SpaceShot

SpaceShot, IV, 5.6, C2, 8 pitches
Zion National Park, Utah
Feb 25-27, 2000

by Andy Gale

So, the question I ask myself, whose answer is actually pretty obvious, is why am I writing a trip report about this particular climbing trip anyway? After all, I go climbing nearly every weekend and I haven't written a trip report in a couple of years. The reality is, I write trip reports about climbing trips I am especially proud of. I have no desire to write about the average everyday weekend at Joshua Tree. I certainly won't be writing about various miserable failures I had on larger scale climbing expeditions. The fact is Spaceshot was my first successful "big wall" climb and here I am writing a trip report about the experience. Actually in the past couple of years or so I have had several climbing expeditions that I envisioned writing trip reports about before they took place. I envisioned writing the TR as being sort of a jubilant proud thing. But then the climb was aborted and I slunk away in frustration with no thought of writing a TR about such a travesty. But those failures have stuck with me. I have been determined for some time now to succeed on one of these trips to exorcise that feeling of failure and disappointment in myself. For the clear fact in every case was that, even though reasonable excuses existed to bail on each of those climbs, I allowed myself to take the easy way out every time rather than suck it up and climb. Frankly I was beginning to wonder if I had what it took.

Well, anyway, enough about all that. It should by now be pretty obvious what the outcome of this climb was. So I guess the suspense is all gone. But hey, you don't read about a big wall newby's first wall for gut gripping suspense and death defying feats. I leave those up to Mark Twight. The genesis of this trip came about mere weeks ago. I did have big hopes for aid climbing in the upcoming year but I had no imminent plans. But at the end of January I happened upon Mike Esparza next to Intersection Rock in Joshua Tree while I was belaying Frank up the first pitch of Overhang Bypass. I first met Mike last October at the annual Rec.climbing Halloween bash. We hadn't really interacted all that much actually. There were lots of people there and it was quite a rip roaring party. Definitely one of the best yet! But that is another story. But we happened upon each other one other time since then and we chatted a bit there next to Intersection rock and agreed that we really ought to get together for some climbing sometime.

Much sooner than I expected, in fact only a couple of days later, Mike emailed me with a surprising question. He was looking for a partner to climb The Prow on Washington Column with him sometime in late February or early March and he was wondering if I was interested. Whoah! I was thinking a day at Josh! Mike was thinking a big wall in the winter! Granted, to this point it had been one of the milder winters on record and if the weather held a wall in these conditions would be pretty pleasant. I told him I was definitely interested but wondered a bit what I was getting in to. Well we settled on the last week in February with the plan to take Thursday through Sunday to give us plenty of time. Then we started watching the weather forecasts. Recently a cycle of winter storms had finally started sweeping through California so the weather was a big question mark. Well, up until a few days before Wednesday it seemed there might be a window of good weather in the Valley but then it slammed shut and we decided at the last minute to head for Zion and see what we could get on there instead.

Since the weather in Zion wasn't supposed to clear up until Thursday we decided that there was no point in driving late on Wednesday night. Might as well let Mike get a good night's sleep to recover from his 12 hour overnight shift at work and get to Zion all fresh and ready to go on Thursday afternoon. We met up at the Sport Chalet parking lot in Rancho Cucamonga early on Thursday morning, piled his stuff into my truck and took off. The drive went quickly and we talked about starting up a route that evening and bivying a couple of pitches up to finish the next day. If that went as planned we should be able to get in another route as well, maybe even in a one day push on Saturday. But that plan began to fade as we approached Zion and saw looming precipitation laden clouds gathered over the high red peaks. To make a long story short, it soon began to rain and that turned to snow as we drove further up the canyon towards the Angel's Landing area. Obviously it would be stupid to start a climb in those conditions, particularly on the wet sandstone, so we stopped off at the ranger station and got a backcountry permit for Spaceshot, and then headed into town to find a place to hang out until we could reasonably go to bed.

Personally, the weather made me apprehensive about our chances. After all, it hadn't really taken too much bad weather to get me to bail before. But Mike was confident and matter-of-fact so I tried to ignore my doubts. We spent about 4 hours in a small Mexican restaurant right outside of the park and played several games of dominoes with a couple of locals named Jeff and Chris. Then finally we headed back in to the park to sleep in the back of my truck in the parking lot of the lodge. On the way in my truck fishtailed a bit on the icy roads just to let me know how crappy the weather had become. Well the next morning it was cold but clear so the plan was a go. We took our time over breakfast in the lodge cafeteria to give it a chance to warm up then headed up the canyon.

