line on the North Face, since i have yet to see a topo of it. That - plus the description as continously difficult aid - should provide a high adventure factor.
John
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bluering
Trad climber
Santa Clara, CA
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Mar 28, 2016 - 01:10pm PT
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bold looking route!!
EDIT: JE, I want to get on some Higher Cathedral stuff too. Maybe we should talk....
Not Affliction, but some easier stuff first.
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steveA
Trad climber
Wolfeboro, NH
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Mar 28, 2016 - 01:25pm PT
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Funny how this thread brings back a memory of when I used up "one of my 9 lives".
Back in 1971, I recruited Phil Gleason into exploring this possible line.
I remember leading something like that 1st fist crack, and got pretty pumped on it. Phil thought it was pretty hard too.
My memory really sucks, but I think the following day, I was jumaring up a fixed line that we placed. It was on a real vertical face, and I had failed to inspect the rope fall line carefully enough. While I was jumaring, a rock the size of a cantelope, came wizzing buy, and just brushed my head, opening up a pretty good cut, in my cheek. No helmet--not many wore them back then.
Well, when Phil got up to the anchor, we decided to go down, since I was bleeding pretty bad. We abandoned the route, and never went back. Maybe Phil will chime in to make a comment.
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john hansen
climber
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Mar 28, 2016 - 08:13pm PT
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Good stuff Tarbuster, thanks.
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le_bruce
climber
Oakland, CA
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Mar 28, 2016 - 09:12pm PT
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Four great threads. Thank you, Tarbuster.
It was like kicking a Greyhound bus off the wall.
Yikes. Has the Affliction seen a second ascent?
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Fritz
Trad climber
Choss Creek, ID
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Mar 28, 2016 - 09:20pm PT
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Tarbuster! Dooede! Post some more stories! We've been missing your wit, wisdom, pictures, & prose!
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eeyonkee
Trad climber
Golden, CO
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Mar 29, 2016 - 07:56am PT
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Just read Scott's account of this. Holy crap, what a good yarn! Thanks for coming up with this, Roy.
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eeyonkee
Trad climber
Golden, CO
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Mar 30, 2016 - 05:55pm PT
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Bump.
There's something about this story. It's crazy scary climbing and yet there is this frankness, this everydayness in the story-telling. It reminds me of living in the Valley. I have a bit of a reputation as a bold climber but I feel more like an alternate cast member on the Donna Reed Show compared to Scott and Walt.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 30, 2016 - 06:40pm PT
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I think of we dig a little deeper, we might find that some of Cosgrove's writings exist in one of Largo's recent works about Yosemite?
I'm not sure which book I'd be talking about here. IIRC, something was in the works involving, among other things, Scott's time in the Valley.
Scott said that he had been published four times.
One of them is probably Crazy Eyes, from Alpinist 28. The other is the piece I linked above.
(The excerpts from Crazy Eyes are featured in my thread about Powerpoint)
That still leaves one or two other potential pieces of writing by Scott which I haven't yet found.
I was after Scott to write about these five routes in the Valley, the same ones for which I have annotated topo's from him. Some of it is extant.
Must dig a little deeper!
[edit] and yes Greg, Walt was one wild and crazy guy!
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Mar 30, 2016 - 07:15pm PT
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Has the Affliction seen a second ascent? Yes.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 30, 2016 - 07:39pm PT
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Thanks for that Clint.
Who was on the team I wonder?
Now go and review Scott's annotations to the topo.
I'm curious if the second ascensionists would agree that The Affliction needed bolts where Scott suggested?
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 30, 2016 - 07:55pm PT
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What about that psycho insane route Walt did in the lower Yosemite falls amphitheater?
That thin guillotine flake you have to undercling and run out.
Didn't he do that with Fish?
Way out there and insane lead .......
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Mar 30, 2016 - 08:00pm PT
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^^^ YEAH eeyonkee, well whenever i'd hear Walt talk with ambition, which was always. i felt like i shriveled up to the size of Ellen Degeneres' boy toy.
Man, livin in Canmp4, it's never gotten any better then that, has it? Yhat's why Wearner"s my hero, lucky duck! Maybe more than the love i had for climbing the sunshiny rock, was hangin on rainy days in the center of the universe catchin up, drinkin, smokin, talkin sh#t. And Walt was the loudest!That guy could write too. i remember him writing quite abit actually. Like every night maybe. i wonder what happened to those words? i read alittle. now reading a bunch of Scott's stuff, the flavors are distinct.
i remember rollin into C4 in 92' and Walt had Brad Jarret all hopped up Affliction. so we went up and scouted it out, but then did Brailebook.Ha! Still yummy tho. We were psyched tho to build our worthiness,maybe to approach Higher Cathedral and pluck another of one of her roses. We trained at the cookie, the rostrum, but when we got benighted on the Steck-Salathe', well we both tucked our tails and went back to pounding nails that year. So Affliction remains a dream in my mind..
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 30, 2016 - 08:10pm PT
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Werner asked:
What about that psycho insane route Walt did in the lower Yosemite falls amphitheater?
That's called Dagger, Walt Shipley & Russ Walling, 10/1985
The first ascent information is in Reid's 1994 Yosemite Free Climbs guide.
But I can't find the route in the index or in the topos.
Anyhow, Walt took me over there one day and watched with his typical giddiness and a kind of glee, as Helga and I climbed that thing.
The start is a little sketchy. I got up off the deck a ways and pulled some committing face moves protected by a bolt that was either bad or old or both. IIRC I may have been ground fall while spanning the moves protected by that bolt to get into the crack. Or maybe the ground fall moves were getting to the bolt.
I remember the route being pretty cool overall.
The crack itself, behind the flake, is burly but actually really good!
I think we were calling the route 5.11b.
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Alexey
climber
San Jose, CA
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Mar 30, 2016 - 08:15pm PT
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there is nothing insane about Dagger. It is very good and well protected quality route.
here is Russ story about the first assent on MP
By Russ Walling
From: www.FishProducts.com
Sep 20, 2007
rating: 5.10+
FA: Russ Walling & Walt Shipley, 1983?
FA story: We go over to do the Dagger.... Listed in the yellow Myers Guide as 10+, FA: Donny Reid and Rick Cashner. Walt goes up a ways and there is a terrible rusted bolt. (I recall only one bolt on the pitch.) He comes down. I go and climb past the bolt and do the rest of the pitch to what is a logical stopping point, and set a fairly ok gear anchor. I thought the pitch was pretty cool and burly. Walt comes up and I decide I want to do a/the second pitch. I struggle up a dirty shallow box via some Gaston moves and decide I either just don't have it, or don't have the gear to protect it.... so we decide to rap. Since there is no anchor there, I lob in a stopper to leave. Walt decides that we don't need to leave any wireds, and slots a webbing knot in a small V slot..... I rap clipped into the webbing as a test with the nuts backing it up. Since it held, Walt removes the nuts and just raps on the webbing knot! Sketch!
Now, we go back to the Deli to refresh and Donny Reid is there... we ask him, "hey, how about that Dagger!" He looks at like, "Dagger....?" We tell him what we just did and how he and Rick did the FA. He laughs and says they never got around to doing it....! The guide book or something was coming out and being pressed for time, they just walked on by, reported it as done, and intended to come back and do it some other time. Unfinished gem!
https://www.mountainproject.com/v/dagger/106029002
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 30, 2016 - 08:25pm PT
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If you look at the Mountain Project description for Dagger, it lists 2 bolts at the start.
I only remember one bolt, and as Russ said, rusty.
With two good bolts, the lead would be much less dicey.
I would buy 10+/11-
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