The Zodiac Wall on El Capitan - Part 2

Written by Peder Ourom

Photo of Peder Ourom and Matt Taylor, the Zodiac Wall, El Capitan, Yosemite Valley, California. 1979.

And then we were in the Valley. I can’t remember why we picked the Zodiac route. A Charlie Porter masterpiece, it was steep, hard, and dangerous. We would be pushing our limits. A more sensible route would have been the Triple Direct, or the Nose (that I had retreated from already in the nailing the stove leg with pitons era way back in 1977), both would have been much safer options. We wanted a more challenging aid route, and the draw of a Charlie Porter solo masterpiece route was irresistible. It would be around the 10th ascent if we completed the route, all previous climbs had been by very experienced teams. To summarize, a couple of rookie Canadian kids were going to commit to one of the hardest climbs in the world. We wanted a climb that would be the climbing equivalent of a moon landing, not just a lap around the earth.