Lust and Serenity in the Valley Yosemite

June, 1997

by Andy Gale

The trip started out inauspiciously enough. I was stuck in the Orange County Parking lot that is Interstate 5 during rush hour. Finally though, I got to Brent's place in S. Pasadena at about 7:30 and we hit the road soon after in his car. Some hours later, as we approached the Wawona tunnel under a full moon, Brent asked me what music I would like to be playing when I got my first view of The Valley. Something classical seemed appropriate but Brent didn't have any so I settled on Tom Petty, American Girl, off the greatest hits album. We burst out of the Wawona tunnel at about 1 am with a full moon shining down on El Cap!! Wow!! What can I possibly say that would convey the wonder of that site!!

Once I had drunk my fill of the view we headed off to find the SCMA campsite. My note said North Pines, sites #41 and 42. The guidebook map showed an upper and lower pines but no north pines campgrounds. Brent was not aware of a campground named north pines so we decided it must be either upper or lower. We cruised through both. Upper sites 41 and 42 were occupied by RVs. Moving on to lower, 41 and 42 each contained a single car and tent, neither of which matched the description of Lorena's (VW Jetta) but maybe she wasn't there yet. So what the heck? We stowed our food in the bear box, I set up my tent and we hit the sack.

At about 6:15 AM Brent was walking about outside and tells me quietly, "Hey Andy, I don't think we're in the right campsite, these people don't seem to be climbers." D'oh!! I did the all-time speed dismantling of my tent and we threw everything in the car and drove off. There was no sign of movement from the tent in the site. I guess we got away with that! After that we decided to check a map on a bulletin board and discovered that there is indeed a North Pines campground on the other side of the river. So we cruised over there and sure enough, there were Lorena and the rest of the SCMA people. Brent dropped me off and took off to find the woman he was supposed to meet this weekend at the SAR campsite.

I sat down and started making coffee. Brought back to life by the sweet aroma of brewing coffee, I looked up to notice a large puddle of antifreeze under Lorena's car. On closer inspection it was clear that there was something major wrong with it. Not good! Fortunately, Yosemite can hardly be called a wilderness. We called the garage located in The Valley and a tow truck was dispatched. In the meantime, though, Brent returned sans partner because he was unable to find her! Lorena decided that she needed to deal with the car rather than climb and so Brent and I went off to climb my first ever climb in The Valley. It turned out that Brent had been lusting after "Serenity Crack" and "Sons of Yesterday" (above SC), so we decided to go for it. I was a bit nervous about the 10d crux pitch, but Brent wanted to lead it, so what the Hell? Everything else was 10a or easier. "Serenity Crack" is 3 pitches, 10a, 10a, 10d and "Sons of Yesterday" starts at the top of "Serenity Crack" and goes for 5 pitches of 5.6-10a. There are rap anchors at every pitch so we had the option of bailing at any point.

When we got there (late because of all the car hassles, etc.) there was already a party of 3 on the 1st pitch and another party in line. We were feeling pretty relaxed so we decided to wait. It took a while, but we finally got on the route at about 1 pm. It was rather hot and we were in the sun, but hey, no big deal. Brent led the 1st pitch, which mostly follows a thin seam that is totally bashed out with huge pin scars. This wouldn't even be a free climb if it wasn't for the pin scars. That was new for me, but the pitch went pretty smoothly. I led the second pitch and the pin scarring wasn't as bad here. The climbing was pretty continuous up a nice slightly left leaning crack with a couple of rests followed by a short friction traverse right to another crack which continued up to the belay. I climbed as fast as I could, both because of my limited endurance and because my heels were hurting like Hell (damned shoes)!

The crux pitch started up an easy flake followed by some moderate crack climbing to the base of a steep splitter finger crack through a smooth bulge with no face holds. Once again, the main features of the crack were pin scars, which created beautiful finger locks. The beta Brent had for the crux (about 20 ft long) was to place gear at the base of the crux and then run for the top without stopping. Of course, this is easier said than done. The compulsion to stop and place pro when climbing right at your limit can be pretty strong! Brent tried to place gear along the way and got totally pumped out and ended up taking a couple of short falls and hangs. Oh well! When I got to the base of the crux, following Brent, he told me not to stop, just rip out the gear and let it hang at my waist. Fortunately all the gear came out easily and I was able to execute this plan reasonably well. I got through the crux! It was really hard though and we were both exhausted. I did recover a 2.5 rigid friend from behind the flake lower down on the pitch with 10 minutes of teasing. All right, my first Valley booty! It was also in excellent shape.

Now we were a few hundred feet off the deck and the view had evolved from merely spectacular to mind numbingly awesome! At this point we were out of water and tired, but we weren't ready to stop yet. The next pitch was easy, mostly 4th class with a bit of 5.6. I was happy to lead that up to the real base of Sons of Yesterday. Following that was a long 10a pitch up another crack, with some flaring sections. Brent led that, but in his dehydrated state had some trouble with it. By then I was also really feeling beat because of the dehydration, so neither of us was willing to lead the next pitch even though it looked like a beautiful 5.9 hand crack. So we decided to rap from there, and that was definitely the best decision. It was still 5 raps with 2 ropes and I found even rapping to be difficult. Fortunately, water was waiting in my pack, soon to be followed by Gatorade purchased in the grocery store. After rehydration I could look back with satisfaction on climbing the classic "Serenity Crack" for my first ever climb in The Valley!!

Please append any comments below

Wed Jan 7 Chipmunks? Stein Lundby (285) {21}

Wed Feb 17 Re: Chipmunks? Lon Harter (108)

A Los Alpinistas story by Andy Gale. Photographs by Richard J. Hughes.