DeuceldikeD
AKA: Gronked, AKA: Oops this isn't Snake dike, aka: thanks for the burn gear, aka: don't try this at home
Kat and I woke up at 4 am on Saturday morning, the usual weekend warrior alpine start for those with big objectives and weekday jobs. We had camped at a site in Upper Pines that a friend of a friend had booked which gave us easy access to our goal of Half Dome. The plan was to climb Snake Dike on the south face of Half Dome, sometimes called Snake Hike based on the grueling approach and 9 mile descent. Our heads parted ways with our comfy pillows and warm bags at 4 am and by quarter to 5 we were already at Happy Isles making our way up the arduous trail. We passed Nevada Falls and Vernal Falls and reached Liberty Cap just as the light entered the sky. Once at Liberty Cap the switch backs end and the trail straightens and a long spine from Liberty Cap follows the trail on the left. We knew we needed to jut cross country at some point so as soon as the crags looked like we could easily scramble up, we made our move.
We followed the contours of the land going up and back down, working our way up friction slab and down through brush at one point ending up in a small grove of Quaking Aspens by a stream. At this point the objective was in site. The sun had lit up the back side of Half Dome and we continued making progress up, at last finding cairns and a switch back trail leading us up the final uphill before the start of the route.
We were the first party to reach the route and I wasn't surprised about that. Kat and I get after it, we wake up early and we move quickly. With no one else at the route we were faced with finding the start of the route. Now, I always use my Don Reid guide book even though it's out of print and just about everyone else has the Supertopo in their back pocket. It's not as detailed but it has more routes and areas and...I just like it. I had a print out of the topo with me and I eyed the rock looking for our start. Excited to climb however, we quickly roped up and I started up a very obvious line that led to a prominent crack where I saw some fixed gear and a bolt with a biner. I worked my way up the slab to the crack, jammed my way up and popped out right back onto slab before working my way left onto some sketchy slab to a rusty bolt. I remembered reading about this sketch traverse left and I figured I was on the right track.
I reached the first bolt, a rusty old button-head and clipped the biner siting there waiting for me. At this point another party showed up, a boy and his father and they readied to start up after us. From this first bolt I headed straight up under a roof about 30 feet until I reached another bolt. I paused here and pulled out the topo. This should have been a two bolt belay. I called down to see how much rope I had left and it wasn't much. I had a comfy hole here for one foot so I had Kat start climbing as I belayed her off this one rusty bolt. She worked her way up the crack and at the top, stopped and built an anchor, giving me more rope to play with. At this point, I was eyeing a flake about 40 feet to my right that I thought would make a wonderful actually belay station. The slab looked thin, it was lower angle but it looked better than working my way around the roof above me into the unknown.
I started out right and it was in fact thin. Looking back, this is even off route for the actual Deuceldike route so I'm not sure the rating. However, in comparing it to the 5.9 I was about to meet, I would at least call it 5.9 and in spots definitely argue for 5.10 Yosemite slab. It was small and very balancy and the swing would have been ginormous. I made the distance and arrived at the flake, greeted by a nice ledge to stand on and enough of a crack for my yellow alien and red #2 friend. I belayed Kat up and sweated just a bit when she worked the same slab traverse over to the belay. She of course moved like she was born on the rock.
This was our first official belay station since leaving the base even though we had our intermediate belay on the bolt to give me more rope. We looked at the topo and looked up at the rock. There was a dike to our left and a dike to our right. The one to the right (Snake Dike apparently) seemed like it would take another thin traverse just to reach it while the dike to the left looked wonderfully climbable with a possible spot for a cam above the roof we just worked up and around. I left the belay, heading up and then left indeed finding a spot where I plugged in a red alien before reaching the distinct feature of the dike. The dike shot straight up as far as I could see and it looked wonderful, thinking to myself that I had found my route and I was out of danger. Bolts should start appearing everywhere at this point. I climbed about 30 feet above my red alien and was in fact greeted by a bolt; another rusty button head, but a bolt none the less. The climbing was harder than it had looked and I thought to myself that this was hard for 5.7. "Well hell, it's Yosemite 5.7". I had started up a 5.7 in Joshua Tree the November before and was surprised to find 5.10b smooth face climbing. This wasn't quite that bad yet I thought. My head was in great shape and I kept climbing; 20 feet above the bolt, 30 feet above the bolt, 40...50. The dike ended in a dimple and I thought for sure I'd finally be welcomed by two bolts to belay Kat up on. Nothing!
With no protection and a 120' cheese grater fall if I made a slip, I found a comfortable stance and pulled the topo out of my pocket. The less detailed Don Reid had one redeeming quality over the more detailed Supertopo; it showed the other routes near Snake Dike that the Supertopo omitted. Finally I knew where I was. Looking to my right and a large dike ramp seemed to jet out into infinity which showed on the topo as the route next to it, Deucel Dike. I called down and asked Kat again about my rope situation which she responded with an unwelcome "10 feet". Shit! Fuck! Bitch! Tits! I just screwed up big. Fortunately, all 165 lbs of dumb ass up on that rock was able to stay calm. As corny as it sounds, I kept thinking back to the movie Touching the Void, when Joe Simpson found himself in a crevasse with a broken leg after his parnter, Simon Yates had cut the lead rope. In the movie, he recounts himself thinking that he can't stop making decisions, as he rappels into the blackness going deeper into the crevasse.
