South Face C1 5.8

Given all the WC threads, and the fact that we saw some of the other parties up there, I thought I'd add to the fray.

Drinking beer in Berkeley, about a month ago, Kate corners me and says "Do you want to climb Washington Column?" YEA! "Ok, when?"... "uh, er, um... June?" No more talking, we're gonna go do! I'm scared - I don't know what I'm doing, so I think it's gonna be hard. Kate is not so worried. Luckily, WC is a total noob-fest, so we fit in with all the noob-dudes (and one other dude-ette).

Sadly, we didn't take as many pics as I'd have liked, but on day 1 we reached Dinner Ledge, rested, and started up P4 around 3pm. HA! The Kor roof proved to be tricky, and by the time I reach Kate (who led it!) around 7pm, she was FREEZING and very unhappy. So we rapped to the ledge. I think I was asleep by 7:30pm.


The next morning, I'm worried, so I wake up early. Here is Kate, and me getting ready to jug up. Kate looks MUCH happier.


Oh Yea, I look the part. Don't let it fool you, I'm still a noob!


Kate led P5 too (the book says some about a move being difficult for a midget... well, I'm kind of a midget, but Kate is tall, so Kate takes P5). Luckily for me, this puts her in a position to take pictures of me looking really tough. Here I am figuring out how to follow traversing leads on jumars.


By the time I get to the belay at the top of P5, we've gotten into a rhythm... Kate has figured out how to lead, and I've figured out how to follow (and gotten over being scared of penduluming). Unfortunately, while under the Kor roof the day before, I got spun in the wind about 20 times, putting a twist in the rope, which gets horribly bunched up while trying to pull it through the pendulum rings, and is then STUCK!!! We are both tired, and finally we decide to just go up one more pitch P6 and rap down to unstick the (other) rope. Since we're tired and have gotten into a rhythm ... that, and I'm a wimp, Kate leads again. She is such a rockstar. Also, I have pee really, really bad.

At the top, she has time to take a cute picture of herself while I follow. She has set pro on a ledge above herself, and the only thing I can think is "Can I pee on that ledge?"... not, "Can I downclimb to the anchor from there?" Oh, the things one has to sort through while aid climbing...


We finish P6, rap, unstick the rope, rap to Dinner Ledge, and enjoy the remainder of our afternoon there. It is so nice, we decide to spend the night. We also think of other ways to unstick the rope... in retrospect, we had options.


We got to sleep in the next morning.


And then I learned how to rappel and kick a pig down the mountain. Fun fun! I got my butt kicked, but somehow, I think I'll be back. But I need to practice first.


We ran into these guys heading up.

http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.html?topic_id=612189