High conquest.

After reading a fourth part of Alpinist's Inspirations, I got the "High conquest" by J.R. Ullman from the library. The books doesn't disappoint. Here is an excerpt from chapter 2, about the beginning of mountaineering in Europe:

But, in its essence, it has been a struggle not of man against man, nor even of man against the obstacles of the physical world, but of man against his own ignorance and fear.

It's an excellent book, with the right kind of spirit!

The color of life (is lilac).

I think in terms of defining what's possible for a human being it's a step up: http://www.climbing.com/exclusive/features/lifeislilac/

A short summary: Silvia Vidal is a renowned big-wall {very long routes on rock faces} climber, known for her extreme aid-solos of the new routes. She weights 95 pounds and is 5 feet 2'' tall (there is a photo of her if you scroll down the page that is given above). During her climb of the Shipton Spire she spent 21 days on the wall (alone, she did it solo), so she had hundreds of pounds of gear to carry and haul to the base and up the route. And the route itself is extremely difficult too (5.10 A4+ 2900 feet, grade VI).


It's as inspiring as it gets :-). Amazing!

Igor

Kiener's Route, Longs Peak (07-Aug-2007).

I remember vividly my thoughts when I first saw Kiener's Route: you got to have a death wish and/or be just damn foolhardy to do that. It was about three years ago, I wasn't doing any climbing back then. The route just looked intimidating as hell, when doing Keyhole route seemed like a major adventure. But as time went by, the super-intimidating thing started to look pretty doable, so I decided to go for it.This photo was taken in May, it's not that snowy during summer time. But it's a long route, and escape from its upper part is problematic, in case weather turns sour. Storms usually come from over the mountain, so you don't see them until it's too late. Last year two climbers got caught up there in a storm like that, and one of them didn't make it. So you got to start early and go fast.

Here is a different photo of the route, taken a week before doing it:It's a lower portion of the route, Lamb's Slide couloir. One of the great things about this route is that it has it all: you start by 40-45 degrees snow/ice couloir, then traverse the Broadway (a horizontal system of ledges), then climb some easy fifth class rock (3 pitches of 5.4 when on route, the green line on the top photo), followed by quite a bit of fourth class scrambling to the top.

To be continued...

Long's Peak solo: Lamb's Slide, Loft, Clark's Arrow (2).

Getting back to it. I got to the Loft and continued on the Clark's Arrow route. The routefinding was fun: at first I started cutting the Keyboard of the Winds too soon and ended up cliffed out. I scrambled lower and went along the Keyboard, finally (after some more interesting routefinding) getting to the top of Keplinger's Couloir. The connection between the top of the couloir and Homestretch was snow-covered and ended up being the crux of the route:The snow slope was ~45 degrees steep, with a dropoff at its bottom. As I put my crampons on and started traversing it, I found that this "snow" was mostly ice. Boy, was I glad to have borrowed a second ice-axe from Morgan! I would have to turn around otherwise, it just wasn't very safe with one ice tool and my soft boots. It took me about the same time to traverse this thing as to climb the whole Lamb's Slide, and it was exhilarating! A no-fall territory, on ice, it was fun! Very tiring though :-) . That section really took its toll on me.

After finishing the traverse I started on the Homestrech, the last section before the summit (green line on the photo above). It was pretty iced too:To keep up with the spirit of the climb, I followed the ice line (green) to the top, summiting at ~9-30am. I shared summit with only one more person, a guy from California. He told me that a day before a hiker doing Keyhole route fell on the Homestretch and broke his leg. He had to wait for six hours before being evacuated. Poor guy, six hours on the mountain with a broken leg!

After resting and snacking, I went down via the Keyhole route. On my way down I bypassed the ice on the right (pink line), I was just too tired for downclimbing ice.

The lack of sleep really caught up with me on the way down. I got only around two-and-a-half hours of intermittent sleep in my armchair, and I guess it was not quite enough :-). I was hiking to the parking lot in a strange state, with dreams getting mixed with reality. It was kind of fun though, a mild hallucinogenic experience. The best thing was a bolder that looked (just for a moment) like an intricate dark castle, with towers and everything. After 13 and a half hours of hiking, I got to the car, had some coffee and headed home. It was a great day, and I felt that the next thing on my tack list should be Kiener's.

Long's Peak solo: Lamb's Slide, Loft, Clark's Arrow.

This weekend my climbing partner was out of town, so I decided to do something long and solitary. I decided to try Long's Peak via a reasonably technical route. Enough to make it fun, but not too dangerous to solo. And to make it as solo as possible I decided to start on Monday.

