It was never supposed to be a link-up. Drew texted me Monday
afternoon asking if I wanted to climb Freeway sometime in the next couple of
days. The next morning, we were racking up in the Chief parking lot, no mention
of the Grand Wall. But first, a bit of background is in order.
I met Drew while climbing in Smith Rock last month. My first
impression was a bit off: he was the dude who showed up at the Dihedrals with a
full trad rack intent upon climbing all the crack lines. For those who do not
know, Smith Rock is a world class climbing destination known for its beautiful face
climbs, and definitely not for its often times chossy crack climbs. Being so in
love with the Smith face climbing, I couldn’t understand Drew’s propensity for
the cracks, so I immediately thought there must be something wrong with him.
However, as I got to know Drew better, I came to realize he just loves trad
climbing in pretty much any form. His enthusiasm for climbing and the nomadic life-style he lives are
infectious. I was sold, Drew is awesome!
By the time we arrived in Squamish, I was far from psyched
on trad climbing. So while Drew crushed some sweet walls and link-ups (most
notably the three-peaks-on-the-Chief-in-a-day via Parallel Passages, Angel’s
Crest, and Diedre-Squamish Buttress), I spent my time pebble wrestling in the
forest at the base of these beautiful cliffs. I had a plan though: I would
primarily boulder for a few weeks in order to build up the strength and power I
lost while climbing in Smith. Once I was feeling strong again, I would shift my
focus to routes and bigger days in order build up endurance.
Up until Tuesday, things were going pretty well according to
plan: I spent two weeks almost exclusively bouldering and was in the process of
easing back into routes. At the beginning of my bouldering stint, I felt really
weak, falling off of boulders I would normally expect to flash. I didn’t mind,
the bouldering was awesome and psyche was high. Soon enough, I was feeling
strong and ready for some routes. The physical strength I managed to build bouldering
translated seamlessly into route strength; however, mentally, I was a bit shaky
on lead. Maintaining a good lead head is always a struggle for me, but I knew
with more mileage I’d be feeling good.
So that brings us to Tuesday morning: I was still feeling a
bit hesitant on lead and hadn't put any work into my long route endurance, but I had a good partner and a lot of psyche. Our
objective, Freeway with the Express Lane variation, is a Squamish classic. It
consists of nine awesome pitches up to 5.11c. With six pitches of 5.11 and
three of 5.10, it would serve as a stout reintroduction to harder long routes
for me, but I was psyched, the route is classic!
Drew and I decided to each take one of the 11c pitches, then
divide the remaining 5.11 evenly. This put me on lead for the 11a first pitch.
The difficulties came early with a delicate under-cling section about fifteen
feet off the belay. I was able to successfully navigate this cruxy section and
cast off into the sustained, balancy face climbing above. About fifty feet up
the pitch, the difficulties started to ease, and I thought I was in the clear,
then pop! a foot blows and I’m taking a ride. I pulled back on and finished the
pitch with no further incidents. On follow, Drew had a similar foot blowing
issue low on the pitch, then continued on to the belay. We both blew our
on-sights in the first fifty feet of the climb, but we could care less; the
first pitch was sick and the next looked splitter! We were psyched!
An awesome wide hands to thin hands splitter pitch and a
novel down traverse pitch deposited us at the base of the first crux: a long
corner characterized by cruxy thin sections. This was Drew’s big lead. He
decisively dispatched the low crux and charged up to the high crux. The high crux consisted of very tenuous
moves between creative stances. Drew reached deep into his bag of granite
trickery and came away with the on-sight. Inspired, I followed the pitch clean.
An 11a pitch of cruxy lie-backing and awesome face climbing put us in the truck
stop, a sweet cave perched 500 feet up the wall. Above us loomed a giant roof
whose easiest passage escaped at 11c. I was pretty intimidated but feeling
good. I up-climbed and down-climbed a few times to place some protection and
suss out the moves. Finally, I committed and fired through the roof. Some
wild stems and few hard pulls got me to the chains. Drew cruised it on follow; we
got through both crux pitches with no falls!
