When you're falling...

This past weekend, Anton and I went to Jasper for some climbing. I printed out the various climbing guides I could find online, quickly browsing through them. I also chatted with some friends from Grande Prairie, who had been there climbing a lot and were going to be joining us a day or two into the trip.

Well, on our first day of climbing, Anton and I were sport leading whatever we could identify, even though the climbs were generally ones that worked my weaknesses - strength moves. For the non-climbers, sport lead climbing is where you pull the rope up with you, clipping it into anchors that have been drilled into the rock face as you go. As a result, the consequences of falling can be a bit more serious - at the least, you're likely to fall further.

On our last climb of the day, I took a BIG fall. My hand holds had not been great, the next anchor was above and behind my head, on the other side of the overhang above me, and I wasn't really feeling it. I'd already gotten to this point and down-climbed a metre and a half to the previous anchor for a break once. After working myself up for giving it another go, up I went, even though my head wasn't fully in it.

So, hanging off a bad hold with my left hand, I reached behind my head, found the clip in point and reached down to bring up the rope to clip in. I felt shaky and not confident, and the rope wasn't co-operating and clipping in right away. Instead, I hooked two fingers into the lower carabiner and leaned back on it. I was panicking and not thinking clearly, but, for as long as those fingers held, I was not falling. My left hand found the rope again and brought it up to clip it in. I tried it twice before realizing why it wasn't working: My fingers, wrapped through the carabiner and keeping me from falling, were also blocking the gate of the carabiner, preventing it from opening and the rope from clipping in. I could see no way to move from this point, so I shouted "falling", and let go.

The fall was over almost before I realized it. We accelerate towards the earth at about 9.8 metres per second per second, so, by the time I had gone the distance to where I was caught by the rope, it had been less than a second, and I knew I was done with climbing for the day. I was thirsty (a little dehydrated), physically and mentally tired, and needing some food. In total, I think I fell somewhere in the realm of 4-6 metres.

I had thought I would have some emotional release, some need to shout and scream, but instead, I felt somewhat calm, and a bit cold inside, almost like a state of shock.

I thought about this for the next couple of days of climbing and touring around Jasper with Anton, as he extolled the rush of adrenaline, and it made me doubt my connection to this whole climbing thing.

I've thought about it long and hard, but decided to keep going, keep doing it for the enjoyment, the challenge, and the sense of adventure. I know I'll have a big challenge of getting past the fear of lead fears, and I don't think I'll ever fully ignore it, or get into the whole adrenaline rush, but I know I'll be able to come to a place where I can move beyond that fear.

The rest of the trip was a lot of fun - we met up with Steven and Renee, did a bit of biking, some hiking, and some general touring around before driving home.

The drive home was a bit of an adventure too. Driving between Hinton and Grande Cache, the skies kept getting darker, and there was lots of threats of rain. Then came the rain, sheeting down, requiring me to actually use the High Speed setting on the wipers to keep up with it. Then came the hail, marble to acorn-sized hail falling out of the sky and thankfully exploding into little slush balls upon impact with my windshield and Rav.


Looking forward to future adventures,


Chris