[TR] Yosemite Friction Tour - The Grack 10/9/2009

[Plaidman]

Trip: Yosemite Friction Tour - The Grack

 

Date: 10/9/2009

 

Trip Report:

This is when Rick and I were still having fun and had not been beaten to smallness by the Big Valley. The weather was off the charts fantastic. Warm and no wind. We had the route all to ourselves.

 

Video not edited for small ears. Sorry. Just a friendly notice of the content.

 

 

Plaidman

 

Gear Notes:

Standard rack. Which with me is a ridiculous amount of gear.

 

Approach Notes:

Really short and easy.

[billcoe]

Ask Adam and Ujahn how it went for them last June. They did the East Buttress of Middle Cathedral, finished it off relatively quick for it being a long assed route and had come down and started to relax and get all blotto with beer and pizza on the Glacier Point deck. At some point Broken Ankle Chris went wandering by so we sucked him in to coming over to tell us an El Cap or Fred Becky story (these are good when you've been drinking). So he joined the party and started digging into our pizza and beer when the story of my screwed up knee and the Grack center came up. He'd never done the route. I told him what a great route is was, best 5.6 in the world etc etc and as he'd never done it, he's primed to go. They decided that although the boyz had done a long route, and then proceeded to drink our next door table mates under their table, now was a great time to go climbing as every other sane person was back in camp as the sun would soon be setting. So they'd all go out anyway since they could still stand up and it's been such an amazing day....well, that's what I was seeing, and they would try to finish it errrr get on it ...errr find the base, before it got too dark.

 

........it got dark of course. Much like all other days where the sun surprisingly goes down...like... everyday. Adam, who copped the last lead but whom had never even seen the route before, had the opportunity to find the top of Marginal in the pitch dark as the beautiful Grack Center crack ends near the top and he wandered off route on the blank face in the blackness. Which, as we all know as it turns out, wasn't the right place at all! 30 feet of slab downclimbing and pitch black hilarity ensued of course once the boyz caught up to say to him...WTF dude? What ya belaying off of there and the route is over there the other way!

 

In my minds eye it looked like this:

 

I was ready to gimp over to look for them with some extra high def candlepower as it had been dark so long, but they came wandering in late looking for dinner and beer about bedtime, having had a full value day and a grand adventure.

[stevetimetravlr]

Gack!