We got into a discussion of the Porcelain Wall in Aaron’s 2007 climbing season thread, but that doesn’t seem like the right place to continue. So, now we have a thread to discuss all things Porcelain, and what it’s like to be that bull in the china shop.

The Porcelain Wall (Half Dome’s little brother) got its name from Harding’s original route, “Porcelain Wall.” In the mid-80s a huge rockfall ripped down the wall, decimating everything in the vicinity of the base. Today, there are seven different routes on the wall, two of which have been repeated. Until 2006, when Aaron, Nick, and Dave each climbed a different line, the wall had never seen a second ascent. It was the wall of no repeats, the wall of obscurity.

Half Dome and the Porcelain Wall from the Valley floor.

Half Dome and the Porcelain Wall from the summit of Washington Column.

The following are the seven routes on the Porcelain Wall, from left to right:
 Luminescent Wall – Walt Shipley and John Barbella, 1987
 Sky is Falling – Eric Kohl and Bryan Law, 1998
 Porcelain Wall – Warren Harding, Steve Bosque, and Dave Lomba, 1971
 When Hell Was in Session – Eric Kohl and Pete Takeda, 1995
 House of Cards – Dave Turner, 2006
 Strange World – Bryan Law and Eric George, 1999
 Sargantana – Silvia Vidal and Pep Massip, 1997

Looking up from the base.

Until recently, there hasn’t been much talk about this prominent, yet obscure wall.

Mungeclimber started a thread about Sky is Falling a little while ago:
http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.html?topic_id=527410

Here’s where we began:

Aaron’s thread:
http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.html?topic_id=540846

Minerals:
Hey, you climbed the Porcelain Wall in 2006, at the same time as Dave and Nick, right? That wall went seven years since the last ascent and there were no second ascents until you guys went up there. Do you know anything about Dave’s route? Have you seen a topo? Where does it start and where does it go? How many holes? What did you think of Strange World? Got any other Porcelain info that you would like to share with us? Nice job up there!

Hey Nick, are you out there? Got any stories for us?

aaronj:
minerals-yeah the porcelain rocked! one of my fav solo experiences, thanks for putting up such a stellar route! strange world was rad, by far the most natural route ive done, only 30 holes on the route and almost every belay had 2-3 bolts. the right or flight was hard but i still coulda chopped one rivet! steep as f*#k and good aid. 9 days on route with tons of storms.
i don't know much about daves route but i know the hole count was less than when hell was in session.
it was awesome to be up there with nick simul soloing right next to me. great wall but i totally botched the descent and ended up on the wrong side of the falls in spring and had to back track and wander around for hours dying of lack of beer and ice cream.

nicolamartinez:
Yo guys, I´ts been I while since I posted here last time... Yeah, we had lot´s of fun on the Porcelain Wall. We went up there once with no gear to check the aproach, Aaron still had his gear on the top of El Cap, he climbed Native Son... Me and Dave started hiking our loads to the base, set up a nice base camp to the right side of the wall... Got all the water we needed from a snow bank and started fixing. Dave´s route, House of Cards, starts by Sargantana... I fixed till pitch 4, Kohl and Takeda´s anchors had just the bolts, no hangers, the first and second pitches were all mossy and wet, the upper pitches on the slab were kinda hard, specially the one before the tree. a bunch os blind beaks a couple of rivets and a huge hook traverse, it didn´t end there, I still had to bust some free moves on a loose flake and trhow a sling on the loose tree, it took me 4 or 5 tries to get the job done, once I climbed up the small tree I had to throw another sling on the stronger tree and hoping not to take a whipper on the slab, that wouldn´t be nice. Dave decided to wait for his friend Matt while Aaron and myself kept moving camp... From the tree above the thing got very steep, I had to climb the tree and get to the first rivet, as the thing got higher my biggest concern was to fall on the tree. The A4 pitch was also scary and higher up I got to this wide, loose, massive and sharp blocks pointing at me and hollow... The A5 pitch was short, about 35 or 40 meters, felt good on it, some loose and flaky rock to get to the bottom of the big roof. A couple of pitches of blank rock and a massive rivet ladder, good job for those drillers, I had a hard time hooking the hangers with the tip of my fingers and on the top step of my aiders. The highlight of the route was the Yellow Planaria feature, got really strong updrafts that day, my ropes were flying over my head and my bags were going all over making things harder... Oh that yellow feature, 60 meters of a big suffer fest. the corner was blind I almost ran out of blades and beaks, I fell on a fixed head 3 moves from the anchor, it was getting dark and I didn´t, I thought I was going for the big ride but an upside down knifeblade, somethimes I thank God I was born lightweight, had to jummar up back to the pice hoping for the thing not to pop, replaced the head and got to the anchor, this one was alright, all the hangers were there, I decided to clean in the dark, forgot my water bottle and had to clean and haul with my mouth dry as f*#k... Got the day off the next day to enjoy the view and my body was really sore. f*#king smashed my finger placing a circle head to get to the big ledge. Got a storm and couldn´t really climb again. The pitch above the ledge started with a big traverse on a big flake nad going up some rivets and a bunch of hooks climbing the "death block" to get to the anchor. Last pitch was just hard topping out, everything was wet. Couldn´t really see much up there, was foggy and snowing. Misse the trail on the descent, Aaron toped out 2 days before I did and the same thing happened to him, I spent 9 hours with a 80lbs bag on my back, I always overload myself, got to the other side of the falls, could see the tourists but couldn´t traverse, was a big epic, but I lived, oh yeah when I got to the bus stop they were not running anymore, had to walk one more mile to Curry and hitchhiketo camp 4. The monkeys sent. Peace you all and sorry if it was too detailed pitch by pitch. Good job for the firs ascenters, that was one oh the hardest things I´ve climbed. Fun though.

