SushiFest Indian Creek 2013

A few of the Arizona crew at Sushifest 2013

The endurance of a climbing area is tested by the rapid turnover of climbing generations.  Some areas that have formed the deep roots of our sport are forgotten as number grades pass them by and the attention of the young and strong turns to crags with thinner cracks, smaller crimps, and steeper walls.  Other areas transform and evolve over decades as the eyes of ascentionists are opened, technology improves, or ethics change.  Small cams allow protection of thinner and shallower cracks, unprotectable faces are bolted, and a generation of plastic-hardened gym rats sees holds where none were seen before.  Harder routes continue to go up at some of these crags right next to climbs established decades before. 

            Indian Creek continues to stand the test of time, and I experienced one brief moment in the ongoing story at Sushifest 2013, which brought together climbers from almost every generation in the geneology of Indian Creek.  Food, drink, laughter and stories were shared between aging alpinists and first ascentionists from the 70’s, original offwidth masters, historians and guidebook authors, and climbers in their first season at the creek.   

The Doctor, Dave Bloom, in his office

            My connection to the Sushifest was through David Bloom, known in part for his Indian Creek guidebook.  We have become climbing partners and good friends in the past few months and when he encouraged me to join in the Sushifest, I couldn’t say no.  History was thick in the air around the campfire and at the crag.  Jim Donini recounted surviving on rations of monkey in Venezuala, David and I repeated routes he established with Micah Dash, and others told stories of pre-cam first ascents at Indian Creek and around the country.

            After the healthy doses of story telling and swordfish sashimi, I had a chance to sample some classic climbs established by Steve Hong, Steve Petro, Eric Decaria, and recent additions from Pat Kingsbury.  Perhaps the highlight of the trip for me came as I was belaying, not climbing.  I had the chance to belay Dave Bloom on a new project, a climb so steep and beautiful it will certainly rank among the classic hard lines.  Despite his impressive efforts, the climb awaits his ascent and stands as a symbol of the vast potential remaining at Indian Creek despite the extensive development.  New gear, stronger climbers, and fresh vision have made possible new and incredible cracks at this enduring area.

Joel Unema on the finger crack of Pat’s Blue Ribbon

            The diversity of climbers from so many generations assembled that weekend made me feel that now is a Golden Age for Indian Creek.  Perhaps most of the plums have been picked, the desert is feeling the effects of the crack-hungry masses, and some of the air of adventure has left the place.  However, it is a narrow window in which a young creek climber can both share a beer or a rope with some of the original pioneers, repeat classics established over decades, and establish new climbs of exceptional quality.  The original Golden Age perhaps has past, but I am glad for the place in time I find myself in the sandstone halls of Indian Creek. 

Thanks to Dave, Nature, John, Mike, Roy, Carrie, and everyone else for making this few days at the creek so fun!  Photo credit Carrie Albrecht and Roy McClenahan

           

Joel Unema entering the headwall on the onsight of Family Home Night

Desert Dogs: Bosco and Ruffus

John Crawley following the beautiful and unique The Cleaner at Scarface

Mike Broad on his first wide encounter with Big Guy, Scarface

Earning The Shirt

 At its best, climbing is a framework for us to challenge the strength of our bodies, the creativity of our minds, and the tenacity of our spirits.  At its worst, it can lead to arguments and fights over ownership of routes, climbers chasing numbers with little regard for beauty, and condescension towards those new to the sport.  Gnarbarian climbing began in 2012 as a way for climbers across Northern Arizona (and beyond!) to get to know each other and encourage one another, regardless of discipline.  Some climbers find satisfaction on a quiet afternoon beneath the pines with just a bouldering pad.  Others seek the fulfillment of perfecting a long sequence of difficult moves on a sport-climbing project.  A few crave that knot in their stomach when looking 15 feet down at a lonely brass nut or microcam.  Many feel freedom when spending all day in the vertical world on a sandstone tower or granite face.  And some of us are just here for the pizza and beer.

                However, nearly all of us seek to push ourselves in the vertical realm and grow as a result of our climbing experiences.  On a trip to Yosemite this past summer, my partner Eric and I came up with the concept of “Earning your Shirt”.  At this point, only a few GNAR shirts were gracing the backs of climbers in Flagstaff, but now you can see the unmistakable bright blue and orange at crags and canyons all over the southwest.  The process of Earning your Shirt is not a prerequisite to obtaining a shirt and is not intended to be an exclusive rite or hazing ritual.  It was envisioned as a personal process of growth and challenge highlighted by a specific breakthrough event.  Not clear yet?  Let me give you an example.

