not much too it - a long hard route on a fall day - we didn't start until the sun hit the wall - dan voted to cut off onto galaxy when we were an hour and a half from dark but it was my lead and i was obstinate (a long drive from pdx afterall!) - the belay i'd set up made it hard to get in the right side of the pressure chamber and i spent a long time in a supertight squeeze chimney to the left - dan finished his pitch to just below the exit crack/roof as it got dark - the belay was too far left for us to haul the pack w/o a 2nd rope, and i spent a long time feeling pissed and stuck - eventually went to prusik but the rope was too skinny for my cords - went skittering off into the inky blackness at one point, rope rubbing across a sharp edge - ah! - climbing by headlamp is not fast - we probably topped out around 1000 or so - was only my 2nd descent off the wall and it was a bit tricker at night - missed the turnoff for traversing over to orbit and the base of the wall - ended up much lower down and had to hike back up a bunch to get the backs - a fun day, it's good to know you can still do the hard shit when the conditions are less than optimal, no?
a great climb - lots of wild places - the step around the edge onto iconoclast - the steep, chossy bit below the belay/cutoff for library ledge - my favorite was leading the double cracks, where i could stem way the hell out on the knife-edge of the dihedral (beacon training in effect!) - the climb def gets harder the higher up you go