Goodrich Pinnacle, Right 5.9 R

On Monday, June 13th, Riley Wyna and I climbed Goodrich Pinnacle, Right. It was our first time climbing together and it was good times. Since we had 2 parties below us, we opted for the "optional rap" route as per the ST. We were rapping with a 70m rope and a 5mm pull cord. I led the way down and found the 1st set of bolts right where they should be. I made the next rappel and at 200 feet down, couldn't locate the next set. I swept left and right with no luck. I looked up and saw green webbing on the left side of the pinnacle. I went up and found that it was a piton and an old button head. It was too sketch for my taste, so I kept looking. I swept even further left and spotted a pair of bolts. I was able to get to them only since I was on a 70m rope. However, I realized that the Mountain Shop had not measured my pull cord correctly to 245 feet!!

I shouted up to Riley and he replied with an ingenious idea....tie the ends together and make a loop! Yes! So I did and when I got to the anchors, I was out of rope. I BARELY made it. The anchors were bent from rockfall. I clipped in with a sling and tugged on them. They were acceptable and Riley rapped down. As a precaution, we clipped a runner to the anchor and to the rope so we didn't loose the rope as Riley came off rappel.

We began to pull on the pull cord, but the rope wouldn't budge! Ah Hell! Both ropes were soaked from the runoff that we had to cross. We didn't make any progress. Luckily, I always carry my Wild Country Ropeman ascender and 2 prussiks. We space hauled on the pull cord (rated to 1,400 lbs.) STILL we didn't make any progress. Luckily, there was a fixed line from our anchors to the bottom. However, the weight of the snow pack below pulled on the rope, which allowed for ZERO slack. Riley, as ballsy as he is, tied the pull cord to his harness and down-prussiked the fixed line. PROGRESS!! When the rope came down to me I was able to do a single rope rap to the ground. Woohoo!

We then headed over to check out Haley Daley. We decided to call it a day instead in order to rest up for our ascent of Lurking Fear. After the rap ordeal, we knew we were a good team to take on our first El Cap route!