Scene of the crime. Our route is in red; the yellow dot marks the bivy site at a bit over 12,000ft.
We had been on the move since 3:00 a.m. and were on the route before the sun came up, but after about 4,000 feet of climbing and nearly a mile of traversing, we still had 500 vertical feet to go. Complicated terrain slowed our progress greatly after the sun set. All we knew was that the black stuff was rock and the area with stars was not rock. By midnight I was starting to move so sloppily that simul-climbing was out of the question, and my partner was beginning to nod off at belays. At midnight, at just over 12,000 feet and without bivy gear, we made the decision to stop for the night. For the first time in my 11 years of climbing I committed myself to an open bivy. I couldn’t help but laugh wildly at the absurdity of our situation while we tried to figure out how the two of us were going to sleep on a ledge that resembled a broken park bench with a ridge running down the middle. I cannot remember a colder night, but a few tricks and just enough of the right gear helped take the edge off and let us finish the climb the next morning.