The Life of a Guide

Story by DAVE McRAE
Teaching rock climbing always seemed like the ultimate job. Hang out at Smith Rock, climb all day, meet new people, and even get paid. Well...a good friend of mine always says, “Havin’ a job ain’t nothin’ but work.” After a few days on the job with Smith Rock Climbing Guides, I learned it’s not like a day of climbing with the buddies. I hate sun. Maybe it’s my British blood, but when the sun shines strong, I hide in the shade and try to keep my skin as pasty as the queen’s. When two equivalently pale clients from Portland, John and Mike, want to soak up some rare sun, of course we do.

The first few routes go okay, but then it starts to get really hot. I feel my energy waning, and sense a similar vibe from John. As the Mesa Verde wall turns into a giant reflector oven, Mike wants to step it up to a 5.10-rated face climb on marble-sized knobs. Under ideal conditions, I still stink at this style. In unadulterated sun, it’s a full-on chore. I labor my way to the anchor and come down soaked in sweat. I make it look so hard that Mike suddenly realizes our infernal conditions and loses interest. With my gear now stranded on the route, I scorch out a second lap to retrieve it. A guide’s job is to control risk, especially for the clients. But, as any piece of new gear warns, “You cannot eliminate the risk of rock climbing.”

For a guide, this means leading every pitch, and taking on the vast majority of the mandatory risks. With this concept in mind, there’s still no such thing as canned adventure. This isn’t the rock wall at the county fair. One couple, Allen and Caroline, traveled all the way from Anchorage, Alaska to scale the walls at Smith. A few hours into their first day, it started to sprinkle. We hunkered into an overhanging corner and worked on some knots and got a snack.

The storm quickly gained momentum and turned into full-on monsoon conditions. Sheets of rain poured sideways, followed by intense hail. Thunder echoed through the canyon, juniper trees danced sideways in the gale force wind, and all three of us took copious amounts of dirt blown in our faces. Small rocks and sheets of water landed just beyond us while I hid in the corner and shook like a dog on the 4th of July. Caroline simply pulled her hood over her helmet and said, “Does it always storm like this? Oh well, it still beats spring in Alaska!” The evening news later reported 60 mph winds and over an inch of rain within an hour. Nearly every other party in the park got soaked and called it a day.

Our sheltered position allowed us to stay mostly dry and finish the day with a few more pitches in an otherwise empty park. Unlike most climbing, a day of guiding isn’t about personal challenge. My fulfillment comes from passing the torch, seeing the wide eyes of the beginner’s mind, and opening new possibilities for others. But, it’s not for everyone.

One day, I had two different half-day trips lined up. The first party, two teenagers accompanied by their mom, started on the easiest route in the park. The younger sister did great, but when her brother made it fifteen feet up, he froze on a huge ledge and asked to come down. Mom chimes in, “You always give up. Just suck it up and try!” The mentally challenged young man shook with fear and began to whimper. He needed to come down, yet mom nagged on, “C’mon son! You’re always such a quitter!” By now, he broke down and continued to cry and shake. I just let him down and said, “He can always try again.” He eventually did, with a similar result.

Like Tom Hanks says in A League of Their Own, “There’s no crying in baseball.” Neither is there in climbing, at least not on my watch. We spent the rest of the time crossing the river, sniffing the bark of pine trees, and learning the names of peaks. The kids got belayed on the easiest of scrambles, and the end of their lesson couldn’t come soon enough.Later in the day, I met the second pair of clients, a fit-looking couple of Texans in their early 40s (yes!). Then they introduced their son and daughter, the only ones climbing today (doh!). Grandma also came along to watch.

As matriarch of the family, she questioned where to park, hike down, and even which restrooms to use. At the cliff base, the kids craned their necks and stood in awe of Revelations, our first route. “It’s three times as high as the wall in the gym.” As I cast off for the twenty-foot-high first bolt, grandma notices, “Why’s he tied in right now? If he falls…” I didn’t. She finally just clammed up and watched the kids have an unforgettable day. Both fought tooth and nail to get up Revelations, and came down with ear-to-ear grins. They learned movement in the rock gym, but compared to Smith Rock, not everything is big in Texas. The teenage boy spotted New Testament, a beautiful, eighty-foot-tall crack splitting a steep wall.

His eyes bugged out of his head as he begged to try it. With a zealous effort, he hung on the rope a few times, but made it to the top and came down elated. He scoffed at his younger sister as she tied in to try it. To everyone’s surprise, she styled the steep crack and came down in full diva mode. She struck her best Britney Spears pose for the camera and said, “Yup, I’m at home up here on a rock.” As their four-hour slot neared a close, the parents readied to go. But, with the kids’ infectious enthusiasm, I was actually having fun, and in no hurry. We stayed nearly until dark. I wanted to fully nurture the growing fire in their hearts. After all, they’re the future of the sport.


Proceed with Caution
Climbing on Mt. Washington Not for the Faint of Heart
Story and Photography by Dave McRae

For climbers well versed in vertical adventure routes, Mt. Washington is the granddaddy of Oregon’s Cascade range. It contains at least twenty routes that range from 200-1,000 feet in height and encompass all 360 degrees of its steep summit plug. Every route sports a combination of solid rock, friable rock, and loose blocks. There is no easy way up Mt. Washington. The easiest route, the North Ridge, contains some of the worst rock on the mountain.

