In mid-January, 2016, I stepped into aid ladders for the first time. I had just met my friend Henry a few days earlier. He was circling the Hidden Valley Campground loop in Joshua Tree, looking for someone to share camping with. I had a spare parking spot in my site, but was hoping that a dirtbag princess would fill the vacancy. After a moment of hesitation, I agreed to let Henry fill the spot. It’s been a classic climbing bromance ever since, complete with many memorable climbing trips.
A few days after meeting Henry, a number of us, Henry included, wandered out to Asteroid Crack, a 5.13a finger/tips crack (more of a highball boulder really), to try our hand at aiding. In typical gumby style, I clipped my ladder improperly into the non-weight bearing release strap on my adjustable daisies. Luckily, I made it to the top of the 30 foot crack without daisy whipping and potentially taking a bigger than expected fall. I was hooked, and have been making autumn big wall trips to Yosemite Valley the last couple years to further develop my skills.
My first aid lead on Asteroid Crack in Joshua Tree N.P. January 2016.
Fast forward to the present, and I’m living in Yosemite for half the year as a Climber Steward. Henry, living only a few hours away in Oakland, is able to visit fairly often. Since our 2016 trip, Henry has become a very skilled trad climber. Fresh off a successful free climbing season in Indian Creek, he was stoked to join me in Yosemite to pick up aid climbing and get up his first big wall.
I wanted my first wall with Henry to be a bit of an adventure. Washington Column has a number of good intro wall routes, such as the South Face and The Prow, but I had climbed both and they tend to be a bit crowded. One of our Climbing Rangers, Brandon Adams, had completed the first clean ascent of Laughing at the Void on Ribbon Falls Wall in the winter of 2014. After talking with him about the route I knew I wanted to challenge myself and go for another clean ascent. At C3+ the route seemed like a good fit. I had done some C3 aiding on the Zodiac, The Shield, and The Muir Wall, and was stoked to test those skills on something with slightly harder aid climbing. Laughing at the Void seemed to provide that challenge, and with half of the six pitches being C1 and C2, it would be a perfect wall to do with Henry, who had yet to get up a wall.
On June 26, 2019, we got a late start on the hour long approach up to the route. For a lesser traveled wall, the approach to Ribbon Falls Wall was well defined and easy to follow. After filtering water from Ribbon Creek and packing the pig, we were ready for a lunchtime start. Our plan was to have Henry lead the C1 and C2 pitches which were pitches 1,2, and 6, and for me to lead the central 3 pitches which were C2+ to C3+. Our goal for the day was to get to the top of pitch 3, set up a hanging portaledge bivy, and fix pitch 4, the crux pitch, from the portaledge before sunset.
Pitch 1, at C1, seemed pretty straightforward; however, there was a reachy move about halfway up the pitch which gave Henry some pause. After talk of potentially spicy hook moves to get to the next fixed piece, I tagged Henry up my Metolius nut tool. It’s the nut tool with the holes for tightening bolts and makes an excellent mini stick-clip as it is rigid steel and you can clip a ladder to one of the holes and use it as an improvised six inch stick-clip. The trick worked and Henry efficiently got us through his first two pitches on the wall in good time. Pitch 3 – my first pitch – started as a cruisy bolt ladder with a few hook moves in between bolts for the first hundred plus feet of the pitch. The fun of the route begins at the final third section. The highlighted feature of the route, which starts near the top of pitch 3, is a beautiful, thin splitter, stretching over 150 feet and ending at a bolt ladder near the top of pitch 4. This splitter drew me to the route as Brandon had described it as what The Shield headwall splitter must have been like before it got pounded out.
I had placed beaks before on The Shield, but mostly hammered placements, and never more than one or two hand placements in a row. The top of pitch 3 is where I really started trusting multiple hand placed beaks. Some seemed so bomber that if I gave them a palm slap, I felt confident they would hold a decent lead fall. It was the perfect setting to learn as the seam starts above bolts and sports a clean fall. I reached the anchors atop pitch 3 with no issue, fixed the line for Henry, and started to haul. The belay consists of three bomber bolts and a crack to the left which took bomber cams – perfect for organizing a hanging bivy. Within minutes we had the portalege set up on a gear anchor in the crack to the left, backed up by the leftmost bolt, with our pig docked on the right-most bolt at the right end of the portaledge for easy access. Even though we were only three pitches up the route, the bivy felt exposed as it was situated 1000 feet or more above the valley floor, with great views looking out towards Bridalveil Falls and The Cathedrals. It was going to be an awesome first night on a big wall for Henry.
The Golden Beak, near the top of pitch 3 on Laughing At The Void.
