Climbing the Washington Column

It was the type of anxiety where you’re trying to make yourself throw up. Deep in your stomach, you feel this heavy lead ball, spewing toxins into your body, weighing you down. You feel like you want to throw up, get rid of this anxiety inducing ball as fast you can. I knew there wasn’t much I could do, I had to ignore this feeling the best I could. I had two more days until I would start my climb on the Washington Column—my first big wall.

With one month left in the year, I was eager to add a big wall to my 2021 accomplishments. About a year ago, I led my first multi-pitch on gear, a measly 5.4 hike, and I thought a big wall was the best way to show my improvement. Going into the climb, I knew there would be many unknown variables and situations we’d have to get out of, but didn’t know what to expect. Big wall climbing requires a unique set of skills and shenanigan-pulling. Namely, big walling requires the frequent use of aid climbing. If free climbing is a gymnastic dance up a wall, pulling on thin ledges and contorting your hands to fit in odd shaped cracks, aid climbing is an art: thinking creatively of how to do whatever it takes to get up as quickly as you can, usually by pulling on pieces of gear. However, I had never aid climbed before in my life.

The First Attempt (December 3 - 5)

The climb was a scheme between my buddy Jake and me. After I turned in a final at school and he got off work, we drove off to the valley, arriving there late Friday night. We hiked our way into the base of the climb, finding a spot to bivy.

It was the first weekend of December, but you could easily mistake it for a summer day. No clouds, no snow, and warm temperatures; everything was primed for our send. Being our first big wall, we were quite clumsy. We started the day following a party up the wrong route, having to descend and start from square one. However, we got more efficient as the day went on. Our plan was to get to Dinner ledge for our first camp—a massive ledge that sleeps around 5 people—and fix the pitches above it.

I led the pitch up to the ledge. As I got up, I saw one guy going down. He was the archetypal Yosemite hardman. He lit a cigarette, casually slung his haul bag over his shoulder like it was a sack of potatoes (it must have weighed at least 50 pound). He walked over to the rapel station which entailed being just a few inches away from a fall that was a few hundred feet, he was, to say the least, unphased. Talking to him, I learned he started the climb two days ago on a whim, climbing it solo. Upon topping out in the dark, he discovered he had no headlamp, continuing to rappel down in the dark.

We continued climbing, fixing just one pitch before using our last remaining daylight to set up camp (which in retrospect was a mistake, we should have pushed onward). We enjoyed our evening playing chess and going to bed early. However, the next pitch lingered in my mind, the topo designated it as the crux, and I was dreading it only actually aiding for the first time yesterday, and even then, it was no more than a dozen moves.

We started the next morning jugging up the fixed line, and I went to start the crux pitch. Surprising myself, I found the pitch to be relatively straightforward and casual. Jake quickly cleaned the pitch and shot up to lead the next. While he was climbing, the party behind us was starting to catch up. Looking over, I saw the leader of the party nervously climbing, a second later, they shrieked and peeled off the wall talking about a 20ft fall. They decided to bail.

Climbing onward, I took the last hard aid pitch, which was long and involved. At the top, I was grinning ear to ear. All the hard pitches were over. The next pitches were mostly free climbing, which goes by quickly. Was I really going to climb a big wall on my first attempt? Tired, the idea of finishing made me energetic. However, seeing Jake jug up the line, he wasn’t exactly all smiles.

We bailed. We had about two hours of light left and he didn’t want to rappel in the dark—a fair call since rappelling is statistically the most dangerous climbing maneuver. I agreed, but was thinking about the mysterious climber managing to rappel in the dark the day before, but I wasn’t going to argue and put pressure on the partnership. Plus we both had work the next day, and him, much earlier than me.

Rappelling was awkward in some spots, and our feet didn’t touch the ground until it was dark. Ironically enough, because we arrived and left in the dark, we never actually saw the wall we were climbing. I think it was better that way.

The Second Attempt (December 18 - 20)

I couldn’t let it go. The climb was totally within my physical capabilities, all that was left was to do it. My focus was drifting back at school and work, my mind was still there on the wall. I knew I would have a hard time shaking this feeling. I asked my childhood friend Logan if he was game to hit the wall. I didn’t need any persuading, it was a prompt yes.

Our schedules briefly overlapped (he was on break from the Naval Academy and me from Berkeley), but the extended forecast looked bleak. There was relentless snow everyday. It looked like the climbing season was over for Yosemite. The livecams showed the valley blanketed in a few feet of snow in freezing temperatures. However, a few days before our brief schedule overlapped, there was a weather opening—four days without snow. Still, the conditions were not on our side. The temperatures hovered around the 20’s and 30’s, and there was minimal daylight (the last day of our planned climb was one day prior to the winter solstice). I assumed the climb was off, until I got the text, “So we’re still on?” I spent the night prepping my gear.

It’s a funny thing, when everything goes against you, but that desire to succeed only gets stronger. Everybody appreciates an underdog story, and who doesn’t want to be the underdog in their own life story? Defying the odds is an easy thing to romanticize, but to carry out in actuality is a different story.

Saturday morning I helped scrub graffiti off rocks with fellow climbers at a local crag (I said I’d come a few weeks ago and felt too guilty to ditch them to climb instead). Right after we hopped in my prius for the valley, getting there at 7pm. Two weeks ago, it looked like the Valley was still in summer. Now, it looked like it was in the dead of winter.

