Disco Inferno – Feels Like the First Time, Part 2

Finally, part two of our first big wall adventure in Zion. If you missed part one, you can read it here.

Early morning in camp.

We woke up with the morning light and slowly got our day going. After a quick breakfast, I racked up to lead the next pitch, rated C1. It’d been awhile since I’d done any aid climbing, and it took me some time to re-familiarize myself with the systems and process of getting your ass up the rock via your gear. Eventually I settled in and fully enjoyed the lead. The first half was finger crack-ish, but the second got real small. Ball Nutz and offsets were the ticket, though I was a little apprehensive about the quality of such placements in rock this soft, but Mike commented when he followed that they were all bomber.

Rise and shine, it’s thin crack time!

The next couple of pitches were the cruxes of the route, and it soon became apparent that they were going to take longer than anticipated, and that the girl team wasn’t psyched to lead them. They decided to bail, rather than waiting around at hanging belays all day. For the rest of the climb I would yell down whenever I got real uncomfortable at a hanging stance and they assured me it was very comfortable on the ledge with all the beer. Damn!

Mike on the “bolt ladder”.

The bolt ladder pitch took a while, due to blown out hooking holes and the improvising Mike had to do to get past them. The crux pitch, a rotten roof, was the first time maybe I’ve ever seen Mike wigged out, but he stuck with it and eventually found the placements he needed to keep moving upwards. When I arrived at this belay, hanging in space on a gently overhung wall, it was getting late. The next pitch was only C1, but we had about an hour of daylight left, so I suggested Mike lead it since he’d be quicker. I could tell he was a little fried from the last pitch, but he took the rack and headed up. Another funky C1 pitch slowed him down a bit, and I arrived at the last belay as dark was falling. We both looked up at the last pitch, and back down at the ledges. We were close, but we had several overhanging raps to get down, and each station would need new webbing to replace all the tat. After a brief conversation, we decided to head down to be with our wives and get some food. The last pitch didn’t look that good anyway….

This was taken by our friend Tommy Chandler who was climbing on Moonlight at the same time. Mike is at the belay below the roof and I’m following the bolt ladder pitch.

The first rap was easy and brought us to the steep, exposed belay stance. While we were getting the rope ready for the next rap, Mike’s glasses fell off and landed on my arm. They perched there for a split second, and then continued on their voyage to the base of the climb while we helplessly watched them fly through space. He was pissed, since his contacts had been bothering him and he was relying on the glasses, AND this was the second pair he’d lost in a couple of months. Oh well, got to keep going down, maybe we can find them at the base tomorrow. Mike clipped some directionals on the way down to help him stay close to the wall. As he went down, I looked up at the anchor, two bolts on a steep sandstone wall. Some idiot had attached the webbing high on the bolt hangers, so with each bounce of Mike’s descent, the hangers were flexing outward! This was rather disconcerting at a hanging belay 700 feet up on a slightly overhung wall. I was glad it was getting dark and harder to tell how far away the ground was.

As Mike was rapping, Joy yelled up that she thought the rope was hitting the lower anchor. This seemed unlikely, but Mike clipped the mid anchor and kept going. He got to the end of the rope and was still 5 feet away from the anchors. Needless to say, he was not happy. While he vented some frustration, I fixed the cord so he could ascend back to the mid anchor. Once there, I joined him and he headed down the last steep rap on the bolt ladder pitch. Due to its traversing nature, he clipped several bolts on the way down so he could get to the anchor. As I came down, I unclipped the draws as I went, but it was getting harder and harder to pull over and unclip. Finally I decided to clip the ropes to two leaver slings that probably served the same purpose in the past. I got down and we were relieved to have the worst behind us. One more rap and we were done!

Our gift to the next people up Desert Shield.

I pulled the rope, all was going well, and then it hit me. F#$#@$#$#$#$@#!!!! What’s wrong, yelled the girls. I had clipped both ropes through the leaver biners, and the knot was stuck. Mike looks at me without any hesitation and says, let’s cut ’em! I was like, wait, how can we fix this? I jug back up, unclip the one with the knot, and come back down. Ok, I got it. So I lower out, jug up the line, get the rope out from the biners, and rap back down. Sheesh. Are we done yet?

Everything went smooth on our last rap, and the sight of food and our wives was a welcome change from all the monkeying around in the dark that had just taken place. We had planned to spend another night at the ledges, and I drifted off to sleep with ease. Despite the mini epics, we learned a lot and had a great time. Next time we’ll probably shoot for one of the trade routes, and leave the sandy obscurities for another time.

You can view more photos and read Mike’s post of the adventure here.