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| I'm on the left. You can see the splitter pitch 2 "Daylight Crack" below me and the down-traverse pitch 3 ahead. |
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| Looking out to see Lauren in the parking lot definitely gave me a psyche boost! |
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| Pulled back view of the last shot. This shows about half the route. |
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| Drew on the first crux of pitch 4, 11c. |
The final pitches were outrageously exposed and really fun.
A pumpy traverse after the roof brought us to the Express Lane. Express Lane is
a two pitch variation that ascends some very enjoyable face and arête climbing in
a great position. It was a really nice way to finish off the route. We topped
out around 2 pm with the only falls coming on the first pitch. We were psyched!
So psyched, in fact, Drew jokingly suggested we go do the Grand Wall. I
jokingly agreed, then he seriously agreed and our plans were set. The link-up
was on!
We ran down the descent, jumped in the van, and blasted to my apartment. We enjoyed a leisurely lunch with Lauren and finally headed back
to the chief around 4:30, psyched to charge up the Grand Wall. The Grand Wall
is possibly the most classic climb in Squamish. It tackles a direct line up the
middle of the Chief’s most impressive wall at the surprisingly moderate grade
of 5.11a with a few points of aid. We elected to do the Apron Strings start to
the route, adding two great pitches of 5.10. Drew has climbed the Grand a few
times, so he generously let me lead most of the more notable pitches, namely:
both Apron Strings pitches, the Split Pillar, the Sword, and Perry’s Layback.
We got to the base of the route a bit before 5 pm. I was
pretty nervous to see how I would feel having done so much climbing that
morning. As I started up the first pitch, I was relieved to find that I still
had some juice left in the tank. We cruised up some awesome splitters and some
low angle face climbing and quickly found ourselves at the base of the Split
Pillar. The Split Pillar is a beautiful, 40 meter dihedral featuring sustained
laybacking and hand-jamming. Up to this point, I was feeling pretty good, so I
confidently started jamming up the pitch. However, I quickly found my reserves
were running low. In addition, the hot afternoon sun was doing little to foster
confidence in my wide hand jams. Finally, with jugs in sight only a few meters
above, I ditched my last number three and started laybacking. I was quickly
rewarded with good holds and easier terrain to the top if the pillar. The views
from the belay were awesome, I was psyched!
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| The awesome pitch of Apron Strings. |
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| Apron Strings with the Split Pillar (above the pine tree in the upper right) and Sword visible. |
The next pitch, The Sword, though harder at 11a, was much
less sustained. Some punchy laybacking, a bit of super exposed face climbing,
and a short bolt ladder brought us up to our last major obstacle: Perry’s
Layback. This pitch tackles a sport bolted 4 inch layback crack that hangs in
such a way that it climbs like an undercling. It’s burly at 11a, and I knew it
was going to be a real challenge coming at the end of the day. I did my best to
climb it quickly and efficiently, but I gassed out a bolt short of a good rest.
I fell and hung for a bit, then finished off the pitch with a whoop! I knew we
had it in the bag. Drew quickly followed me up having gotten all the pitches
clean; he took over the lead for the last two pitches to the top. Before I knew
it, we were traversing off of Bellygood Ledge and headed back to the car with
plenty of daylight to spare.
I came home to a delicious home-cooked meal prepared by my
awesome girlfriend: the icing on the cake. Our little impromptu link-up was
done. Both of these climbs are incredible and to experience both of them for
the first time on the same day was really cool. Link-ups can sometimes be a lot
of work and entail a bit of suffering, but this one was all fun all the time.
Each pitch was amazing and psyche was constantly high.
Summary:
Freeway with Express Lane variation
Grand Wall with Apron Strings
8 pitches of 5.11
9 pitches of 5.10
19 pitches total
~2000 feet of climbing
2 falls for me, 1 for Drew
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