Hoot (Dave) arrived at the Springer Gulch campground to announce that he’d forgotten his sleeping bag and tent. Well, he says he didn’t forget them, since he’d set them out with the rest of his gear, he just didn’t move them to the car. With a low expected in the 30′s we cobbled together a few spare blankets and I lent him my down jacket for the night.
He survived the night and we tanked up on coffee and let the sun hit before we moved back down the canyon to Turret Dome. The rest of our group hadn’t shown up yet, so we hiked up to the start of the Guides Route (5.6) and started behind another couple.
After leading the first pitch, Hoot took the short second pitch.
The third pitch made some zig-zags back and forth to add some rope drag and connect the easier climbing but I reached the summit and belayed Hoot up.
Unlike last year, we decided to scramble off in a different direction and returned to our cached gear at the base of the route more efficiently. Rich and Brenda had now arrived and were doing their own climbs and Emily had also showed up itching to climb. We decided to head over to Elevenmile Dome.
Emily was interested in learning more about trad climbing and to start leading, so we decided that I’d lead up the 5.7 route Moby Grape, then Hoot would follow and clean the route.
Because the climb was longer than half a rope length, he’d rappel back down on the single strand, give the rack of gear to Emily and she’d tie in to both ropes. I’d give her a loose top belay, while Hoot belayed her from below as if she was leading on the second rope.
On the way up both Hoot and I encouraged her to place gear often and then after she arrived at the top we had both ropes to rappel on.
Doing a tandem rappel, Emily and I descended the route and I offered some pointers and reviewed her gear placements.
We had time for one more climb, and I wanted to try The Overleaf (5.8+). The climbing wasn’t too bad until just below the roof where I tried to move directly up to the roof on the left and took a short lead fall. Rich and Brenda drove by, stopped and having done the route before yelled up some beta – “Move right first, then back left”. I re-did a few of the placements to reduce the rope drag, rested and moved right to scrunch up beneath the roof. Traversing back left with some awkward fist jams and arm bars while hunched below the roof I placed a few cams then setup with a decent hold just below the roof.
Standing up I was able to slot my hand into a very secure jam, and place a .75 cam. Down below, Rich yelled up that I should back down and rest. No way – I was too tired and with the jam feeling secure, switched hands, made a small mantel with my right hand and a heel hook with the left foot. Exhausted, I pulled over the roof, moved up 4 feet and built a quick anchor.
Tired and with plenty of rope drag it took forever to pull in all the slack. Emily had to go, so Hoot followed. He had his own demons on this route – having backed off the crux move once before. Following he quickly reached the roof, struggled to find the right sequence, rested for a bit then he too flopped up and over to reach the belay.
I was a bit more rested now, so I grabbed the gear from Hoot, re-flaked the rope and set off on pitch 2. It seemed like fairly consistent, but very fun, 5.6/5.7 climbing until reaching some easy, but run-out bathtub formations, then a small headwall to pull over. With only a couple feet of rope left I thought I could pick out the walk-off to my left so built an anchor and Hoot soon followed.
Even if we had more daylight and time I doubt I’d have had the energy to climb anything else. So we packed up and headed to our respective homes happy with the day of climbing.
Adam’s complete photo album
Hoot’s complete photo album
