June 10-14, 2019

Free Solo: Free solo climbing or free soloing, is a form of technical ice or rock climbing where the climbers (or free soloists) climb alone without ropes, harnesses or other protective equipment, forcing them to rely entirely on their own individual strength and skill.

Alex Honnold had a crazy dream. He wanted to do something that no one else has ever done before. He wanted to free solo climb El Capitan, a 3,200 foot vertical rock formation in Yosemite National Park, California.

I had a similar dream, although mine was much less dangerous. Actually wait, no, mine wasn’t similar at all… well, other than the shared location. I just wanted to go there, see it, and sketch it.

I had watched the movie, Free Solo, about Alex Honnold’s attempt to free solo climb this beast of a mountain, and knew I had to go see it and sketch it for myself.

El Capitan is big. Alex’s friend, and fellow climbing legend, Tommy Caldwell, puts it like this:

El Capitan is unbelievably huge. Kind of unfathomably huge. It’s 3,200 feet of sheer granite. Looking at it doesn’t seem right. It doesn’t seem like you should be able to climb it.

I understand why Alex is obsessed. El Cap has obsessed generations of climbers. I think It was first climbed in 1958 by Warren Harding. And it took them 46 days over 16 months because they couldn’t do it continuously. They had to drill bolts into the granite, and pull themselves up. And then ever since then, it’s been the center of the rock climbing universe.

I’ve spent 20 years of my life climbing El Cap, but I’d never do it without a rope. There’s no margin for error. Imagine an Olympic gold medal level athletic achievement, that if you don’t get that gold medal, you’re going to die. That’s pretty much what free soloing El Cap is like. You have to do it perfectly.

- Tommy Caldwell, from the movie ‘Free Solo’

So on June 10, 14 days, 6 flights, and 10 cities into my tour, I embarked on a 9 hour bus ride from San Francisco to Yosemite National Park.

There was, however, a problem. Well, actually there were two problems. For one, I decided to take a bus from San Francisco to Yosemite, instead of renting a car and going there. A car only takes 3 hours, while a bus takes 9.

The second problem, is that I drastically underestimated the size of Yosemite National Park. When I hear of a park, I’m used to something that you can enter and leave within seconds, or minutes. Yosemite is different. It took a full hour from the time we entered to the park to the time we were able to actually stop in towards the center of the park. I had no idea.

I had booked to stay at the Yosemite International Hostel. Being that it said Yosemite, I assumed it would be pretty close to wherever it dropped me off. Wrong. It turns out, my hostel was over an hour away, and it was past 10 pm when I arrived in the center of the park.

Being that it’s in the center of a massive national park, there are no taxis, no ubers, no rental car places nearby, and all busses stopped exiting the park by 9:30. So I was stuck. I walked a little ways and found the information center. I felt a bit of a panic, kind of like that feeling you get when you’re a teenager, and show up to class on the day a class presentation is due, and you totally forgot to do it.

Inside I was panicking. Where am I gonna stay? Is anything available? If so, how much will it cost? Should I have used a travel agency?… Was this whole trip too ambitious? Am I just an idiot? Amidst these feelings of angst, I remain calm. I tried to sound as friendly and polite towards the receptionist as I could. Maybe she could work something out to help me. I really did not want to just sleep outside on the ground, or have to pull an all nighter.

The good news is, there were some tents available. They were much more expensive than my hostel, but it beat staying up all night. So I got my keys, and I walked through the quiet shadows along the edge of the woods until I arrived at my tent.

After a good night’s sleep, I was able to explore the park over the course of the next few days. I saw breathtaking views along the 4 mile trail, met tons of fun people, hitchhiked down a mountain back to my camp site, and oh yea, I saw and sketched El Capitan.

I learned a few things in Yosemite National Park:

1) ‘Good Things’ can come from ‘bad situations’.

2) Yosemite National Park is way bigger than I thought.

3) It’s helpful to double check the location of where you’re staying when you travel.

4) Life is full of ‘mistakes’ (purposely in quotation marks) that turn into blessings.

If I never would’ve made the decision of riding the bus, and booking a place to stay on the outside of Yosemite National Park, I wouldn’t have been able to feel the adventure and excitement that comes from letting go of control in life. Yosemite ended up being one of my favorite places in the whole tour.

The original thing I saw before watching the movie Free Solo, was this 10 minute documentary from the New York Times about the incredible story of Alex Honnold…

Link: What If He Falls (10 minute video)

I should also add that before I even saw the movie Free Solo, I had already started to become obsessed with the work of photographer, Ansel Adams, a frequent photographer of Yosemite National Park. I bought three or four of his books prior to my travel. Inside the park there is an Ansel Adams shop/ museum.