Climbing The Nose, El Capitan
4 days and 3 nights at the end of September.
These pictures are from the first 2 days.
The photos of us on the wall are courtesy of Tom Evans at www.elcapreport.com.
Big thanks to Richard for being such a cool dude and great climbing partner.
DID YOU EVER FALL? WHAT IS BACK CLEANING? THESE SHOTS MAKE IT LOOK EVEN MORE CRAZY THANKS.
No we never fell. We were either aid climbing and usually pretty firmly attached to the rock, or free-climbing stuff that we were pretty sure we weren’t gonna fall on. I wasn’t comfortable enough to push fee-climbing to a point where I was going to take a fall. The feeling of being so high was a bit unsettling.
Re: “Backcleaning” Usually when you climb a pitch you leave gear every so often for the rope to catch on if you fall. On that pitch after the king swing I was aiding it and always had at least two pieces that I knew weren’t going to pull out. So instead of leaving gear in the rock (which would have been a pain for Richard to clean) I removed everything as I climbed past it. So when I got to the anchors for the pitch the rope is running straight to Richard at the top of the boot flake. Everything becomes a bit easier and faster, especially since Richard had to go sideways and a bit down to get to me.
I am seriously grateful to Tom Evans. The pictures he took are some of my favorites because the rock just looks so awesome, and it is!