Katherine and I decided we'd leave one pack at the bottom of the climb so she could focus on leading and I'd carry our other pack so that we had food, water, warm stuff and emergency stuff with us on route.

In retrospect, I wish we'd just left both packs at the bottom or I'd hauled the pack below me as it was a pain in the ass through the crux.

Katherine started up the first 5.6 pitch and it basically became immediately apparent that this was going to be an 'old school' 5.8. Gear placements were good, but the rock was seriously steep. I'm a slabby limestone kind of guy - I like low angle friction climbing. This 5.6 pitch was the steepest thing I've climbed all season. The holds were super positive, but climbing was a lot more gym-like than most of what I've done outdoor this year. Still, Katherine wasn't too stressed as looking down she realized if she'd taken a different fork in the route on the way up it would have been easier and the coming pitches followed nice distinct features so hopefully the 5.7 would be a bit friendlier.

It wasn't. In fact, it was overhanging for large chunks of it. Katherine still powered up, but it was becoming pretty obvious that the climbing was not catering to our strengths.

Standing at the bottom of the third pitch, Katherine looked stressed. Like more stressed than I've ever seen her and I've climbed a number of long routes up to 10d with her where she's basically just laughed the whole way.

Maybe it was the rock, maybe it was the cold, maybe it was the absolutely continuous rumble of avalanches across the valley, but things didn't feel fun and relaxed. Instead, we were in 'serious objective mode'. We were double and triple checking everything. Buddy checks were obsessive. Everything that could be backed up was. This wasn't a casual day out, it was a legitimate battle.