Yosemite - Pacific Ocean Wall attempt - 10/2-4/99 - Paul Friberg

Paul and I tried to climb the Pacific Ocean Wall, which I had
been interested in for some time.  We climbed about 7.5 pitches,
before we ran into some problems and rapped off.  But I still
enjoyed just being on the wall after having thought about it
for many years.

October 1. Paul's flight arrived at San Jose, but his haul bag full of
gear did not!  We went back to my house for awhile, then
back to the airport, where his bag was on the next flight.
Drove to just outside Yosemite and slept near Hetch Hetchy.

October 2. Drove in the next morning, and hiked up to the base to fix
some pitches.  The pitches were fairly demanding, as we
expected from the trip report on Tuan's page, and the new
topo from Chris McNamara.

p1.  Paul led this quickly, while I browsed Chongo's Big Wall
book that he offered me at the base.

p2+3.  I was much slower on this lead, probably taking 2.5-3
hours.  The start was spooky, free climbing in my hiking boots to
a fragile undercling/aid flake.  Finally some decent gear,
then over the bulge and up to the original p2 anchor.
Then off right under an arch, using Aliens in thin pin
scars and thankfully a couple of fixed pins.  It was a hard
move reaching up from the last Alien to stretch and place a
#1 Friend in the big corner.  I had to grab a handhold, topstep
as my aider swung out left, and try to stem with my right foot.
Then up on somewhat easier aid in the corner to the belay,
although with a lot of rope drag by this time.

p4.  Paul led this long and sustained pitch fairly quickly.
We fixed our ropes to this point.

There were 2 sets of fixed lines from the anchor at p5.
A German guy was removing one of the sets as we were climbing.

October 3. Filled our water bottles at Fern Springs, and packed
remaining loads to the base.  Paul jumared first and hauled
the bags.  I struggled a bit on the steep fixed lines.

p5. I led this, which has a brief overhanging corner to 2 short
pendulums left.  Chris's topo showed only one pendulum, so
I tried at first to do it with just one, but I failed.

p6. Paul led the arch left, taking a fall when a TCU pulled,
and another when an RP(?) pulled.  On the second fall, he
was testing the RP while on my Fish Hook.  After the RP pulled,
the hook failed as well -- I had not slung it properly, with
just a single overhand knot, which pulled through the hole
under the load.  The hook flew off into space and hit the
ground.  I was a bit concerned, because it was our only large
diameter hook.  Paul finished the pitch, and we set up a hanging
bivvy.  I didn't sleep that well, having brought my hammock
instead of my permaledge to save weight for the descent.

October 4.

p7. I led a diagonal crack pitch, placing a couple of pitons
down low.  I was somewhat slow, expecting a hard pitch, and
doing a lot of gear testing.  But the placements were all pretty
good.  Some of these pitches are indicated as being "linkable"
on Chris's topo, but I think this is only if you backclean
most of the gear, to keep rope drag down and so that you
don't run out of gear.  I wasn't willing to take those sorts
of runouts, and plus I am not very fast, so it would more boring
for the belayer.

p8. Paul led off on the initial decent hooks to many fixed heads
and aluminum dowels.  He was at the spot where there is a wide
but shallow hole, where a bong is normally placed.  But I had
forgotten the bong selection (I wasn't sure if it was 2.5", 3"
or 4") in my garage, because I had not begun racking/packing
for the trip soon enough to do a careful job.  So I was coaching
him to weave some wired stoppers together to cheat past the hole
to the next dowel.  After some attempts, he noticed the dowel he
was on was flexing.  It broke suddenly and he plunged down.
The fall was held by one of the fixed heads, but the back of his
hand had been cut by the sharp remnant of the dowel.  It was a
long open cut, and would not heal well on the wall.  He was
bummed by the injury and his 3rd leader fall, and we decided to
go down.  But first, he hauled up our small bolt kit and
replaced the broken dowel with a good 1/4" bolt and hanger.
This took a very long time, as the granite there is pretty
much hard quartz, and the drill was dulled almost immediately.

At this point, some guys had come up the fixed lines below us and
the leader had just reached the belay below us.  We left them
some of our water and poured out the rest.  I rapped down to
the top of p5, skipping the station at p6 since they were there.
I made good use of their fixed lead line on p5 to reverse the
traversing p6 back right to the anchor atop p5.  Once I was
established there, it was a big relief.  Without their fixed line,
I would have had to put in a lot of aid gear to reverse the traverse
and make the descent feasible.  Their trip report can be read
on Tuan's page.  They were an interesting team, with an
experience leader, and a fairly inexperienced but gung ho follower.

Paul sent the bags down and I secured them.  We tied 2 ropes together
and Paul went down to the ground.  We thought at first that he might
be able to get some stiches for his cut, but realized it was already
too many hours old by that time.  I sent the bags down one at a time,
and he untied them.  Then I rappelled down.  It was getting late,
and we were tired, so we slept at the base, after rigging our food
on a rope in midair, to get it away from the critters.

We may return someday, but we'll probably do some easier walls
first.  The P.O. Wall has several hard pitches, and it is committing,
because it traverses out left over a very steep area, so that
descent would require some time-consuming downaiding.
My back still feels "vulnerable" after being reinjured on a fall
on the second pitch of the Nose back in 1994.  So I climb very
carefully and slowly to prevent another fall, where I might be
badly injured.  I feel a bit out of place on a wall, and I think
a more "durable" climber could make a more reliable wall partner....