After setting up camp, we still had three hours of light to fix the 180 foot crux pitch. As I led above the portaledge, I found mostly thin, body-weight-only gear in the seam for the first 20 feet. Henry’s look of worry increased the higher I got above the portaledge without a good piece, which provided me with great entertainment. Finally, I got a bomber cam placement and Henry sat down and enjoyed a comfy belay as I worked my way higher and higher up the seam. The crux pitch was never too spicy as the endless string of hand placed beaks was punctuated at perfect intervals by the occasional bomber cam. The crux of the pitch came about 100 feet up where the seam begins to change direction from straight vertical to diagonally up and right, and then abruptly goes dead horizontal back left before continuing vertical again. This section required quite a few hand placed beaks in a row, as well as the trickiest beak placements of the pitch in the left trending horizontal, which was quite thin and shallow. A fall here would have been quite long, potentially ripping out a string of beaks, but clean, as the climbing was quite steep, with no ledges below. After bounce testing (and popping) quite a few beaks, I finally found one that cammed into place perfectly in the horizontal. I committed to the piece and quickly beaked through the crux. I made my way to the bolt ladder which took me to the pitch 4 anchor. I was stoked to fix the rope and rap back down to our camp with the hardest climbing behind us, or so I thought.
Henry looking slightly concerned that I would whip onto him and flip the ledge.
That evening we enjoyed clear skies and perfect views of the West Face of El Cap, The Cathedrals, Bridalveil Falls, Leaning Tower, and Fifi Buttress. For dinner I had my typical big wall meal of Tastybites, summer sausage, and cheddar in tortillas, with Chips Ahoy for dessert. Henry obliged me by giving me the outside half of the portaledge, which is my favorite side to sleep on.
After a good night’s sleep, Henry and I enjoyed yet another casual start, as we had only two more pitches to Rainbow Ledge, the route’s terminus. We both executed the portaledge wag bag poops cleanly and packed up the ledge and haul bag. We left the pig and ledge atop pitch 3 as we would be rapping the route and planned to grab them on the way down. After ascending the fixed line from the day before, I racked up and prepared to lead my last pitch of the route, pitch 5. Looking up from the bolts, the pitch looked ugly. After the first move- a bolt above the belay- the pitch entered a dirt and grass filled water groove with a dirt choked thin seam in the back. Awkward climbing to say the least. Before leaving the bolt above the anchor, I warned Henry to move from the right end of the 3 bolt anchor to the left, as there was a serious risk of ass-hatting him if I ripped a piece early on in the pitch. Upon entering the water groove, I realized it was going to be slow going. I needed to garden almost every placement, many of which were hand placed beaks, by first cleaning the seam in the back of the groove with my nut tool as I ascended the feature. About 25 or 30 feet up the pitch, I stepped onto a beak in the dirty groove. It popped as I shifted my weight onto it, and then the next one popped, sending me onto a number three Camalot with two perfectly cammed lobes and two that were almost open in the flarey groove. I had placed a screamer on the cam because it looked like garbage, and the screamer deployed completely. Before I knew what had happened I was next to the belay, barely grazing Henry’s right shoulder as I came to a rest. If I hadn’t told him to move to the left bolt at the beginning of the pitch, I would have ass-hatted him for sure.
Luckily, unlike the crack, which was dirty as hell, the fall was clean and I was uninjured. I jugged back to my high point, and backed up the number three with a couple cams below it, and tried again. This time I was able to aid through the section without falling, but the gardening continued for quite a ways. At one point I removed a two inch thick dirt clod from the groove, revealing a bomber fixed piton! I was excited to finally have a good piece. Near the end of the pitch the difficulty eased, and I was able to bust out of the ladders and free climb for the first time on the route as there was some easy 5.6/5.7 climbing to the anchors. Although the pitch was not the longest or hardest (according to the topo anyways), it was the most demanding for me due to the gardening and awkward nature of climbing a water chute on ladders, and took me a strenuous and dirty three hours to lead. I was happy to be done and hand the lead over to Henry who had a single 90 foot pitch of C1 and 5.7 climbing to take us to Rainbow Ledge.
Atop Rainbow Ledge at the top of Laughing at the Void.
Henry led the pitch in no time, and shortly thereafter I joined him on the appropriately named Rainbow Ledge, where for the first time on route we had a complete view of Ribbon Falls, which was sporting a double rainbow at the bottom of the falls in the early afternoon sun! After mutual congratulations and a handful of goofy selfies, we rapped the route in four double rope raps without any rope snags, grabbing our bivy gear halfway down. Our climb was a hammerless success and with a memorable hanging bivy, portaledge poops, and a whacky whipper that nearly resulted in an unpleasant ass-hat, would no doubt be a memorable first wall experience for Henry.
I would like to recommend Laughing at the Void as a route for aid climbers looking to challenge themselves at the C3 grade. The route features bomber hardware and clean falls, and is an ideal setting for those looking to test themselves with hand placed beaks. I encourage climbers to leave the hammer in the bag, or at home, as the highlight of the route, pitch 3 and 4’s beautiful seam, is still relatively pristine, and has enough bomber gear between hand placements to go clean relatively safely.