                August 2012, hot off  the my best season of sport climbing and gear climbing yet, Eric Deschamps and I find ourselves in Yosemite Valley, for me the first time.  We met up with Darren and Angela Mabe for a week of exploring the granite cracks and faces so iconic and historic in our sport.  The first objective for Eric and I was the Northwest Face of Half Dome, a plan he envisioned and I eagerly ascribed to.  The route promised to be challenging logistically and technically for me, as I had little experience with wall climbing.  Climbing hard sport routes and single pitch gear routes had built great strength and technique in me, and the free climbing planned on the route was much easier than what I had been doing all summer.  But as we stood beneath the face, the numbers attached to all the climbs I had sent didn’t sum up to any measure of confidence to meet the variety of challenges that lay above. 

                The climb began smoothly and we moved at a comfortable but consistent pace, the systems planned out by Eric providing a framework for constant progress.  For the first many pitches my mind reeled uneasily and I was intimidated by the many pitches above.  As we inched closer to the top, my confidence grew and I began to climb freely and enjoy each pitch.  Early in the afternoon, I finished leading the last of the Zig-Zag crack pitches, fixed the rope, and looked across the Thank God Ledge. 

                The confidence forged on the pitches below built to a crescendo as I considered my options for traversing the ledge.  My thoughts moved quickly and I hastily cobbled together a plan.

“I hear this is supposed to be hard to walk” 

“Honnold did this whole thing ropeless, of course I can walk it with a rope…. It’s only 5.7”

“It would be rad if I could walk it without placing any gear”

“Walking it on rope-solo should be fine”

I took the first few steps across the ledge.

“This is too easy”

Simultaneously the wall above the ledge began to steepen and the footledge shrink.

“Ok, I can see how this requires some balance”

My steps turn in to a shuffle, my chest to the wall and my backpack and heels hanging high above the first 20 pitches of the route.

“Maybe I should put a piece in for Eric”

“Maybe that piece is really for me!”

I shuffled back right, reached down and stuffed a good cam in the crack between the footledge and the wall.  I payed out armload after armload of slack through the Gri-Gri until the loop looked equal to the distance remaining across the ledge, which didn’t look so easy any more.

“The worst that can happen is a little pendulum here…. I’m going for it”

I repeated the shuffle-steps back to the left and pressed on as the steps became smaller and more desperate.  My hands frantically alternated between a futile search of the wall above for any feature and windmilling involuntarily to provide some sort of balance.

“just a few more steps”

I had made several moves that I had no hope of reversing, placing gear was impossible, and I was fully committed to the traverse.  My steps became more like stabbing hops as I desperately fought to maintain balance and continue progress.  Controlled movement was no longer possible.

The point of no return became also the point of no progression; I could no longer lift either foot.  That lonely cam placed 30 feet behind laughed at me as I stood, unable to move any of my limbs. 

“If I could just find even the smallest hold, a potato-chip-sized flake would do, I could make another step”

My hand found exactly that, a tiny flake of potato-chip thickness, and just as greasy as its namesake.  I gingerly moved first my left foot, then my right and prepared for another shuffle, allowed by this miraculous thin-cut fried gift of a hold. 

“SNAP”

The breaking of the chip-flake was as quiet as the crunching of a single Lay’s, but felt as devastating as the instantaneous smashing of entire stack of Pringles.

Both arms reeled in a rhythmic flapping as my conscious mind attempted to maintain balance and my subconscious prepared for flight. 

Somehow, against the laws of physics and in spite of my preparations for flight, my feet remained on the ledge.  The potato chip had given me just enough to make it past the most difficult section.  Trembling, I finished the shuffle to a secure stance at the end of the traverse.

At that moment, Eric reached the belay at the beginning of the ledge and asked how I was doing.  I lifted up my fleece to expose the blaze orange and blue beneath. 

“I just earned my shirt!  I walked the ledge!”

I was happy just to be alive.  That was a breakthrough moment for me in which I found the soul of why I climb.  Climbing presents challenges in many different ways, and that walking traverse had been a challenge for me in the moment and symbolically.

The idea of Earning the Shirt was born that day.   The process can be different for everyone.  Mine was unexpected but certain once it had occurred.  For others it may be a project climb to break through a mental barrier, a link up that pushes endurance to a new level, or a moment of decision on a committing climb leading to success, or a glorious whipper. 

