Full Mylar Jacket -- The Ho Chi Min Trail

FULL MYLAR JACKET Story by B. B. Bindner Chirps of a bat echo off invisible granite 1500 feet up Middle Cathedral Rock in Yosemite. It is very, very dark. My partner disappeared down our rappel lines an eternity ago. Far below, I can see a ghostly, bobbing orb of light pendulum back and forth across the wall as John scours the night for anything resembling anchors. The gusts of wind serve notice of an impending storm as I use a tiny penlight to probe through the jungle of brambles and inspect our rap anchor one more time: A prehistoric, fixed, rocking SLCD, cams frozen in place, connected to our rope by a filthy, petrified sling of unknown age. This terrifying piece is backed up with a bombproof, three-piece "chicken" anchor which could hold a falling truck. As John rappels, I reach out and add my weight to the rope. The ancient cam holds. "Off Rappel Brutus!" floats up from below. I strip the crack of our back-up anchors, hold my breath, bowels quivering, and slide down into the black void, off the lone, ancient fixed cam. How did we end up here, a third of a mile up a rock face on unfamiliar terrain, in the middle of the night? ******************************­***** May 23, 1996: John Byrnes was in Yosemite, impatient with the recent flooding and frustrated by raptor nesting habits. Our plans for the North Face of the Rostrum had been torpedoed by baby birdies. [Note to add that to my "excuse list".] As I motored into the Valley around midnight, I reflected on how our abilities had diverged since we climbed Astroman last fall: A winter of weekends spent lazing about on portaledges, relaxing in aiders, and cooling my heels on water ice and backcountry snow ledges had left me overweight, understrength, and somewhat burned out. John, ever the hard-core free climber, had no such problems: His intense training this winter had even included a trip to the Cayman Islands, cranking horrific sport routes on the incredibly steep limestone roofs and caves of the Brac. Friday we talked about goals. I related my troubles with motivation, strength and weight, patting my rotund tummy for reference, and John, ever the tactful gentleman, suggested we climb the Ho Chi Minh Trail on Middle Cathedral Rock. The 5.10c cruxes would be within my abilities on a good day, and the 20 sustained difficult pitches of the route offered enough of a challenge to pique John's interest. I was supposedly familiar with the descent, having climbed Direct North Buttress of Middle Cathedral many years ago. The remainder of Friday was spent relaxing on easy short climbs near the road with the rest of a loosely-knit group: Our names read like a thread discussion from Internet's rec.climbing newsgroup: John (formerly known as "Lord Slime") Byrnes, Eric "Loose Cannon" Coomer, Inez "Real Women wear kneepads" Drixelius, Robert "Rodenting on the edge" Ternes, Amanda "too-hot-for-a-sundress" Tarr, and me, Brutus of Wyde. Saturday was yet another rest for John and I. After a crack-o'-noon start and one lead apiece in the Pat & Jack Pinnacle area, we called it a day, bade goodbye to Tuan Quong-Luong and friends on the adjacent route, and retreated to the truck amid spattering raindrops from the afternoon storm. Meanwhile, back at the newsgroup, Inez, Amanda, Robert and Eric were rapelling off Arrowhead Arete in the face of the impending deluge. Evening. Evil Grape and tall tales flowed profusely. I finally stumbled away from the fire and into bed. Sleep was long in coming, and in my unsettled slumber I was tortured by a demon named Uncertainty. May 26. Too soon, the alarm pestered me awake. I started coffee, threw a few last-minute items into Kalahari-the-daypack, and we were off. First light. John led 200 feet up the wall, reaching the end of the rope ten feet from the belay bolts. Another party waited as I powered up his linked chimney pitches, spending excess energy to move fast. I leapfrogged past, combining the next two pitches, carefully crafting my protection to minimize rope drag as I worked my way through the puzzling face moves that are the crux of the Direct North Buttress route. John blasted up to the belay in minimum time, and we re-racked for his pitch. "Awesome lead, Brutus, if that's 5.10b, I wonder what we have in store on the 5.10c!" John never fails to compliment me after a good lead. That, and his willingness to put up with my epics, (not to mention his incredible climbing ability,) are some of the attributes that make him a truly great partner. I reflected on this as he worked his way up a thin, straightforward 5.10 fingertips-only dihedral and traversed a desperate, inobvious 5.8 roof to the next belay. Due to the roof traverse, this was one of few pitches on the route which we chose not to combine. "Thanks for the pro on that traverse, man. That was sweet. What's next?" After I pulled onto the tiny stance and John clipped me to the anchors, we paused for three minutes to munch on a bit of food, take a few swallows of tang, glance at the topo. Then, back to the vertical race. I drew an easy pitch-and-a-half, momentarily startled by the sounds of sirens in El Cap Meadows behind me. "This doesn't look good. I hope those ambulances weren't going to a climbing accident." John muttered, with a note of concern. John's next lead was one of our cruxes. 5.10c face, wild and steep, protected by a 1/4" bolt with some spall sign around the split shaft. Yeech. More crux followed. John, as usual, floated it. The Medevac chopper worked its way up the valley, over the forest, swept in a broad half circle and finally settled down in El Cap Meadows. The wind from its rotors fanned the emerald grass of the meadows outward a multi-hued pattern as it touched down. There it waited, perched like some huge insect, as our day passed by, to evacuate the casualties of an accident on Bev's Tower on Cookie Cliff. Much later (the following week) we would discover that the fatality was someone I knew. My turn yet again. 