Yosemite bouldering again. First time in a few years now. Last time was probably with Paul, Paul, and Brando.
Kodai forgot his puffy at the B&B in the morning. He realized it just as we were rolling up to Camp 4. We made our way towards the Wine Boulder, passing Midnight Lightning on the way up. When we rolled up, there was a dude trying Dominator, Jerry Moffatt’s legendary climb. We took a look around and chatted with him a bit.
“Hey dude, do you know where Dying of the Light is? Like the one on the cover of the guidebook?”1
“Yeah, it’s at…2 I just asked some other guy the other day and that’s what he told me.”
I turned to Kodai, “Dude, we should try it out today.”
“Yeah man, it probably has one of the best climbing environments in the world. Like even if you took El Cap out of the background.”
“Does it climb well?”
“Eh, yeah, it’s good,” he said hesitantly.
“Oh by the way, what’s your name? I’m Enoch.”
“I’m Forest.”
We chatted a bit more. Forest was dirtbagging in his van, driving between Bishop and Yosemite. A large snowstorm had blown him here from Bishop.
After warming up, we projected Initial Friction for a while. I honestly thought it wouldn’t be that hard since Robinson’s Rubber Tester isn’t that hard but damn, Initial Friction is on another level of trust your feet and hope you don’t die. It even took Forest a few tries, and he had already done it a few years back.
It was already 2 p.m., and this late in the year, the sun was setting at 5 p.m., so we started packing up to go on a little adventure to the top of a hill.
So we hiked up that hill; we even got a bit lost on the way up. Through the forest, past looming boulders. Hiking, scrambling, hiking, and hiking some more.
And finally, we made it to the top.
So dog-tired, but damn, the view was to die for. I felt like I was dying as my legs screamed; dropping my pads provided a slight reprieve. But it was worth it. El Cap, large and looming in the distance, Yosemite Falls behind us.
And so we begin.
Setup the pads, start trying the moves. Feeling stiff, gotta warm back up, and damn, the landing kinda sucks. Try the top out, kinda spicy but not too hard. Take a break, give a spot, take some photos. Getting warm, finding beta, making links. We were running out of time, racing the sun down. Dammit, I didn’t want to get stuck on the top of this hill in the dark.
Kodai sends, and I can feel the pressure building. So I burn and burn and burn again, but I’m not resting and I’m not sending and the sun is already disappearing under the horizon. But Pitbull has my back and we’re gonna meet him at the Hotel Room Service. And I’m sending, and we’re having the Time of Our Lives. And we’re packing it up, but the sun is already down. And the sky is dark, and we’re probably fucked.
We took it slow on the hike back down, ambling through the dark, trying to find whatever waypoints we could. At one point, Kodai was behind me and he froze.
“My right lens just popped out.”
“Dude, no way,” I turned to yell, “Yo Nate, wait a sec.”
We took a good fifteen minutes looking around on the ground, but we did find it in the end. And then we got lost again. And a few more times before we finally made it back to the trail. From boulder to car, it was one long hour of stumbling around in the dark.
I looked up and I could see the stars.