http://www.nicolamartinez.blogspot.com
http://www.susannalantz.com RIP 03/18/2008

aaronj:
that was great fun wasnt it nick? we had a supergood hang at the base. the snow melt gave us all our water so that was good. i remember watchig nick try and get to the tree, throwing a cam on a long sling while pimping a layback! i was way gripped watching that! remember when i dumped the ledge after blasting and lost the bong in the bergschrund! the sewer pitch was running with so much water drowning was a concern. i got totally hosed becuz my stuff was on the summit of el cap still after an april solo of native son. i went back to get it right after topping out and the fixed lines were gone! so i tried to do the falls trail but the snow was over my head. no dice. went back up to the east ledges with a borrowed rack and rope to try and climb the east ledges but luckily cedar and renan were fixing it! then i could contiue my shuttle of gear directly from the summy of el cap to the base of the porcelain. i believe it was like a 5 day turnaround!

nicolamartinez:
Nice one Aaron... Thank´s for the add´s on the TR bro, so much to say... That was a sick ascent for all of us... It was epic for Aaron to rescue his bags from the top of el cap, I remember watching you on Native Son from the meadow, you weren´t moving cause of that storm... Remember you got your bags from the top and hiked to the base of the Porcelain to join us, you were psyked and not f*#king around... The ringtale cats were there, The tube of fun. You dropped your device and went all the way down to get it, I´m glad you found. You found Eric Kohls beak with his initials on. Aaron kept falling and screaming like a mofo, the placement didn´t want to stick, but you kept trying and got things done. The huge blocks we dropped from up there, there was one that even hit your haul bag... Lot´s of storms... Hope to simul solo something again, was thinking on going highr up and move camp to half dome. Peace and keep adding memories from the good seasons. N

Aaron, it’s great to hear that you enjoyed Strange World and I really appreciate your nice comments; that makes my day! That route is probably my favorite of all time and the one that I am most proud of. Nice job of soloing it! There was only one rivet on the “Right or Flight” pitch, if I remember correctly… after the string of beaks off of the belay and a dicey hook move. Is that the one? I was probably gripped, hanging on that hook! I always thought that Eric’s (George) pitches were harder. He led the wickedly steep second-to-last pitch with “The Hand” and I was gripped just cleaning it. What did you think of that pitch? “Agent Orange” was my favorite pitch (and probably still is…).

Nick, I just got sucked into your blog website for who knows how long… You’ve got some great photos on there! Sweet shots of your El Cap climbs! And your Porcelain video is awesome! Way cool! I watched it three times and the music is good. Funny to see Clay Wadman’s handwriting (phone number) on the topo… You guys got the topo from “Obscurities”, Chris got the topo from Clay, and Clay got the topo from Eric? Ah, the life of a topo… You did a great job with the video and nice job on getting the second ascent of an ominous route!

“…what you call… steepness…” Classic!!!

Check out Nick’s video here:
http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=16064387

Well, that ought to get us going. I have a bunch of photos of the two routes that we did as well as some text that I wrote a while back, but it’s all in storage. Maybe I can grab it and plug my computer in at another friend’s house this weekend where I get a wireless signal.

For starters, here’s Klaus doing his best Batman impersonation on the second-to-last pitch of Sky is Falling. Note the triangular summit block – the Diving Board.


(Edited post to add more photos)