Whatever form it comes in, Earning your Shirt is about challenging yourself and overcoming on a personal level.  What is monumental for some may be mundane for others, but that fact is fundamental to the soul of climbing.   Self-challenge and improvement, not competition and comparison, is what Gnarbarian Climbing is about. 

Maybe you have already had an experience in which you “Earned your Shirt” and maybe this idea can inspire you to challenge yourself on a new level.  Either way, share your story!  Post up your story on the GNAR page and add some psyche to an already super-psyched community.

-Joel Unema

on the ledge, after Earning the Shirt

The Beginning: Monkeyfinger TR

As I stemmed, jammed, smeared, and oozed my way up the sustained corner, my mind and body began to drift apart.  Sweat poured out of my helmet, soaking the fleece vest I forgot I was wearing.  With it poured out more than just vital fluids and electrolytes, my will was leaking too.  Forty feet from the belay, feet skated, forearms, back, and abs began to cramp, and mental processing slowed to a crawl.  Reaching the belay, it took every ounce of concentration and willpower to build an anchor and set up a belay.  My thoughts drifted to the water bottle and energy bars 120 feet below me, untouched in the last 4 hours.  I had bonked, and we were done.

When does giving up become the right decision?  Certainly the first moments of struggle and feelings of failure do not warrant abandoning a goal, but at some point it is wise to cut your losses, right?  Decisions to press on or give up face everyone who pursues climbing.  Bailing can be the right decision, and a life-saving one, but what can we gain by enduring? 

For Eric and I, the line was ambitious, but well within reason.  900 feet of vertical weather-hardened sandstone broken into 9 pitches, all but one requiring at least 5.10 climbing.  Monkeyfinger… an innocent sounding name, like perhaps Olevsky, the first ascentionist, let a kid name it.  The morning began in an unusually civilized fashion.  Our friends Darren and Angela had pulled their new trailer to Zion for the weekend, the maiden voyage of this home-away-from home for the comfortable weekend warrior.  I, lacking a sleeping partner, and hence, the claim to a proper bed, forfeit my place within the trailer to Eric and his wife Evin and on waking arose from my place next to the trailer.  Restless in the first light, and feeling somewhere between a family pet sleeping on the doorstep and a wound-up Saturday morning onesie-clad child, I occupied myself as long as I could before taking my chances and waking my climbing partner, still in bed with his wife.  A dangerous way to start the day, I know, but we had to start sometime! 

A quick breakfast, a short drive, and some pre-climb meditation in the park bathroom passed by quickly, and we began the approach towards our objective.  Five minutes later we found ourselves at the base of the route (Where else but Zion do 1000 foot faces have such short approaches?).  We climbed pitches one and two quickly and found ourselves staring up at the ominous Black Corner, the first true test of our confidence, footwork, and our cuticles.  Scissors had cut paper 100 feet below, putting Eric on the sharp end for the dark dihedral above.  He cast off, placing pencil-width cams in the dark glossy sandstone, testing the quality of the rock in a few places when a sequence was misread or the friction of rubber and varnish failed and Eric found himself falling.  Studious attention and creative body positioning unlocked thin blank sections and he reached the belay.

The Black Corner

I followed, losing myself in the feel of my soft Miuras on tiny nubs and improbable smears, the coarse sandstone biting into my fingers and palms in a thousand tiny grains.  I reached the belay and impatiently racked up, all the while looking at the thin roof traverse hanging above.  Minutes later I found myself hunched over in an awkward stem, placing gear behind my head, and performing two entire 360’s in the process of placing the perfect gear to protect the roof, and then untangling myself from said perfect gear.  Two tough moves on undercling fingerlocks supported by tiny footholds lay between me and the corner above the roof.  My thoughts drifted, then zeroed in on the rubber impregnating each and every pore of the sloping cherry-pit footholds and I was off.  Unwavering feet and trust carried me up and over the roof and brought me not only to the thin corner above, but for the first time that day, into direct sun.  I stemmed, jammed, sweated, and oozed, reached the belay, and found myself expended, physically and mentally.  How could this have happened, only four pitches up, not even half way?

The impatience, neglecting to look at the time, eat, drink, or consider the effects the sun-induced fluid loss.  I had watched my diet carefully in the several days prior, wanting to lose a couple pounds and feel light for the weekend.  This unwise caloric restriction may have left my reserve tanks empty for this anticipated climb.  In any case I was useless, and fortunate to have safely belayed Eric up to me.  When he came into sight, joined me at the hanging belay (did I mention it was a full hanging belay?), and saw the look on my face, the joy of climbing quickly turned into concern. 

