I Always Wanted to get Paid to Climb, Part 1

I have always wanted to get paid to climb, to be one of those special folk who travels around the world just to work test pieces on new crags wearing shiny near Patagonia gear. Doesn't that sound like a dream? No time-clocks, no uniforms, no customers or bosses- just you and a rock and a camera, ready & waiting to prove to yourself and the world that you can send the route ahead of you. And then once you achieve that project you find somewhere else, something new, something famous, or perhaps something that has never been climbed before. The choice would be mine after all. I must admit that I had always hoped for a sponsorship from some reputable climbing-affiliated company like Petzl or Adidas, but much to my surprise the United States government beat them to the punch. Thanks to the National Shutdown of Federal facilities including National Parks, last week I had plenty of free time to explore the local and regional crags and ring in my 25th birthday pushing myself on to harder, better climbs. And as of this weekend it looks like I will be receiving retroactive pay as one of the 800,000 furloughed workers that you keep hearing about., so on behalf of myself I would like to soak in the ONE positive outcome of this ludicrous shutdown business and thank all guilty parties for providing me with the opportunity to get paid to climb during my furlough. Word.

The first stop on my 2 week-long climbing tour actually began before the shutdown with a trip to Las Vegas last weekend to climb at Red Rocks National Conservation Area where there are thousands of routes to try your hand at ranging from sport to trad to bouldering. An article published in the New York Times had this to say about climbing at Red Rocks:
Since the 1970's, when climbers first came to the area, more than 2,000 rock climbing routes have been pioneered on Red Rock Canyon's tall cliffs and sandstone domes. Recent surveys show that more than 100,000 climbers visit Red Rock Canyon each year, according to Jed Botsford, an outdoor recreation planner with the park. Red Rock is an austere wilderness of arid plains and Joshua trees. Mountain peaks rise thousands of feet off the desert floor. Petroglyphs bake in the sun. Wild burros and desert tortoises track the park's coarse sand. For the rest of the article, click here

My buddy Josh spent all winter climbing at RR and has really hyped it up this summer so we were pretty pumped going into the weekend and ready to climb hard. The weather was perfect for the weekend with temperatures in Vegas dipping as low as sixty, perfect for climbing! The first area we explored was where we would do the bulk of our climbing for the weekend and was called the Black Corridor. The Corridor was well shaded during the day with walls just high enough to be warmed by the glow of the sun. Hiking to the climbing area was half the fun as you leave a well marked trail and disappear into a network of small canyons, gullies, washes and boulder fields before rounding a final corner into the Corridor. Our first day we pretty much had the wall to ourselves and had a super productive day, squeezing in 7 climbs before dusk. The rock was beautifully sculpted and well climbed, chalk marks dotted the sandstone and mapped out the way to the anchors almost every time. I love climbing on sandstone, so smooth and flowing, it just feels natural to be climbing on it, minus the face-fulls of sand you get on lesser climbed routes. But that wasn't ever the case at Red Rocks which sees probably dozens of groups of climbers on any given day.

Our last three climbs of the day were up the canyon at the Hunter S. Thompson Dome, aptly named for the sketch approach requiring a scramble up a narrow fin of red rock and an anchored belay. By the late afternoon the sun was hitting us full on but the warmth was welcomed after the chilly canyon below and I remember feeling pretty infinite during these final climbs of the day, climbing fast and true with warmed and well seasoned muscles. I was ready for tomorrow, ready to climb something less... easy.

The second day we returned to the Black Corridor and pumped out a stemmy 5.9+, a couple of 10s and Kyle and I took a stab at an 11b that Justin and Josh put up. We might have each been practically pulled up by our belayers but we stuck with the climb, didn't give up, and crushed our way through all of the moves to the top of the short, pumpy route. I was on cloud 9 after that, feeling ready to step out of the safety net of 5.8, 5.9 and even 5.10 into more challenges, more problems....harder problems.

Our final day at Red Rocks was short lived although we did manage to get up a trad route over in Willow Springs. Trad climbing differs from Sport climbing in that it is the Traditional style of climbing that you heard about decades ago where the only option for climbing was not clipping into fixed bolts on the rock but placing your gear, piece by piece, into pockets and cracks in the wall and using skill and finesse to secure yourself to the top. Many areas nowadays are generally well bolted, leaving only places where bolts aren't necessary to the traditionalists to continue the fine art of "crack climbing" which thrives in the American Southwest due to the amount of continuous cracks slicing their way through the sandstone. With crack climbing you generally have to thrust your fingers, hand, fist, arm, leg or foot into a crack of any given width and twist it so that when you lean out you are secure. I have only done a couple of trad routes and have not really had a chance to master this skill as it feels extremely awkward and uncomfortable for me. But I digress. We finished off the weekend with some fun time at the Vegas climbing gym before heading back to what we thought was going to be another long week of work.