5.10a, 5.10a. Cool. I could handle that, both pitches. But the second pitch was a dirty, wet dihedral capped by a roof. I emptied the rack into the effort, moving delicately up the filthy corner. Belayed at the end of the rope, 200 feet out. John flew up to stance, arrived wide-eyed, with black ooze dripping down his forearms. "Great lead, Brutus!!" The day, and the climb, continued. The climbing blurred, John and I running the pitches together when we could. A lieback that our topo rated 5.10c lichen stuck in my memory. I chimneyed behind a huge flake to find myself above the crux, 5.9. Another pitch, John's lead, involved runout face moves on the bald edge of nothing to switch crack systems, and struck me as the most desperate on the route. Topo rating: 5.8. Somewhen during the early afternoon the ambulances sirened up to El Cap Meadows, and victims were loaded aboard the chopper to the trauma unit in Modesto. Not a good sign. Summit. Or at least, top of the route. In the waning daylight I opted for a ledge system traversing left, rather than repeat the final four pitches to the actual summit of the rock. I hoped to connect with the Katwalk and have us at the truck by dark. A bad decision, and a vain hope. ******************************­****** As I finally grope my way to the bottom of the 200- foot rappel, I find John at a good stance but with no fixed anchors. Fifty feet below us in the night is a good ledge with a substantial-sized tree. John is on the radio. "KC70NK, KC70NK, this is KB0UNC" "This is KC70NK. Where are you John?" "Glen! we could use your help. We're in the middle of some rappels on the face of Middle Cathedral Rock, and are not really sure of our location. If you could locate a guidebook, we'd like to try to connect with the top of the Kor-Beck or Central Pillar of Frenzy routes and follow those belay stations to the ground." Our friends roll into action on the valley floor, making a valiant effort to assist us, including hiking up to the base of the rock to illuminate the bottoms of the requested routes, spotting our location from El Cap meadows, transmitting beta, and locating knowledgeable climbers who have climbed the routes in question. As we continue to seek information, we rappel to the tree, locate an additional anchor, and set up yet another rappel. Two hundred feet lower, after an eternity in the dark, I stumble onto a traversing flat ledge cutting across the wall to the right, back towards the DNB. Finally a familiar landmark. I remember from a topo of the DNB (which I saw in 1991), that there is a connection to the flat, sandy Powell Reed Ledges where I now stand. I know where we are, at last. We are a long, long ways from the ground, on the only large ledge for a thousand feet. It is now 11:30 pm. John arrives at the ledge. Our council of war consists of few words: "Let's bivy." "OK" He radios the decision to our friends on the ground, and they depart for Crane Flat to pass the information of our whereabouts. A number of climbers sipping brews or wine in camp at Crane Flat, upon hearing the news, snuggle closer to the fire in sympathy. It will be a long, cold night. We burrow into Kalahari to see what, if any, of the knick-knacks therein will help make the six hour ordeal until daylight more bearable: Survival ensolite pads. Wool hats. Fleece jackets and wind/rain shells. "walk-off" shoes and socks. Food. Our remaining 1/2 liter of water. I let out a "YES!" as I find a "Hot-Pad" (a chemical warmer left over from my walls this winter, but the pad turned out to be spent, and useless.) And, good luck for one of us, a mylar "emergency space bag" for forced bivies. We put on every thread of clothing, and I slide my feet into Kalahari. Tonight we are stalked by the demon named Hypothermia. First light. In that eerie land between sleep and wakefullness, we are withdrawn deeply into ourselves, huddling for warmth. Encased in mylar, John resembles nothing so much as a large aluminized caterpillar. The storm has kindly held off, dousing Curry village but leaving us dry. The wind has gusted only occasionally. As the new day gains strength, its grey skies congealed with clouds, we begin to move out of the focused "*NOW*" of an unplanned night out. We can finally look ahead once again. Still shivering, we rub crust from our eyes and glance about, amazed at our unearthly position. A thousand feet of wall remain, then it will be over. The familiar territory of DNB rappels is an easy traverse away. In the growing light of a cold grey dawn, we stretch, cramp, pull the ropes, and pack Kalahari. We munch the last bits of granola bar, drink the last precious drops of water, and resume the march. Soon we will reunite with our friends, luxuriate in a scalding shower, and wolf a huge breakfast. After that, a lazy meadow afternoon stretches before us. It's time to get moving. Our schedule for the day is fully booked. END ..............................­..............................­........................... NOTES: The Direct North Buttress of Middle Cathedral Rock in Yosemite Valley, California is a significant challenge in any climber's career. Depending on whether the summit is reached, this route requires eighteen to twenty-two pitches of sustained free climbing up to 5.10 in difficulty. Climbers who complete the "DNB" in a day have passed a major milestone on the road to hard, long free climbs. From 1986 to 1989, Clint Cummins et. al. established a major new variation on this Buttress. The Ho Chi Minh Trail departs the DNB at the sixth pitch, striking out to the right, straight up the very prow of the Buttress: wild, balancey "over the border" face climbing linking incredible steep cracks ranging from 1/4" tips-only fissures to delicate liebacks, knee-eating chimneys and flared slots. Never harder than 5.10c, the moves seldom feel easier. Even the 5.6 and 5.8 pitches seem desperate. The first continuous ascent was in 1991. IN MEMORIAM: The fatality at Cookie Cliff on May 26, 1996 was Stephen Ross, who died when a piece pulled in a leader fall on Bev's Tower. Stephen was a well- respected and experienced climber, a mentor, and a good friend to many San Francisco Bay Area climbers. The stars in tonight's sky shine for you, Stephen, you have headed out on the greatest adventure of them all. We'll expect one helluva trip report from you when we meet again.