“Are you ok? What happened to you?”

“I bonked…. I have never felt this terrible climbing”

He opened up the pack and handed me my water and a clif bar, and I choked down a bit of water, organic oats, and soy.

“Does this anchor look alright?  It took every ounce of my concentration to build it” I asked as I attempted to manage our lead line, pack, and haul line.

“It looks fine, but do you think you are okay to belay me up this next pitch….” 

While my reserves felt depleted, both physically and mentally, Eric was straining at the end of his daisy chain, eager to climb.  I wanted down, and I wanted beer, and I wanted to be done. 

“I think I can safely belay you up… but I don’t know about making it up this thing” 

I reluctantly committed after looking up at the steep crack looming above, summoning what was left of my mental fortitude, preparing to hold his life in my exhausted hands.   Eric climbed high off the belay, settled into a stance and placed his first cam, smoothly pulling the rope up to clip the piece until…..

“CLIPPING”….. the rope drew taut.  I battled my gri-gri, pulling as hard as I could to feed him some rope.

 “CLIPPING!”  he shouted louder.

I couldn’t reply… intent on solving this problem, I looked down and saw the lead line wrapped around a leg….my leg.

 “CLIPPING!!” 

The thin loops of webbing on my harness had completely cut blood flow to my legs, and they were numb dead weight, tangled in the rope and tethering Eric on a short leash.  One hand free from the belay, I threw my useless lower limbs back and forth, freeing the rope.  Eric finally had the slack to clip his first piece.

“I thought you were ok to belay!?”

“I’m good, just a little rope management”

            Eric led the next few pitches as I struggled up with gasping breaths, cramping muscles, and a weak will to continue.  At each belay, Eric asked

“Can you safely belay me?” and “Do you think you can keep going?” 

“Probably” and “I’ll try one more pitch” I replied each time, while really thinking “I sure hope so” and “No, I can’t keep going” 

We persevered one pitch at a time, re-evaluating at each belay, while my body failed me and my mind rebelled against me.  Beneath an imposing offwidth, Eric asked me again if I could belay and if I wanted to keep going.

Eric battling the offwidth

“We can’t go down Eric, we are having too damn much fun” I replied, wanting only to stop.  As the words left my mouth, a half-smile replaced them, then a full grin, and I began to shake with laughter.  For the first time in hours, I was able to comprehend where we were and what we were doing.  Scores of people milled below at a popular trail along the river…scores of people who would never have the opportunity or ability to be where I was.  This is what I live for, I thought as Eric grunted and powered his way up the wide maw above.  The sheer wall, the stream bubbling far below, the beating sun, and the bond between climbing partners….this is what I am here for. 

            A shout of “On belay” came from above and brought me into action, but didn’t break the trance of revelry in that which is climbing.  The powerful offwidth allowed me a gentler path, revealing small crimps and footholds that made my progress quick and smooth.  As I pulled over the ledge and into view, re-energized and smiling, Eric’s jaw dropped. 

            “I thought that pitch would wreck you” He admitted.

            We rested in the shade, finishing the last of our food and water and for the first time agreed…. “We can finish this thing, we can top out!” 

Refueling on a ledge in the shade

After a short pitch, I took the lead, eager to test myself and my recovery.  I made my way past star-drives and half-driven pitons, relaxed and savoring the sensation of sand grains wedging in the valleys of my fingerprints and digging micrometers into the soft rubber of my shoes.  I was back… feeling confident, moving fluidly, and living in the moment…. We were back, and we were going to finish.  Eric took the lead for the final pitch standing between us and the summit, a steep but crumbling chimney. 

Eric enjoying the vintage protection on the slab

            Against the odds, despite both of us knowing just a few pitches ago that we wouldn’t make it, we reached the summit.  The wind was whipping at the top, and we quickly rigged for the first in a series of rappels.  The route passed by our eyes in high-speed rewind as we gave in slowly to gravity’s unrelenting will drawing us back to the ground.  Wide grins stretched our sunburnt and windblown faces as we descended, and came into earshot of the rest of the crew at the base.  The party had started mid-afternoon, and they had driven up to watch us finish and drive us back to camp.  The night flew by as we told our story, refueled, celebrated the birthday of a friend, and also celebrated the moments that make climbing so captivating.

            The grit of sandstone on skin worn thin, the lines drawing our eyes upward, the choice to persevere when both body and mind have given up, and the encouragement and camaraderie of a trusted partner, these… these things are worth enduring for.