Continued at Part 2....

I Always Wanted to get Paid to Climb, Part 2

PSYCHE! No work means more climbing! Tuesday, after being officially released from work duties, a bunch of us drove up to this sweet spot on the boundary of Zion for some more red rock sandstone climbing fun and climbed a stemmy corner route surrounded by two wavy walls of sandstone and a couple of harder 10s & easier 11s that were super pumpy and overhanging and SUPER fun!! Zion Adventure Company usually has this spot on lock-down on the weekends running guided climbs and rappels for groups of all ages and size, so hitting the crag up on a Tuesday was perfect! The holds have definitely been overused and felt super fragile, Reuben even broke off a pretty big hold that was literally hanging on by a thread!

Wednesday, hmmm, oh ya, we hit up the local bouldering gym, which I have been sorely missing since the weather has turned perfect for outdoor climbing!!! 

Thursday was my birthday!! The big 2-5, whooo, starting to feel old! : ) But if old feels like more climbing then so be it! And a paid holiday to climb on my birthday, now that is almost a miracle. We headed back west towards St. George then out to Santa Clara where you follow old highway 91 out into a true no-mans-land. The climbing area is called the Utah Hills, named for the swaying hills of limestone that sweep in and out of the landscape before leveling off into a flat abyss of Mohave desert country, the kind of terrain that makes you feel nervous about only having a little bit of water in your car and no cell-service. The terrain is a maze of unmarked BLM roads with rocks so big they will slice right through your tires but once you actually find the crags you will be happy that you made the journey. This particular occasion we chose to meet up at the Soul Asylum Wall that we had heard had some fantastic limestone climbing, and it did! I only hopped on three routes that day but man were they fun! Jagged pinches of limestone jutting out in every direction, little pockets for your feet, and the best weather of the season! Jeans would have been nice because of the sharpness of the rock, but I never mind coming home with a few scratches. The boys kept climbing after I decided to take a rest for the sake of my sore right arm but I had a blast anyway and the sky had fallen well into darkness by the time we finally reached our cars. In fact, on our walk back we rounded a corner out of the wash and were welcomed by a most beautifully, warm sunset fading into the distant mountain ranges of Nevada, casting a humbling glow on us all. Celebratory birthday cookies and drinks followed by late night jokes wrapped up the evening and we settled in for a chilly night of car camping with the constant whirl of the wind in our ears.

The following morning was COLD! Holy cow it was cold!! First time of the season I was in full-on winter attire. We had to wait out the chilly morning wind and decided to head for sunny walls down in St. George, a funny notion given we have spent 5 months looking for shady walls and avoiding sunny ones like the plague. We parked at the Chuckwalla Trailhead and passed the masses of climbers at Chuckwalla Wall, making our way further down the path to Turtle Wall, bordering the park boundary for spectacular Snow Canyon State Park. Turtle Wall is hard climbing, but we knew the routes would be sunny and warm so we made for it anyway. The cool thing about Turtle is that even though most of the climbs are 11+, they are short, bouldery routes that can all be top-ropped from above, meaning that we can hike to the top of the rocks, put our rope through the anchors, then practice really hard routes that we don't yet have the skill to lead- which is awesome!!! I successfully clawed my way up a 10d and an 11a! The 11a was probably one of the funnest and most challenging climbs of the summer and even though it was a slow climb, I still did it and felt AMAZING after! 

Climbing has quickly become a prominent sport in my life and even though I just started in March I feel like I have already come so far. I have been lucky to have good friends who are great climbers and are willing to show me the ropes and a boyfriend who has jumped on the bandwagon just as quickly as I have. When you really start to dedicate time to climbing and getting stronger, it is amazing how quickly you gain not only strength and muscle memory but a lack of fear and the notion that you can achieve anything that you put your mind too. I had hoped all summer for 2 weeks of climbing everyday, just to test the waters, to see how strong I got over that period of time and to use it as a gauge for what kind of climber I could become, if I chose to dedicate the time. I must say that for the foreseeable future I want to keep stretching the boundaries of what I ever considered myself physically capable of and develop into an actual climber. Eeeeeh......summer is coming for those of us seasonal workers and we couldn't be more happy. What better way to ring in the start of summer than by ending the long working season with a paid climbing vacation? I think I'll take it.