Golden Opportunities

Work hard, play hard, love life.....that's our definition of a KAVU day

By KAVU

January 10^th, 2017

There are 8760 hours in each year

I find myself slightly disappointed when I hear of folks changing jobs without a gap or adventure in between. I fully understand life has a way of becoming complicated quickly – however for those without significant responsibilities to others, the time in between jobs presents a golden opportunity.

-Austin Bowlin

i wanna make em count

In October I decided to leave my job in California and return to Washington where my roots run deep. The timing of my departure coincided perfectly with peak season in Yosemite – which may or may not have been a coincidence… The objectives consisted of numerous valley classics, unfortunately the weather had a different plan in mind. We called an audible and laid rubber over Tioga pass to seek out sun in the Eastern Sierras.

After a couple casual days in Bishop playing around on sport routes in Owen’s River Gorge later, we decided to venture a bit higher up to sample some Sierra Granite. The autumn colors and bright blue skies paired together as well as one would expect them too.

........gave us a taste of granite and make us hungry for more.

.....we saw a positive forecast in Yosemite with 3 days left in the trip. Time to blitz back to the valley. Arriving early in the morning, we caught some soft light on our main objective. Half Dome looked spectacular in its rose-colored veil from the morning light.

time is always, now

We packed up, racked up and pushed up the “death slabs” to the base of the Half Dome. Somehow I got off trail and paid a price equal to exactly one hour plowing uphill through dense manzanita shrubs. The first glimpses of the wall from below made it seem three times larger than from the valley floor. Fortunately, we were treated to a perfectly clear night as we bivied at the base of the wall.

Our goal was a single day push up all 23 pitches of the Regular Northwest Route on the face of Half Dome - a “North American 50 Classic” and arguably one of the most significant routes to the history of Yosemite climbing. We expected 14 hours of continuous climbing. I was mentally prepared for 18 hours. It ended up taking us 20 hours from the base to the summit. Needless to say, taking photos on the route was not our highest priority as this was both my partner and my first Grade V climb. However we were nothing but smiles the entire way up and captured the exhaustion with an appropriately dark and hazy photo once we topped out.

loving life

In the end our trip satisfied the adventure I craved, for now; a desire that can be difficult to satisfy when working the 9-5. The week threw some curve balls our way, but we rolled with the weather and had a great time. There’s no better time to get out and get KAVU than when you’re between jobs, but really, it’s a mentality that should be embraced all the time. Scheming up the next trip, day trips with the dog, cragging with the girlfriend, beers and stories with friends or week long expeditions – it really doesn’t matter – just get out there and embrace the KAVU.