I stood in that dimple for at least ten minutes or longer considering options. I could down climb the dike I had just came up, 50 feet back to the bolt. Not a good option. I could stay here and call YOSAR (Yosemite Search and Rescue) and find myself being rescued off a moderate that is euphemistically referred to as a hike. I'm proud enough to say that my ego wouldn't let that happen. Or I could keep climbing. I called down to Kat and told her that I was going to continue climbing and that she should breakdown the anchor and start up simul climbing as soon as the rope came taught. This would leave 200 feet of rope between us and one rusty bolt and a red alien. Not ideal but better than down climbing that sketchy slippery dike. Before I started up I called by down to Kat, "Tell that other party not to follow us, oh, and don't fall!"
The ramp was 5.2 and very easy for me, but I gripped like crazy knowing I could be pulled off if Kat made any slip. The ramp also offered chicken heads. These are rocks protruding out of the face enough so that I was able to take slings and girth hitch them. The ramp was supposed to have two bolts but I hadn't seen anything yet in 20 or thirty feet. As I slung the chicken heads, I weighted them with the cams and biners on my rack so the movement of the rope as I went up wouldn't work the slings off. I slung three chicken heads and climbed about 50 feet before I came to a very lovely, shiny new bolt; the first non-rusty 3/8 bolt I had seen on the route yet. I continued up and 30 or 40 feet later the ramp intersected another dike and I found a wonderful site, two bolts, both of them new and a nice ledge to stand on. Breathe in...and out. I looked down at my harness and found that I had two lonely biners left. I had used everything I had to weigh down the slung chicken heads. I put a clove hitch in each biner and equalized the system before putting Kat on belay.
I stood in that dimple for at least ten minutes or longer considering options. I could down climb the dike I had just came up, 50 feet back to the bolt. Not a good option. I could stay here and call YOSAR (Yosemite Search and Rescue) and find myself being rescued off a moderate that is euphemistically referred to as a hike. I'm proud enough to say that my ego wouldn't let that happen. Or I could keep climbing. I called down to Kat and told her that I was going to continue climbing and that she should breakdown the anchor and start up simul climbing as soon as the rope came taught. This would leave 200 feet of rope between us and one rusty bolt and a red alien. Not ideal but better than down climbing that sketchy slippery dike. Before I started up I called by down to Kat, "Tell that other party not to follow us, oh, and don't fall!"
The ramp was 5.2 and very easy for me, but I gripped like crazy knowing I could be pulled off if Kat made any slip. The ramp also offered chicken heads. These are rocks protruding out of the face enough so that I was able to take slings and girth hitch them. The ramp was supposed to have two bolts but I hadn't seen anything yet in 20 or thirty feet. As I slung the chicken heads, I weighted them with the cams and biners on my rack so the movement of the rope as I went up wouldn't work the slings off. I slung three chicken heads and climbed about 50 feet before I came to a very lovely, shiny new bolt; the first non-rusty 3/8 bolt I had seen on the route yet. I continued up and 30 or 40 feet later the ramp intersected another dike and I found a wonderful site, two bolts, both of them new and a nice ledge to stand on. Breathe in...and out. I looked down at my harness and found that I had two lonely biners left. I had used everything I had to weigh down the slung chicken heads. I put a clove hitch in each biner and equalized the system before putting Kat on belay.
Kat made it up to the belay and after 500 feet of climbing this was our second belay. We laughed at the situation we had just escaped knowing that it could have ended 100 times worse. Deucel Dike had now intersected with Snake Dike and we were home free. From here the climbing was no more than 5.4 and the run out bolts of Snake Dike paled in comparison to what we had just climbed. We continued simuling for another 300 feet or so before unroping on the low angle dome and finishing the hike on the fiction slab.
The top of Half Dome was a welcome site and we had beat many of the tourist hikers to the top. We spent about a half hour at the top, taking in the sites, snapping photos and drinking water. When we headed down the NE face, the cables were crowded with tourist white-knuckling the railings. Wanting to move fast, Kat and I opted to descend on the outside of the cables, hiking down the slab fast enough to leave the jaws of the tourist wide open and gasping at us out loud. I must say I kind of enjoyed that. Once off the cables, we through on our running shoes we sherpaed up the wall and started the brisk 9 mile jog back to the valley floor, pack and rope on our back. Yes we're crazy. No I don't know why.
On the car ride back to the bay the next day, we discussed the scariest part of the simul climb. Apparently, while Kat was on the 5.9 dike and above the only rusty bolt on that section of the climb, she slipped and had caught herself. I'm not sure if I had reached the one bolt on the ramp at this point yet but it would have been close. It scares me to think that we could have had 200 feet of rope between us and nothing but 3 slung chicken heads, one of which had come loose by the time Kat even got to it. Later on while researching Deucel Dike, apparently John Middendorf was short on bolts when he put up the route so he only used single bolts for the belays and nothing in between leaving the leader to climb the entire pitch unprotected above a single 1/4' bolt belay. Not sure which was more dangerous, the way we climbed it or the way the FA team put it up. Regardless, it's not a climb I'm itching to repeat but one I'm glad to add to my resume. Thank God.
On the car ride back to the bay the next day, we discussed the scariest part of the simul climb. Apparently, while Kat was on the 5.9 dike and above the only rusty bolt on that section of the climb, she slipped and had caught herself. I'm not sure if I had reached the one bolt on the ramp at this point yet but it would have been close. It scares me to think that we could have had 200 feet of rope between us and nothing but 3 slung chicken heads, one of which had come loose by the time Kat even got to it. Later on while researching Deucel Dike, apparently John Middendorf was short on bolts when he put up the route so he only used single bolts for the belays and nothing in between leaving the leader to climb the entire pitch unprotected above a single 1/4' bolt belay. Not sure which was more dangerous, the way we climbed it or the way the FA team put it up. Regardless, it's not a climb I'm itching to repeat but one I'm glad to add to my resume. Thank God.