Sometimes climbing routes are named after the people who first climb them, like the famous run-out route called Bachar-Yerian, or the classic long route on the Sentinel, the Steck-Salathe. Others are part of a theme; like Strider, Middle Earth, Hobbit Book, and Galadriel all located on Mariuloumne Dome in Tuolumne. Others are part of a story that has something to do with the first ascent. Gadzooks, the route that Bruce Bindner, Em Holland, Tom and I put up at Fresno Dome is one of these.
Tom and I went to Fresno Dome for the first time as part of a Memorial Day party thrown by Chris and Pat at their place just outside of Oakhurst. There is an enormous potential there for new routes, and we spotted a few lines that looked promising. One line in particular, looked interesting, but would probably need a bolt to protect the move over a two foot roof. A few weeks later, we were back, Bruce’s bolt kit firmly in hand, ready to get to work.
Setting off into the unknown, starting from the ground up to see what you will find, is always a somewhat daunting proposal. When I get on a climb, it is nice to know ahead of time where it goes, and how hard it is. I’ve become dependent on the descriptive route topos provided in guidebooks that tell you where the hard moves are, how hard they are, and what the climbing is like. On a new route, you don’t have the benefit of any of this information.
Bruce did the real work, setting off with a certain amount of trepidation up the previously unclimbed (or at least, undocumented) line. The lower moves are protected with trad gear, and Bruce went up and down placing, and the testing the gear before climbing higher to inspect the big roof. It was a reconnaissance mission, he had almost no gear to protect the climb, and no rope to bring more up. Then, inexplicably, he pulled the roof, making moves that would be incredibly difficult to reverse. No protection to continue upward, and blocked by difficult moves from returning to the ground, he stood, wide-eyed, above the lip, echoing the thought behind our wide-eyed and open-mouthed stares. “What am I going to do now?”
Ultimately, Bruce took himself off-belay, and then lowered a loop of the rope that he was climbing on to pull some gear up. Because he didn’t have any gear to construct an anchor for himself, a broken hold or balance bobble would have meant falling to the ground, but fortunately, the climbing above the roof is very easy, and he was able to find a good stance a bit higher where he was unlikely to fall during the maneuver. He ultimately drilled two bolts on the route; one at his stance above the roof, and another on rappel, right above the roof to keep the rope from dragging across the edge if the second fell before making it to the easier climbing above. Tom seconded him, and then I re-lead the climb, using the gear that Bruce had already placed. We all agreed that it was around 10b, although we disagreed somewhat exactly where the hardest move was.
I don’t know of any themes at Fresno Dome. The Binder-Lambert-Ho-Holland route doesn’t really roll off the tongue, and the perfect word for the thought on everyone’s mind after Bruce pulled the roof for the first time, is Gadzooks.
