New Yosemite Bigwalls: The Complete Guide on sale now!

Can anyone who is familiar with the book give me an idea of what percentage of the 300 routes are given a clean rating? 2/3? 1/3?

Wondering if it'd be worth the buy for someone with no interest in nailing, but plenty of interest in C-rated lines.

Sirius wrote:Can anyone who is familiar with the book give me an idea of what percentage of the 300 routes are given a clean rating? 2/3? 1/3? Wondering if it'd be worth the buy for someone with no interest in nailing, but plenty of interest in C-rated lines.

I was stoked to pre order, but why would I want to get dinged for helping out? $55 for a $30 book and a "$15" E-book???? I'll wait and see it in person, probably won't do anything that isn't in the Supertopo book anyways. . .

this is why i haven't ordered it yet. i don't own the supertopo, but i dont need the ebook and the real book, i just want the real book. but not for $55.

Thank you for your questions.

Yes, there is no way to preorder the book for $30 at this time, because we're trying to raise the money for the printing so are asking people to order the ebook and print book together. Considering that the book will be at the printers for 4 months, and if you have the ebook you will have access to every page, all 300 topos, that is (we hope) a good deal for anyone who pledges.

Re: how many of the 300 routes are given clean ratings? Every route that has gone clean has the clean rating, and every pitch with a known clean rating is shown as both an A and C rating the same as the current ST guide. So you get the same style guide just over 5 times as many routes.

Please keep the questions coming. I'm happy to help in any way.

regards,
erik sloan

Hi Skitch,

I understand you're concerns. For sure, helping out means helping out. If you want to contribute to a guide coming out that has 5 times as many routes as the current guide in its third edition, then our project might appeal to you. If not, or you already bought a bigwall book and probably won't do any routes other than the ones that are in it, we understand--that's why we're breaking the guidebook mold and putting every route's topo for free on our website. I recommend you at least check the topos on our website as most climbs have been significantly updated.

Yosemitebigwall.com

Climb Bigwalls! Live it up!

regards,
erik sloan

Thanks Dholte,

If you don't currently own a guide and want to just check out the book, we offer the ebook for $20. The revenue from these sales will help us print the book.

If you're completely new to bigwall climbing, I recommend you just check out the topos for free on our website: Yosemitebigwall.com.

All the best,
erik sloan

Hi Kurt Burt,

My name is Erik Sloan. I've climbed over 130 bigwall ascents in Yosemite. Nice to meet you.

Which route specifically are you referring to?

Our guide contains all the routes with available topos to Yosemite. You can check them out for free on our website: yosemitebigwall.com

regards,
erik sloan

thanks for the reply erik, thats probably better for me, as i want to do my first big walls this summer.

I have a copy of the ebook and I'm very impressed by quality and number of topos. The two authors have done a heck of a job. The rack suggestions are dated which really helps planning the hardware.

If you are looking for a big wall guidebook for the valley that includes routes other than just the most popular ones then this is the book for you. Its a great compliment to the Supertopos.

Repeat Post:

Please contact me if you do not get a confirmation email with your ebook within 24 hours of your pledge.

We are having a fair number of issues with the fundable.com site logging pledges inaccurately and we are doing our best to remedy it, but I'm sure a couple emails have been missed. erik@yosemitebigwall.com

Thanks for the props John! Special thanks to Roger Putnam who made this edition so amazing, to Tom Lambert of Ideawrights.com, Ultraskier.com for his amazing support and advice, and to Don Reid for his pivotal and continued enthusiasm for our project. Woot!

I might have to get a second printed copy.

When the books are out in the spring how will I be able to get a second copy?

I hope there will be enough printed. I wonder what the minimum order is for the first printing.

Thanks for being a Jerk Kurt Bert. Just makes me by another.

DoesNotCare wrote:I was stoked to pre order, but why would I want to get dinged for helping out? $55 for a $30 book and a "$15" E-book???? I'll wait and see it in person, probably won't do anything that isn't in the Supertopo book anyways. . .

Don't worry guys. We're printing either 2500 or 5,000 copies. So there will be enough for several years ;)

Talked to Roger today and we were both surprised by any suggestion that our book does not promote clean climbing. We gave ranger Jesse McGahey a 3 page article about the rules and regulations of climbing in Yosemite. We even have a 'Essential Yosemite gear' Page, which I've attached here for you to check out.

Hi Gang,

Our fundraiser ends at 11pm EST tomorrow night. Thank you to everyone who has contributed. I am so humbled that the climbing community has gathered around this project, so wanted to share a little more about the back story of how this guide came about.

As many of you know I wrote the 2nd edition of the Supertopo book with Chris Mac. We were close friends from 1995-2005 and did many, many bigwall climbs together. I also helped Chris out a lot with the first edition of his Supertopo book, just as a close friend who was passionate about bigwalling. Chris was my ambitious little brother; I was happy to stay anonymous. We were both super bummed about how inaccurate the Reid guide was. Props to Chris for doing something about it at such a young age(his first edition came out when he was 19!).

I was always on Chris to make a comprehensive book. He would counter that it wasn't viable from a business perspective. That seemed unacceptable to me, but it would be a decade before I would do anything about it.

In 2003 when we were working on the second edition, I argued hard that we should suck it up and include many more routes in the book, even if we hadn't climbed them all. But Chris had moved on to publishing many guidebooks by that time and only had a limited amount of time to dedicate to the bigwall book.

