The Prow

By: David McAlister

Ascent with: Dan Beaman

June, 1999 Dan and I had the hot idea to climb one of the trade routes on Washington Column, The Prow. I must say it was a most enjoyable climb with only a couple of mishaps and no partner squalls. Here is a break down as I saw it, pitch by pitch.

Pitch 1

The day before the wall we drove into the valley and humped the loads in. This is a grueling task in itself, and took all day. Dan was able to climb the first half of pitch one that night in the dark, which gave us a head start on the next day. We blasted off early the next morning, and jugged the fixed line from the previous night. Dan lead the remaining half of this pitch while I hauled the bag and got shit ready to go.

Pitch 2

I found this pitch to be extremely fun, supposedly it was A2, but I found it fun. Tons of cam moves (cam hooks would have been useful), fixed gear, and couple of hook moves lead to the belay under the small roof.

Pitch 3

Dan led this pitch, but it went pretty quickly. He seemed to enjoy it and all.

Pitch 4

This pitch went extremely fast for me. Since it has been so generously rebolted, I felt solid just running up the bolt ladder. The fixed heads ending the route were kind of manky, and I had to replace the last one. It ended in a solid two bolt hanging belay.

Pitch 5:

The start of this pitch got Dan a little excited, and he didn%apos;t like all the fixed manky heads. After a short section though, it eased up to good and bad mixed bolts.

Pitch 6:

This pitch started out kind of funky with some A2 moves (maybe one or two only) but eased up in the middle to old bolts. Towards the end of the pitch I was required to do some odd top steeping and half free moves to reach some of the fixed gear, this is really saying something since I am 6'3"!! This Belay is where we hung the port-a-ledge for the night and then fixed pitch 7.

Pitch 7:

Since our plan was to combine pitch 7 and 8, Dan fixed this pitch the first day and then jugged the next day to climb pitch 8. It went fairly well, but was odd. Therefore named the "Strange Dihedral"

Pitch 8:

The critical failure in this pitch was that Dan didn"t leave any slings on the dihedral, so when I released myself from the belay, I took a huge swing into never-never land. That really kind of wigged my shit out, watching the rope rub against this edge and all.

Pitch 9:

Aaaahhhh, Tapir Terrace, moving off this ledge was a trip. It started out with some funky free and A0 moves, then moved into some odd A2 stuff. The odd A2 stuff ended in a huge block that was loose. There was no way around this monster, so after 20 minutes of careful deliberation, I trundled the block and yelled ROCK!!! At the top of my lungs! It crashed into the ground with a huge cloud of smoke and loud bang! The pitch eased up a little and I was leaving little pro in the crack, then disaster struck. I found a wide crack that was very hard to get gear into. I looked above and saw another crack leading off to the right, so I had no idea that I was just below the belay ledge. I placed a real bad piece and bounce tested it. It seemed okay, so I proceeded to stand on this piece and back clean the #1 camalot below me. This proved to seal my fate because as soon as I hooked my Fi-Fi into this piece it pulled straight out, sending me on a tumbling 30 foot whipper! My fall was arrested by a green Alien, and only a two lobe placement at that! I took a long break and batmaned back up the rope to finish the pitch without placing the bad piece this time and definitely not back cleaning the #1 camalot.

Pitch 10:

This pitch went up some easy A1 and ended in a 4^th class ramp. Dan got kind of lost looking for the belay, so he setup a natural pro achor. I came up and had to help hump the bag up that 4^th class ramp. It pretty much sucked ass.

Picthes 11-top:

This I did almost all free with some A0 moves mixed in. once at the top, I set the haul off a tree and it was some of the worst hauling I have ever had to do in my life.

We waited until the next day to attempt the descent and we were glad we did. It took almost all day and in the dark we probably would have been tumbling down some death slabs. Everyone always says never attempt this descent in the dark unless you have done it before, and I agree. The secret is to go higher than you think you should, and further than you think you should. The descent is directly below the middle of North Dome, so look for the sandy trough there.

If you are heading out to do this climb, I recommend the first 6 pitches at some of the best, most fun climbing I have ever done. After that, it tends to get a little lose, and shitty, but it is still a good route. Enjoy!