In May we tried to climb Long's via a variation of the Clark's Arrow (Loft) route, where you get to the Loft by climbing Lamb's Slide to its top and then traversing the top of Flying Dutchman Couloir to the saddle itself. Last time we made it only to the top of Lamb's, so this time I decided to start really early. After leaving Fort Collins at midnight, I drove to Estes and ended up starting hiking at 1-35am, from a deserted parking lot. The moon went down by the time I got above the treeline, and I saw Milky Way for the first time in my life. That thing alone was worth all the trouble. And there was more to come ;-). The night was really dark, so I could discern the silhouette of the mountains just by the line between a starry blackness and a tar-like blackness. It was surprisingly warm, and even with the wind picking up I felt comfy in a thin T-shirt.

At 3-35am I got to the Chasm Lake, which was invisible. I could only see what my LED headlamp was illuminating, an oval spot several meters ahead of me. I thought that I'm gonna get in trouble finding my way to the Mills Glacier, but it was surprisingly easy. At 4-25am, when the sky started to change color, I was looking up the Lamb's Slide. After taking a little 15min break I put on my crampons, took one of my ice axes and started to kick steps up the couloir. The snow was perfect, firm but not icy, which made for a very fun climb. As I was getting higher, so was the sun, first turning Diamond red, and then orange. After getting above the Broadway I took some photos:

That's looking down the Lamb's Slide. After 1 hour of climbing I got to the top, from where it was easy to traverse on to the Loft. Here is the top of Flying Dutchman:Another fun and easy patch of snow that brought me to the Loft at 5-40am, with a great view of Meeker with its Flying Buttress (the prow in the center):As it turned out, this was the easiest part of the ascent. The real fun part started higher up...

To be continued.

1st Flatiron, Direct East Face 5.6R.

On Saturday (3-May-2007), Morgan and I climbed the 1st Flatiron (the large rightmost formation): Here is an approximate line of Direct East Face route that we took (~300m). It is a gentle multi-pitch trad line, which we climbed swapping leads.The first pitch is definitely the crux. The climbing is easy (an easy slab 5.6), but very runout. The first belay station is at the tree (in the middle top of the photo), and it takes a 60m rope to get there. The climb is protected with two bolts in the bottom section, after that there is like 25-30m of unprotected climbing. I think there is a possibility of sticking something half-way, but I saw it when I already climbed above it, so I just went ahead. The climbing is easy, but you really don't want to fall, especially as you are getting close to the tree. Here is pitch 5 in process. The climbing is easy, but slabby, so runouts are ever-present.

Here is Morgan following this pitch. And the trees far below:The pitch 6 is my favorite, first bypassing a little overhang by going left followed by well-protected laybacks on a flake. This pitch gains the ridge. From here it took us 3 pitches of easy climbing/scrambling to get to the summit. From here it's a single 60m rope rappel to the ground. All in all it's a great route, well worth doing. You just need to be comfortable with runouts and slabs on easy terrain (5.4-5.6).

P.S. Protection: a set of nuts, a set of cams up to #4 Camalot (useful in one spot, but not necessary), and a bunch of shoulder length quickdraws.

Montezuma's Tower, North Ridge 5.7.

The tall spire is Montezuma's Tower (Garden of the Gods, Colorado Springs). The first time I saw a photo of it, I just fell in love :-). There is a 5.7 route that follows the ridge line (right ridge on the picture), North Ridge. This Sunday (03-May-2007) Morgan and I did it, and the thing is just absolutely incredible. The climbing itself can't be called outstanding, but the route makes up for it hundred-fold. It is such an aesthetic line - you are following the ridge of this skinny spire, with drop offs on both sides. As Morgan put it, it's the ultimate route for fighting fear of heights. For me it was all about trusting my feet. Leading the first pitch was not that easy, since I'm not used to climbing sandstone, and a recent rain gave the rock a very slippery feel. I always had that thought that the surface layer will just slide from under my foot, sending me into a fall. But after I got used to it, leading the second pitch was just so much easier. It's interesting how leading is different from following, although it's exactly the same route.

Here is another view of Montezuma's Tower (leftmost spire):

P.S. To whom it may concern ;-). The climb can be done in one pitch with a 60m rope, but we did it in two pitches, which I think is a way to go. I didn't want to deal with the rope drag, so we sacrificed the speed. Although the route can be climbed with quickdraws only, I also used a sling (hueco) and #1 and #2 Camalots (maybe #0.4 too). To be honest, I was happy to have this stuff with me. Double ropes for rappel!!! {we used 60m and 50m, but two 50m will do fine}

Unclimbed peaks in Tibet.

Some really good photos of unclimbed peaks in Tibet, from the Alpinist (scroll down).

Silver Turtle Expedition