Aquarian Wall- Trip Report June/July 2009

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tadhunt

Trad climber

Sunnyvale, CA

Sep 21, 2009 - 01:02pm PT

bump for a great TR and pics!

Peyton Hassinger

Big Wall climber

Raleigh, NC

Topic Author's Reply - Sep 21, 2009 - 01:24pm PT

i put it up on the route beta page

Lambone

Ice climber

Ashland, Or

Sep 21, 2009 - 01:28pm PT

Nice job,

so I am curious, it still counts as a clean ascent because your head didn't stick?

nice climb!

Dirka

Trad climber

Sep 21, 2009 - 01:41pm PT

Bump for You.

Footloose

Trad climber

Lake Tahoe

Sep 21, 2009 - 02:04pm PT

Right on!

So would you have had to bail, do you think, without happening across that sweet water cache?

Anyways, great accomplishment, Peyton!

Russ Walling

Gym climber

Poofter's Froth, Wyoming

Sep 21, 2009 - 02:06pm PT

Good stuff!

Gunkie

climber

East Coast US

Sep 21, 2009 - 02:39pm PT

Way cool and thanks for posting.

A wall partner of mine had an ant crawl into his ear in the valley and had to go to the medical clinic to get the thing out. He said it was the worst feeling he has ever had.

You're from NC and I have a question: I just spent two weeks on business in the Smokey's, near Highlands/Whitesides. Does it ever stop raining? It rained every day for the past two weeks.

Post more pix, if you have them.

bluering

Trad climber

Santa Clara, Ca.

Sep 21, 2009 - 02:45pm PT

Nice job!!!

Mungeclimber

Trad climber

sorry, just posting out loud.

Sep 21, 2009 - 04:53pm PT

more pics please

Stanley Hassinger

climber

Eastern US

Sep 21, 2009 - 06:49pm PT

Pman - everyone clearly wants more pictures. If you would, please do throw us a bone.

And I'm sure everyone (me included) would love to hear the details of the bolt-breaking incident. I still haven't heard that story!

Do tell.

Stanley

Peyton Hassinger

Big Wall climber

Raleigh, NC

Topic Author's Reply - Sep 21, 2009 - 09:48pm PT

Answering a few people's questions at once:

No I guess that technically it doesn't count as a free ascent since i tried to place a head that pulled out. I don't think it really matters what you call it, but the point is that there shouldn't be too much nailing on this route in the future. If you bring offset aliens and are willing to engage in some creative, albeit difficult, climbing, you can do this without nailing. There are, however, a few fixed heads and maybe 2 fixed pins that are required and would have to be replaced if they pulled. I would suggest future parties bring 5-10 heads and a handful of pins just in case.

I've never bailed on an el cap route before despite running out of food and water, so I would have continued even if I didn't find the sweet water cache. I could have gotten by on a bit less, I just would have been light-headed and tired all day.

Yes, having an ant in your ear is freaking psychotic. I slept with tissue paper ear plugs for the rest of the route!

Yes, it does stop raining in NC and the climbing there is actually pretty awesome. Looking glass is like a mini el cap with 7-9 pitch routes, many of which are pretty stout. I'm actually in school in minnesota now so I haven't experienced a NC summer in a while.

The bolt/dowel breaking incident at pitch 17 was pretty scary. I had the bad-looking bolts backed up to the 4" crack about 8 feet down and to the right. The problem was that hauling from that crack would have been a pain (would have had to extend all the way up and over the big block). So I figured I'd just haul off the bad bolts and avoid complete demise by backing them up to a #4 camalot. I made the anchor, rapped down, lowered out my bags, cleaned the pitch, then started to haul. As soon as I leaned back, the better of the two bolts broke and loaded the other one (I equalized them with a shoulder length sling). I immediately unclipped from the whole system (it was a big ledge) and began backing up with more cams (4 total, I think). The problem was that the haul was already loading the one crappy bolt/dowel, so I had to keep on hauling off of it. Every time I leaned back I was just waiting for it to break and shock load the cams. Unpleasant. It also gave me a huge blood blister from pulling up on the haul line to keep from having to lean on the anchor so hard (I don't wear gloves, but at that moment I was wishing I did).

I'll work on more pictures later, but I actually didn't take much more. All of them are ledge pictures because I was too tired during the day to get the camera out.