At about 11 o'clock Mike started up the first pitch. The approach was ridiculously short and was trivial even covered by snow as it was. The topo in the guidebook indicated that the free climbing was all dispatched in one pitch. We thought that we might make it two for easier hauling though. Though we were both wearing hiking boots rather than climbing shoes we figured that we shouldn't need the aiders out for the '5.6' free climbing. Well, 5.6 free climbing covered in snow can be a bit dicy anyway and Mike struggled up over the first bulge heading left before disappearing out of sight. After a bit he called off belay. Our plan at that point was to leave the haul bag and carry the haul rope on my back until we could drop the haul line down from higher up to get a straight line haul. Well, the next part of the so-called first pitch was a wide flaring blocky slot. Mike struggled up it a ways in his hiking boots, liberally French-freeing it. But finally he said he felt that he ought to just aid the thing. But our aiders were down in the haul bag at the base. So we decided to change plans a bit. I rapped back to the base on the haul line and then jugged back up with the haul bag on my back. That was quite a bit of work! Then we started aiding the rest of it in conventional style. Actually after a brief crux Mike went back to a mix of free and aid climbing and eventually set up a belay, still short of the end of the free climbing. Then he began hauling up that pitch and we didn't manage to keep the haul line out of the slot so I spent most of the pitch jugging up and freeing the haul bag as Mike hauled.

Well, we were two pitches up and it was taking longer than we expected and we also still had another pitch of free climbing before the real aid started. Without further ado I headed up the final buttress to the base of the steep stuff. The climbing may have been 5.6 but with hiking boots and aiders and daisies dangling it was pretty damn awkward. In fact, I think it would have been awkward anyway. I mixed in aid and some free climbing and finally struggled to the top of the lower buttresses. Mike followed, again pushing the haul bag along as I hauled. Later on we discovered that other topos divide this section into the three pitches we climbed so we didn't feel so bad. But at that point it was much later in the day than we had anticipated. It was actually close to 4 before Mike finally headed up the bolt ladder that started the first real aid pitch. He made good progress but slowed down when he entered the crack and worked his way through a tricky section of shallow nutting. It went slow but steady and by the time I finished cleaning the pitch it was completely dark at around 7.

We set up Mike's double portaledge with some struggle and settled down for the evening. I was plenty tired and didn't have much appetite but I forced myself to eat anyway. We briefly debated fixing some of the next pitch that night but once we settled onto the ledge we didn't feel like going anywhere. It was cooling down and we didn't waste much time before getting into our bags. I didn't sleep much since my feet were cold all night. The night passed slowly as I watched the stars and looked down occasionally at the snow covered canyon floor. At daylight we soon realized that the next pitch, supposedly the third on the guidebook topo, was in fact the fourth. We only had four pitches to go afterall!

It was cold but we tried not to waste too much time. I started up the next pitch fairly promptly as Mike broke down the portaledge and finished packing the haulbag. The pitch started out with easy cam and stopper placements until a bolted traverse right to another crack. The base of the second crack was a puzzle. I guess it was C2. It was all new to me. At first I had no idea what I was going to do. I tried to reach high to a good nut placement but it was out of reach. Then I tried to get various nuts and cams to stick in a flaring bashed out rotten looking slot. None of them wanted to stick. Finally I remembered my recently purchased Trango Ballnutz. I managed to slot one into the crack low down then stepped gingerly across onto it. It looked tenuous, but I think it was actually quite bomber. I still couldn't reach the good nut placement though so I placed a second ballnut in a shallow slot after cleaning it out with my nut tool. I couldn't believe it held also, but again it did. After that I continued up the crack to the belay and we continued on.

The next two pitches to Earth Orbit ledge were almost entirely splitter cracks, fairly thin for one pitch and then 2-3 camalot size for the next. The aiding was easy but we had to back clean a lot to conserve cams. I led the pitch to Earth Orbit ledge and I wished I had climbing shoes and warmer weather. That was a sweet hand crack! Supposedly both pitches go at 5.10 and it seemed to me that I could possibly free the second of the two on a good day. Oh well, another time. In spite of the straightforward aid we were not exactly speeding up the route and again it was approaching late afternoon as we both got to Earth Orbit ledge. Mike headed promptly up the final pitch, scrambling up on a big square block at the end of the ledge overlooking the huge drop off of that big arch! Definitely a cool move, but I know Mike was glad to clip that bolt when he got on the ledge. The end of the last pitch was about 5.6 free climbing but Mike had lots of rope drag, which slowed him down. Nevertheless he finished as dusk approached. I lowered out the haul bag and then followed the pitch as darkness fell. The exposure was awesome, even at dusk! I then followed a fixed line up a short ramp to level ground.

There we found a stash of leftover water, some food, a couple of cans of beer and a bottle of rum! We were tired and had no desire to find the descent rappels in the darkness with the threat of ice and snow on the slabs we had to scramble down. So it was an easy decision to spend the night there, relax with the beers and get a good night's sleep. In the morning the rappels were fairly easy to find and only a couple of places were made tricky by ice and snow. By about 11 we finally got back to the car and gratefully dumped our loads of gear. I had finally done it. With Mike's help I had made it up a big wall.

Photos:
1. The route.
2. Oak Creek in Zion NP the day we started the route.
3. Andy jugging pitch six on day two.
4. Andy leading pitch seven.
5. Mike at the start of the bolt ladder on the last pitch.

Comments?

Tue May 3 '05 Dude A Nother Dude (17)

A Los Alpinistas story and photographs by Andy Gale.