Although I did the approach relatively recently, I got us lost several times. Snow covered all the trails making everything unfamiliar. We accidentally quested onto a snow covered talus field. A talus field is hard enough to climb, but add in snow, ice, and heavy packs (both of our packs weighed at least 40 pounds), it becomes a sisyphean task. In over an hour, we probably made a quarter mile of progress. By the time we actually got to the base of the climb, it took just as long as it did to drive to the valley. This approach was only a little more than a mile long.

The route was―unsurprisingly―wet. The first pitch was tame at 5.8 but was now more difficult with wet sections. The pitch is tricky, as it finishes on top of a ledge, which requires you to manually pull the haul bag on top of. The ledge was iced over, and as I pulled the haulbag up, I slipped, falling onto the cold rock while the haul bag dropped over the rock face, yanking my arm with it. My shoulder was badly hurt, and it hurt to raise above my head. The next pitch was an involved aid climb, something I knew Logan has never done before. Being past midnight already, we both wanted to get to our first camp as fast as possible. I took the second pitch, trying to rely on my left arm as much as I could. Logan then took the third pitch, a free climb, which got us to Dinner Ledge, our first camp. It was—to neither of our surprise—covered with snow, so we set up the portaledge to keep us elevated from the ground. By the time we got settled and checked our phones, it was past 3am.

We had a late start, waking up at 9am, and sluggishly stayed in our sleeping bags, enjoying the sunlight beam onto us after the cold long night. We didn’t start climbing until 11, and felt the pressure of the late start all day. Our strategy for that day was that I would take the same pitches I did on my previous attempt; having already done them I’d be able to relatively cruise through them. The first pitch of the day involved the infamous Kor’s Roof, which as it sounds, is a horizontal granite roof. This would be Logan’s first aid climb—not exactly a beginner friendly climb. It took him a while to get used to the movement, but got faster at it the more he did it, and finished the pitch without any major drama. The rest of the day went the same way.

Feeling pressured by the late start, we made a vital mistake throughout the day: we didn’t eat or drink. Feeling pressured to move faster and cover more ground in the little daylight we had, we neglected our nutrition, thinking it was not worth the time and would slow us down. This was a decision that, in retrospect, probably slowed us down. By the time I finished my last pitch, it was dark and I was drained of all energy. I still felt the previous long night taking its toll on me and the lack of calories consumed didn’t help. Once Logan jugged up the pitch, he took the initiative to set up the portaledge and get camp ready. Our plan was to eat then to keep climbing onward, fixing the next pitch. After we both got settled in the portaledge, the idea of continuing to climb in the cold night became increasingly unappetizing.

After the climb, a friend sent me this post on Facebook knowing I was on the wall while this photo was posted. The temperatures were below freezing that night. Knowing the miserable conditions we got ourselves into, I’m not sure if brave is the right word choice.

The temperature dropped steadily throughout the night. It was the type of cold where your mind tries to trick the body warm. In my first dream I was in a cozy room with my back next to the heater, finding great joy being warm and comfortable. A few seconds later, I was fully awake with my cold wind pushing up onto my back (I had no sleeping pad). My first waking thought was that I had to dream myself back warm again, something which never happened. After what felt like a few more hours of shivering in the cold, I managed to find some more sleep and a much more memorable dream. Logan and I were lying on top of a bird's nest, surrounded by large eggs with other birds flying in and out of the nest. I couldn’t think of a more fitting dream for my first real night in a portaledge if I tried.

We both woke up at sunrise, exhausted from the cold night, each not wanting to move out of our sleeping bags. That day we would need to climb 3 more pitches, descend the route, and drive back home. Although it was sunrise, it was still cold; it would take at least an hour and half until the sun would hit the rock face and really warm things up.

From the get-go, we knew we’d never reach the true summit. The snow at the top made it look too treacherous to try. We only wanted to get as high as we could before having to turn around. Once we started our climb, everything was against us from the start. The late night, bad sleep, and lack of proper nutrition were accumulating. We decided to spend our remaining time hanging out on the portaledge rather than climbing the few more pitches to descend. For both of us, being on a portaledge was a dream come true, it is the epitome of big wall climbing, and we felt like real big wall climbers. Feet still tucked in the sleeping bag, we hung our legs over the ledge and soaked in the hundreds of feet of air between us and the ground. We were both glad we bailed to take some time to enjoy yourselves, but then again, maybe this was just the effect of our ad hoc reasoning.

Perched on our bird's nest, dangling high up in Yosemite Valley we looked across to the sheer vertical face of Half Dome, thinking about climbing it. A few months ago this would have been a fun thought to teeter with, only for fantasy sake. But then and there, it felt a goal entirely within reach.

The Southface of the Washington Column is the easiest big wall in Yosemite. Two attempts left me 3 pitches short of the summit, both times bailing at the same spot. My view of the climb changed from time to time, shifting between optimistic and pessimistic lenses. Instead of a matter of a glass half empty or filled, it’s a wall mostly climbed or left slightly unclimbed. The climbs weren’t a success or a failure, but rather, each attempt teetered between both of these ends. But after all, nothing in life is as clear as one would wish it to be.

Rappelling down the granite face, I felt the waves of nostalgia already start rising into my mind, washing away the suffering from the past two days. Was climbing in freezing temperatures long past midnight really all that bad? I knew soon enough I’d be eager to hop back on a big wall again, but after these two attempts, one thing is settled: I’m done with this route. Now, I’ve got my eyes set on bigger goals.