South Face, Washington Column V 5.10 C1, solo 8/07

I had a crazy idea brewing in my head. I told no one and named it the half-man link-up. My goal was to solo the column via the south face and the leaning tower's west face. I began by driving to Bridalveil falls parking lot at 9 PM so I could sleep and start in the morning. Except wait, the parking area has no overnight parking. And the roads are all screwy from construction. That kinda put a hitch in my desire. So I slept in Camp 4, and then slept in too late. Then in my demoralized state I wandered over to the cafeteria with my buddy Rich for coffee. As usual I had way too much caffeine as usual. It gets me mega psyked though.
S0 at 12 pm I set off on my bike towards the awhanee with the goal of still soloing the column as consolation. I ran to the base of the familiar route (my first wall 3 yrs ago almost to the date!) I started up the first pitch with a puny rack and trailing my 70 m rope as I went. I then linked all I could to get going fast, rapping/cleaning every pitch. I took the southern man bypass to avoid the kor roof this time. I didn't know anything about it but took Eric Sloan's advice on it. I don't know if it is better or not. It may be harder to lead but is easier to clean, I'm sure. Once again I entered No-thought and cruised up the remaining pitches in a haze of free and aid climbing. I soloed the final pitch and stopped the clock at the tree.
6:38, fuck yeah! I ran jubilantly down the north dome gully toward certain fame and reward for getting the solo record! Not really, I just emailed Hans and he put it on his website! wink.