El Chorro 2012: Zeppelin

For the second year running Rich Kasler and I decided on an easter trip to El Chorro, although this year I had promised Rich that I would do a mutlipitch.  Browsing through the guidebook it was obvious that the route had to be the major multipitch classic Zeppelin.  This ten-pitch climb scales the largest section of wall in the El Chorro gorge, with the hardest pitches 4 and 5 at grades 6c and 6c+.  The only similar experience I had of a climb near to this magnitude was a five pitch climb in Thailand (Tonsai beach, Krabi) called humanality over three years ago.  It was exciting to be climbing a bigger multipitch especially with the added exposure of the gorge and therefore we decided to climb Zeppelin on the first day of our trip.  It was the access to and decent from the route that added to the sense of adventure of this climb to make it a truly unique experience.

We decided to brave walking through the tunnels through the gorge and abseil to the start of the route off of a bridge in the gorge.

Rich going over the top of the bridge

The abseil must have been just under 30m and we thought it would be more fun to choose a position where we were free-abseiling in an arch of the bridge.

Me enjoying the view abseiling near the arch of the bridge

From the bottom of the bridge the route started just a minute or two walk away around the corner.  We were armed with a free topo online (to save weight by not bringing the rockfax guidebook) but this was not great and led to a bit of confusion about where the route started as it suggested there were two lines up the face where zeppelin starts (which was not reported in the rockfax book).



View of the gorge from the start of the climb


So the first pitch (Pitch 1: 4+ 20m) lead by Rich went a bit off route and was supplemented by a few nuts and it was nice to eventually find the first belay station.  Naturally I lead the next pitch (Pitch 2:6a 25m) which I found much harder than 6a as the rock was getting sprayed in water from the gorge so I was finding it a but tricky with trusting my feet on the technical slab climb.  Rich found the same problem, made worse with the fact that the second would be carrying the backpack with four litres of water, food and shoes. 

Top of pitch 2, rich making the first moves on pitch 3

The next pitch was nice enough (Pitch 3: 5+ 30m) and exciting because I knew I would be going on to lead the 6c roof pitch next.

Me seconding up pitch 3

The roof pitch was very short (Pitch 4: 6c 20m) and as the guide indicated the last few moves were quite strenuous, but fun climbing and it was nice to be doing a full pitch where you can see and talk to your belayer the whole length!  Rich loves to play with his gadgets and this pitch was suitable to use his pulley to hoist up the backpack so we could let him enjoy seconding this route without the added weight.  I was suprised how effortless this was and if it had been suitable on all pitches I would have done it to save my energy.


Rich climbing pitch 4 looking like spiderman



Me at the top of pitch 4 bringing up the backpack. NB from the camera lense you can see that even at this point we were still being sprayed with water from the gorge

Rich had the pleasure of leading the hardest pitch (Pitch 5: 6c+ 25m) and it felt like I was belaying him for quite a while, and once I was climbing it I could see why as it was all over the place.  The hardest moves were simply moving from the belay station, especially as I was freezing (white  hands) but I managed to keep lunging with full arm extentions and somehow stick the holds and keep going, but with the backpack on me I have to say I would have graded it at least a 7a.  I should have gone on to lead the next pitch (Pitch 6: 5+ 30m) but there was no bolts we could see (except one very rusted one) so Rich lead the route (on trad), after trying a couple of directions and downclimbing - I thought he was a bit of a hero on this pitch given the exposure and the wind with some huge runouts. I went on to lead pitch 7 (Pitch 7:6b+ 25m) which I really enjoyed especially once at the belay station where I was sitting on a ledge with great views of the gorge.

Higher view of the gorge from the top of pitch 7

Pitch 8 was an easy scramble (Pitch 8: 3 40m) along the ridge where we could momenarily escape the wind behind the ridge before coming back on to top of the ridge

Scramble of pitch 8

Pitch 9 (Pitch 9: 6b 35m) was probably my favourite pitch of the climb as it was the most challeging with some arete climbing. I guess it was more challanging than if this were a single pitch as we were starting to become tired from not just climbing but lugging the backpack up with us!  There were nice views again from this belay spot...

Rich on pitch 9, notice the bridge we abseiled from in the background

Pitch 10 was a 65m scramble which Rich lead and split into two pitches as we were using a single 60m rope.  This required his trad rack again.

Us at the top of Zeppelin, I have an excuse for looking a mess having been battered by the wind for the past 10 hours or so...

Unfortunately getting to the top of Zeppelin was not the end of the days adventure.  The decent was pretty hardgoing for tired bodies and so we decided it would be safer to abseil from tree to tree down the decent 'path'.

Rich on the decent from Zeppelin

Then it was just a victory walk back through the tunnels and back to the beloved rental smart car.  We estimate the time from car to car to be around 10-11 hours, a day well spent as it was good for me to put myself out and try something different (from single pitch climbing with minimal faffing and chasing the grade).  We were glad we hadn't left this climb for a rest day from hard repointing as we were thinking about doing, as doing this route fresh still took a couple of days to start to recover and feel human again (but well worth it!).

Rich in the tunnel with another gadget, his beloved headtorch