DISPATCHES

Chin

I was happy to be up with the ravens today. They seem to accompany any big wall climb and their presence riding the thermals around us is comforting. Life is simplifying again as we are now all focused on the climbing. Wall climbing is a lot of work and besides the climbing, we are also spending a lot of time discussing strategy (i.e. where will we put our first wall camp? our second? how many days should we anticipate for food? water? fuel? what do we do if a particular section is not climbable? etc). We try to use our combined experiences on different walls and expeditions to make decisions, but there are still a lot of unknown variables. In the end, we will place our bets and hope for the best... inshallah!!

Our goal right now is to freeclimb the tower and so far we have been successful. No aiding yet, and so far everybody has onsighted their pitches. We are only a third of the way right now and the climbing begins to look much steeper and difficult.

I woke up this morning and knew I'd kicked my fever. The heat toned down a bit today and Brady and I headed up to fix a few more pitches. Steph followed a bit later. After jugging ascending fixed ropes for what seemed like a very long time, I finally got to lead my first pitch of the trip. Ahhh... adventure climbing. I certainly wasn't disappointed as I tried to maintain equal weight on my four points of contact, knowing that if I put too much weight on any one of the loose flakes and blocks I was stemmed between, I might airmail one on to my very suspecting belayer. The pitch finished out with a really nice finger crack in a corner. The rock is getting better and the tower seems to be getting bigger. We all agree that we are starting to feel like we are climbing on a vertical treadmill.

Brady leads the next pitch and does a proud job, climbing through a difficult overhanging handcrack that leads into a loose chimney. The next pitch is Steph's. I am nervous watching her grapple her way through overhanging, flaring, loose, offwidth sized heinousness. We yell up a few words of encouragement that she probably doesn't hear. Steph gets tough and fires through the pitch by doing some ridiculous kneebars. Through some heavy breathing, she suggests the pitch goes at 5.11.

The grovel factor has been pretty high so far on the route, but the upper two thirds of the wall look very clean and the single crack system going up the middle looks really good. We've climbed over 1000 feet, but the steep and difficult climbing lies ahead.

Meanwhile, back at Base Camp, we've noticed a large gathering of people. Our Base Camp is situated right between Karmading village and Khorkondas village. People seem to be streaming in from both sides, quickly filling our campsite. We are confident that Dave, our ambassador, is making a lot of friends today.

We finish the day in the dark, rappelling down with our headlamps. When we finally get back to camp, we are greeted by Zahid. He is a very consistent man and you can always expect a cup of jasmine tea wih the exact amount of sugar you prefer along with the 'return to Base Camp' questions. "How is condition Jimmy Sahib?" Translation: "how are you feeling?" and "what is tomorrow's program?"

We all gratefully throw down the food he has prepared for us and thank him, getting his usual response of "This is my duty sir, no member happy, big problem coming for Zahid." After dinner Dave explains to us that the special forces captain returned today with gifts of Pepsi, cookies and boxed juices for all of us. Dave also breaks the news that Captain Abdula and his second want to join us on the route. Hmmm, that would be interesting. We certainly don't want to piss off Captain Abdula or the rest of his special forces team members who are hanging out. Maybe we could bring them up for counterweights on our haul day?

Dave is looking and feeling much better now and will be heading up early tomorrow. Two more pitches and we will be at the base of the steep headwall and the beginning of the crack system.

— Jimmy Chin, MountainZone.com Correspondent

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