Soul Garden-New Route on Mt Watkins FFA:Leary,Haden,Carter

Soul Garden..."Right now your grief is this giant gaping hole with sharp edges but as you move forward in life the edges soften and other beautiful things start to grow around it. Flowers and trees of experiences. The hole never goes away, but it becomes gentler and sort of a garden in your soul, a place you can visit when you want to be near your love." these are the words that Sean Leary wrote to comfort a friend who, like Sean, had lost the love of their lives.

Now Sean is gone, and the hole in my heart is still sharp and jagged. But before Sean left us he gave me a seed for my soul garden to begin growing.
Sean began working on a free climb on the south face of Mt. Watkins in the summer of 2012. By the end of the summer he had made it halfway down the wall and was convinced it would go free. He asked me to come check it out that fall, and I spent two days, totally blown away, climbing amazing splitters that just kept going on and on! The seed was planted!
The following April Sean and I started working out the lower half of the route. The climbing was fantastic, but more memorable for me was the fun times camping next to the river, eating gourmet steak burritos, and washing it down with "Jack O Max" . Yes thats right, Jack Daniels and Cytomax... your head might hurt a little the next day but your muscles will feel great!

Once the road to Tuolumne opened we began working on the upper half of the wall and crux of the route. We maintained our high level of indulgence by climbing five star splitters by day and Fun times at night! We spent about 20 days all together on the route figuring out climbing and protection for the endless 5.12 pitches and the mid 5.13 crux. We were getting real close!

Then I got the call that Sean was missing in Zion. I wasn't surprised. The relatively new "sport" of base jumping was claiming lives weekly and Sean was at the forefront.

While trying to process the loss of my best friend and climbing partner my resolve to complete the route only grew. I was lucky that my good friend Seth Carter had the ability, time, and psych to help me complete Sean's vision. Seth and I spent 6 days working on the route and stocking supplies for camping on the wall. We, of course, continued the tradition of fun days on the wall and great times camping. Seth, being the" Granite Ninja" that he is, didn't need much time to get things figured out. We were ready!
We started climbing from the ground on June 25th and topped out on June 30th. It was an amazing adventure complete with a soaking rain storm and ensuing heat wave. The highs and lows, the cussing and woohoos, and the crazy emotions we felt on route deserve their own page.

I had completed my most challenging and certainly most meaningful climb to date.But most important was that I had realized Sean's vision and planted the first seed in my Soul Garden.

Soul Garden (VI 5.13b) FFA Sean Leary, Jimmy Haden, Seth Carter