Yosemite Day 3 - West Crack on DAFF Dome

Day 3 - 10 September 2012

DAFF Dome.  Mitch and I had talked about doing this route for a long time.  West Crack.  Not a huge, difficult route at all, but you have to be careful being on an exposed dome like DAFF with regards to the weather.  Clouds forming up in the early AM can be a bad sign.  Thankfully, it was nearly cloudless.  Once again, it was rather cold in the AM.  We got a move-on quicker though because we knew that West Crack is a popular route.  The last thing you want is to hike up there and see 3 parties waiting in line while a 4th starts up it.



Before I really begin this story about this day, I want to just take a sec to do an interesting exercise with y'all.  Check out this pic and think about what you can actually see on the cliff that might be 'climbable'.

Obviously you can see the big corner (Crescent Arch 5.10a), but beyond that what else?  See any weakness or obvious lines?  Not much eh?  Damn, I even made the photo extra large!  Well, just remember this pic...it'll come around later at the end.

So, back to the story.  Thankfully when we arrive, there was only one party on the route and no one waiting.  I snapped a few pics and then we moved up to wait.  And it's a damn good thing we did too because no sooner did I get to the main ledge than another group came up right behind us and asked if we were doing West Crack.  Whew! That was close.

Route of West Crack through about 1/2 of Pitch 2. Climber visible at start.

Pitch 1 was all mine.  Did I mention it was cold? Oh and so was the rock.  And we were in the shade and there was a pretty decent wind.  Last, but definitely not least, it's 5.9 climbing off the deck on polished holds.  It was time to zip up the man-suit.  I got through P1 cleanly.  Of course, just as I got up to a welcome set of anchor bolts at the top of the pitch, the guy seconding the team above us took a nice fall off the roof...just a few feet from me.  Good times.

Pitch 2 was Mitch's and he had 'fun' working his way up through P2's initial overhang with only one "take" on a well-placed cam.  His pack was def cramping his style if you ask me.  Personally, I'm a fan of there being one pack for a team and that the 2nd carries it...especially on harder routes.  But I digress.  Mitch took care of P2, though I did notice it took him awhile and that I paid out a pretty good deal of rope. Hmm.  I didn't think P2 was that long, but whatever.  I thought, "Mitch knows what he's doing."  In the meantime, while I sat there in a hanging belay, with the wind howling every now and again, I watched the sun slowly creep closer and closer around the corner.  I was incredibly thankful I had brought my hardshell jacket...lifesaver.  By the time I was about ready to start climbing I could lean back and get face full of sun.  Ahhhh! Warmth!  Just before I left I looked to down to the base and was amazed to not see anyone coming up behind.  Which was definitely a good thing as I had to seriously pee on the rock (not on the route though) before casting off on P2.  Don't worry...with the arid climate and the breeze blowing it was dry within minutes.

Following on P2 I could definitely see where pulling the initial overhang would be a bit tricky...especially with a cumbersome pack on your back.  The upper stuff though was really cool.  There's this huge crack, but you don't really climb it.  Instead, you climb on the face on these wild looking, golden knobs.

Golden knobbiness

The last part of this rather long pitch to get up to where Mitch was anchored was a fairly stiff finger crack at about 5.8.  I cranked through it though, and thought, "I'm going to get to a good rest once I reach Mitch."  It was not to be.  When I got to Mitch he had built the belay in a set of parallel, vertical cracks.  There was hardly anywhere to comfortably rest your feet.  Mitch told me that he mistakenly went too far on his pitch and built the belay in a rather uncomfortable spot.  He needed me to switch over to leading as quickly a possible, climb quickly, and get us to a better belay spot.  Well, "shit happens", I thought.  Let's work the problem and get it done.  We quickly did the changeover but then we realized that in order for him to feed the rope out smoothly I couldn't just step up in front of him.  Instead, to make it work right, I needed to crawl underneath him.  That's right.  I was on lead, pretty tired at this point, and I had to crawl under him with my pack on.  Somehow this was accomplished but not before I burned a ton of energy doing this.  Ok, now I needed to get climbing.  And just as I left, Mitch told me that he needed me to stop as soon as I can because part of the rope was dropped when I went under him and it had gotten kinda tangled up.  Great.  I prayed that wouldn't cause a problem while I was in the middle of the crux.  Thankfully I found a good enough rest for us to get this taken care of before I started up the real meat of this pitch.

The topo for the route said "Sustained 5.7 fingers" for this section.  It was exactly that.  At that point, it was everything I had to get through it cleanly.  Finger jam after finger jam.  Slot that foot in and turn the knee up straight to lock it in.  Stand up on the foot. Slot the next hand and fingers up.  At one point, I really thought I might come off.  I was just exhausted.  But I remember I caught a short rest and looked up to see my goal.  A big, fat rest block about 10 ft up.  I knew I could get there.  Two-quick exhales, brought in the focus, found the jams and just blew through the moves. Woo hoo! Slammed in some gear and made a bomber anchor.  This is where Pitch 3 was supposed to end.  As I brought Mitch up I knew the real 'hard-work' on this climb was done.  I could see there was some more interesting rock up ahead for me, but nothing harder than anything we'd already done, and nearly all of it was far easier at about 5.4-5.5 climbing.  I watched Mitch coming up and managed to snap some cool pics.

That's actually another climb over there called Blown Away.  Would love to come back for it!

Bomber anchor.

I led the next pitch as well, and thought that I might be able to link it all the way to the top.  Some fun 5.4/5.5 crack and slab climbing led to a nice big ledge, just below the final pitch.  I started to do the moves up the 5.5 slab but then I thought better of it.  I wasn't really sure how much rope I had left and I wasn't sure how far the pitch would go.  So I did the smart thing and downclimbed to the ledge I'd passed, built an anchor and brought Mitch up.  Mitch led the final pitch and after I changed into my approach shoes, I was on my way to the top.

At the last belay before the top.

On top of DAFF Dome.  Fairview Dome is right behind us and Cathedral Peak looms in the distance.

The erratic boulder on top of DAFF Dome that can be used an anchor for an alternate finish.

Once on top of this huge dome I realized just how much fun the route really was and just how alive I really felt.  It was an amazing feeling.  We snapped some pics and had lunch.  To find the rappel we ended up following another group that had come up a different route.  We rapped down two times, and basically walked backwards down the curving rock until it finally dropped off a big overhang.  Once on the ground I looked around at other lines and wondering what else we could do.  But obviously Mitch's mind was on ice cream, and I have to admit it took very little persuading to get me thinking that too.

Before we hopped in the car at the parking area we looked back at DAFF Dome and could now see exactly where we had been.  That's one of the coolest things to me about climbing in places like this.  Remember that pic in the beginning?  Well here ya go.  Bet you probably couldn't see this route on that first pic eh?  When you first look at a cliff, a lot of times you have no clue where your route(s) might lead you.  Making out features at a distance can be tough.  But after a day up there, it's totally different.  You look at it and you know exactly where you were and what you were thinking when you were there.  You can feel like you know where every line is located.  A beautiful and amazing thing if you ask me.

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As we sat there outside the little store and ate ice cream I looked around and wondered if our friends Arthur and Matthew and Seth and Simone were going to show up sometime soon.  They had all flown in to San Francisco and were due in that evening.  No matter.  I was enjoying the warm sunshine and the clean air.  And just before we hopped back in the car, I took a long look at our destination for the next day...Cathedral Peak.