3 Dopes On A Rope

My eyes stare longingly at the weave of the yellow climbing rope wondering if the strands of nylon will hold my oversize frame. I’ve always believed that I was a young hardcore male like the rest of my friends. I owned a cap gun at 8 years old, a sport utility vehicle at 20, and roused the gumption to kiss just a girl or two. But it all becomes very apparent how much of a wimp you really are when you get 300 feet off the ground dangling in mid-air on a rope hanging by two ascenders that don’t look like they would hold even the skinniest Calvin Klein model. I gruntingly moved the ascending contraption up the rope another 2 feet and weighted it with the extreme ease. I forget that each ascender could hold more than 2000 pounds of weight. I looked up towards my goal just in time to get my photo taken by Kyle Drake, Junior, Oregon State University. Kyle smiles and tells me that I’m looking good…I flash him a nervous smile. Shannon Gibb, Junior, Walla Walla University is right next to me hanging in the same feeble state pulling gear off the rock trusting her life to the same two ascenders. I wonder how I got the easy job of just getting up the rope without having to clean the protection off the wall. Inside I feel sorry for her and very discourteous as she grunts up the rock. I was getting the feeling you get after you forget to open the door for the girl and she stands outside to wait for you, but you don’t catch on until later when she brings it up in an awkward conversation. You could’ve been nice…but you weren’t. I think about it for a second and then write it off as luck of the draw and continue ascending.

Kyle, Shannon, and I have climbed, skied, and worked together for the last few years and this climb would be Kyle and my third attempt on the Monkey’s Face at Smith Rocks, OR. Smith Rocks is one of the birth places of sport, traditional, and aid climbing. It is a virtual mecca for many professional climbers and weekend warriors alike. Monkey’s Face is home to some of the hardest climbing routes in the world and has seen many capable climbers pawing and scratching over its sheer faces, way more capable than myself at least.

On this attempt, the plan was to climb the West Face Variation route which is two pitches of gear placing, a pitch of aid climbing, and a final pitch of bolted sport climbing to the top. Unfortunately there were already climbers on the West Face Variation so we headed up to the classic Pioneer route which back in the 60’s was the first line ever climbed on the face.

We arrived at the base of the Pioneer route around 2:30 pm and began to set up our gear. Kyle racked his gear quickly and jumped on the “sharp end” rope for the first lead up through the gap separating the main buttress and Monkey’s Face. He stopped long enough to belay Shannon and I up to the ledge just below the Monkey’s mouth and then led out in the next pitch of aid climbing. Kyle has more experience than both Shannon and I combined so we are fine with letting him set ropes and aid climb. He got into the mouth of the Monkey, set the ropes at the anchors, and Shannon and I launched out into open space jugging (ascending) up the rope to the mouth. Every second I spent hanging there in this new experience I was thinking back to easier times in my life like learning how to blow G.I Joe’s up with fire crackers or how to crack open a sunflower seed in my mouth.

I pulled over the ledge and got locked into the anchors with the help of Kyle. We both sat down and watched Shannon struggle with the gear, trying desperately to clean the route. By no fault of Shannon, by the time she pulled over the edge it is getting dark and so we made the tough but quick decision to bail off.

Kyle rappelled first followed by Shannon and I was left alone for a short while contemplating the 200 foot rappel down to the base of the route. I prayed a little since it was just God and I. Then I heard, “Off Rappel!”, from Shannon and that was my cue to lean out over 400 feet of exposure and descend the rope. The fact that I couldn’t see anything actually calmed me as I slipped lower and lower on the rock. I flicked off my headlamp and descended into darkness. The lights of the surrounding towns and the night sky were amazing. I once again remembered why I climb.

Back on the ground we readied to pull the ropes and head for the car, but as Kyle went to yank the ropes through the anchors he couldn’t budge them. We adjusted our angles and tried different pulling and flicking techniques. For the next hour we tried to alleviate the ropes from their bind but to no avail. I went through a range of emotions because it was my brand new rope stuck on this stupid rock. I made the normal human mistake of trying to blame someone for the mishap but remembered that sometimes there is nothing you can do about the situation leading up to an accident. If anyone was to blame it was me. I was the one that rapped off without checking to make sure that the ropes weren’t twisted. I even remember seeing them twisted and saying to myself that “it shouldn’t be a problem.”

After Kyle ascended back up the rope to get a better angle, he called down to me that he was coming down and we would come out tomorrow morning to pull the ropes. He was right…there was nothing we could do about it in the dark. With headlamps dwindling we made our way over the ridge and back down to the car.

Back at Kyle’s house we discussed our day over bowls of pralines and cream and chocolate moose tracks ice cream. Good judgment helps you live to climb another day. Dale Goddard and Udo Neumann of Performance Rock Climbing say that “Feeling miserable about your failures only haunts your future efforts with the ghosts of bad experiences past.” That stupid primate has defeated me once again but I don’t plan on letting it defeat me for good. Bring it.