By 2008 everyone in Yosemite was understandably sick of hearing me complain about the lack of a good bigwall guidebook. My good friend Tom Lambert mentioned to me one day that with sites like 99designers.com, it seemed possible that even someone with a bunch of pencil drawings could get the publishing help cheaply that could result in an awesome printed guide. I was intrigued, and drew my first map shortly there after: Lost World on El Cap's SW Face.
Suddenly, the possibility of a complete bigwall guide seemed more than possible, it seemed likely!

By 2009 I was working at the Mountain Room Bar, living in the Valley, and making topos in my spare time. Chris contacted me about doing the 3rd edition of the Supertopo book with him. I agreed as long as he gave me more freedom to choose which routes went into the book. Chris hadn't done any real bigwall climbing in the Valley since the early 2000s, opting instead to just show up and do one day ascents of the Nose and a couple other routes he had done a bunch. So I felt pretty confident that I was a better lead for the project, having lived in the Valley for 9 years and being still totally immersed in a 'hike the base, chill in the meadow, bivy on every route you can,' bigwall lifestyle. When I lived in Yosemite I didn't go to the fixed lines on Cookie Cliff to minitraxion. I went hiking to the base of El Cap instead. Bigwall climbing is the most powerful outdoor activity I've ever done, and I love losing myself completely in that wonderment.

Pretty quick Chris decided that me being in charge wasn't going that well, and told me that he was going to do the third edition of his book with someone else. We had already agreed that we would just use the topos I was making for my new yosemitebigwall.com site for the book, and that I would just continue on making a complete guide on my own, so not that much changed in my world. I kept working my day job to pay for my time researching, exploring, climbing, restoring, and topoing awesome bigwall routes in the Valley.

By 2010 when I met my wife Suzanne in the Valley the book was progressing at a fit snail's pace. I was too easily distracted by replacing the aging bolts on a route that I would climb, to commit fully to finishing the book on a timeline. I was happy for it to come out when it did. It was a hobby that I worked on when I could, and didn't feel a lot of pressure to get it done.

In 2011 my son Austin was born. Best thing that ever happened to me and Suze. Kids are the best! I had a lot less free time, but started getting much more motivated to work on the book as Suze wanted us to move away from Yosemite.

By 2012 it was time for me to buckle down and get the book done. I had been talking with Don Reid, the previous author and longtime climbing guide in Joshua Tree National Park, off and on about working out a partnership. Finally, Suze, Austin, and I just drove down to Joshua Tree in June so that we could all meet face to face. Don and Karen welcomed us into their home, and a great friendship began. Don's support for this project has been crucial.

By 2013 we had moved to Boulder, CO, and it was really time to finish the book. Suze had moved out and filed for a divorce. I was super broke. It didn't look good for my labor of love project that was projected to bring in just a couple thousand dollars a year in royalty money.

Then Ken Yager of the Yosemite Climbing Association called out of the blue to offer me a job at the El Cap bridge on the Ask A Climber Program. As hard as it was to leave Austin for a few months, I packed my bags excited to finally have the opportunity to finish this monster bigwall guidebook.

Once I was back in Yosemite, things started going a lot better. I ran into a longtime friend Roger Putnam, who had encouraged me early on when I started making topos. Roger had just finished a master's degree for an El Cap Geological mapping project( news.nationalgeographic.com…). He mentioned that he was in between jobs so I quickly offered him a full time i-owe-u position as Yosemite Bigwalls chief map maker. Thankfully for all of us he agreed.

After years of working through the kinks of figuring out how the guidebook should be alone, Roger quickly showed me the most efficient systems to make it happen. Incredbly, we finished the content of the book in just four, working-around-the-clock months.

I've lived simply my whole life, so when I started this project I thought 'I've never taken a loan(and have great credit), so when the book is done I'll just take out a loan for the printing'. Because of my divorce when the time came that was no longer an option. So when my good friend Tom Lambert, whose enthusiasm sparked this project(and who provided hundreds of ours of counseling and web expertise along the way) suggested an online fundraiser to cover the printing costs. I knew this was my only hope.

So I truly thank everyone who has contributed to this project along the way, and for those whose pledges have allowed us the Yosemite Bigwall community to realize an important goal: finally having a complete guidebook.

And with Yosemitebigwall.com we have done something truly unique--created a real online library to bigwall climbs on our public lands. Thanks to all of the folks who have contributed topos, photos, corrections, and stoke! Woot!

humbly,
erik

My Valley Bigwall Resume: From '94-2013 I've climbed over 130 bigwall ascents in the Valley, climbed El Cap 85 times, and with awesome partners have replaced over 2,000 old bolts on bigwall routes.

More fun facts:
I've only ever led one 5.10a pitch in the Valley, The Surprise at Five Open Books.
I've never been to Cookie Cliff.

Erik thank you for your story, I am happy to support your guidebook even if I never make it up a big wall in my life!

I do have a question. On the website it says the e-book will be received within two days of a pledge. I pledged more than two days ago and have not received the book. I wonder if you meant to say "two days after the close of the fundraiser?" If so, that's fine. I just want to know.

Edited to add: Erik got back to me by email right away and I have my e-book. Thank you Erik!

Hi Seth,

Thank you so much for contacting me. We've been dealing with an issue with the fundable site where certain pledgers are being logged at random times, instead of in chronological order. I've posted an update on the fundable site, as well as posts on the online forums(earlier on this thread ;). Epic! So great to meet you and thank you so much for contributing to our campaign.

Erik - what a story. I ran into you and Roger just below the great roof in September (I still have your draw btw...). Best of luck with the book! I'll be psyched to pick it up when it comes out.