It starts out with a leftward traverse on a six-inch ledge over several hundred feet of exposure. From the ledge one must do a pull-up on a two-handed, cantaloupe-sized hold that feels as if it could crumble into dirt in your hands. Luckily, the harder routes contain some better rock. Yet, in September 2002, Climbing magazine ran a story by Eric Seylor in which he and his partner, Kurt Smith, plummeted over one hundred feet from the West face.

“I fell and my on-lead placements pulled out, the sling broke, and the three nuts holding Kurt to the brittle volcanic rock were loaded one by one and burst out in sequence,” writes Seylor. Luckily, a snowpatch cushioned their fall and they survived with only broken legs and ankles. After two nights spent shivering in the cold, a rescue team finally arrived. Admitted “alpine-rock neophytes,” Smith “wondered on the ground if we should try an easier route.” In truth, Mt. Washington should only be attempted by those with enough experience to know better. One route, Chimney of Space, managed to freeze one of Bend’s best boulderers with fear.

Sans loose rocks or big fall, he stopped, midway through the first lead, and claimed, “I feel like I’m gonna die! Let’s get the hell off of this thing.” He built a hanging belay, brought me up, and was incredulous when I insisted we continue upward. While I enjoyed each adventurous lead, he quivered his way up each pitch, convinced we narrowly cheated the grim reaper with each rope length. I guess, fun lies in the eye of the beholder. Two guys with a loose definition of fun are Bob and Tom Bauman. In the 1960s they made Mt. Washington their personal playground. Of the twenty routes in Jeff Thomas’ guidebook, Oregon High, the Bauman brothers authored ten of them.

One such route, the East Buttress, is a true classic. It cuts a plumb line for nearly 1,000 feet up an exposed, sharp buttress. It’s easily identified as the biggest, steepest, line on Mt. Washington.In August 2007, Kevin Gmitro and I tried our hand at the East Buttress. The first pitch angles right up a gully and feels like scaling a house of cards. Pull on the wrong hold, and the whole thing comes down. With minimal gear options as well as sustained looseness and difficulty, it’s the entry fee for the beautiful climbing to come. The second pitch traverses toward the buttress proper where the rock solidifies, the moves get harder, and the wall drops away vertically toward the talus, hundreds of feet below.

Once past this traverse, we cruise for three rope lengths on solid rock with breathtaking position on the serrated edge of the wall. On the sixth pitch, a steep headwall forces us out to the very edge of the sharply defined corner. In the guidebook, the 5.8 rating looks easy. At a modern sport crag, this pitch would rate 5.10. I marvel at the boldness of the Baumans as I scrape my way past the small holds on overhanging rock with my highest piece of protection ten feet below. We romp up moderate terrain for a few more pitches, then scramble our way to the top. As usual, we have the summit all to ourselves. We felt fortunate to safely navigate the loose rock, complex route finding, exposed position, and strenuous crux of the East Buttress.

What Mt. Washington lacks in rock quality and modern convenience, it more than makes up for with adventure and solitude. Another place with high potential for adventure is Wolf Rock. Located west of Santiam Pass, Wolf rock is Oregon’s tallest monolith. Greg Orton’s guidebook, Rock Climbing Southwest Oregon warns, “Loose rock, slippery downward sloping holds, older bolts, and run-outs are all part of the Wolf Rock experience. It is suitable for only the most experienced climbing teams.” In 1972 Wayne Arrington and Mike Seeley climbed a proud line up the tallest part of the wall and over two massive overhangs. Today their route, Barad-Dur, gets the stiff rating of 5.11.

In September 2006, I recruited fellow Smith Rock climbing guide, David Potter, for an ascent. Sure enough, the holds feel slick and insecure, the bolts look as old as the rock they’re placed in, and the route follows no crack or obvious weakness. It’s a constant game of find the ancient bolt, then don’t fall on it while you search for the next one. On the third pitch, I pull a small roof and bust off a foothold. My feet pedal over the void Cliffhanger style while I clench small hand holds. I look down at my last rickety piece of gear. If it blows, I’ll go big. Now frazzled, I get back on my feet and look for gear. With no cracks or bolts in sight, I commit to another forty feet of unprotected vertical progress.

Normally an atheist, I begin to pray to God, sell my soul, accrue good karma, whatever it takes to make it through this pitch in one piece. As I near mental breakdown, a bolted anchor appears amidst the protectionless stonescape. I reach it, clip in and slump in my harness in relief. When Potter reaches the belay, I suggest we descend. He laughs, grabs the rack, and leads the next pitch. The sixth and most strenuous pitch angles right through a massive overhang. With no modern protection in sight, Potter clips an ancient piton and launches into the underbelly of the wall. He climbs up, down, left and right trying to decipher the path of least resistance. All the while, he dangles from his arms on the overhanging rock. With just a couple pieces of gear above the old piton, he rounds the corner and makes a belay. I manage to scrape, claw, hang on the rope, curse, spit, hang on the rope some more, and frig my way up to join him for a laugh at myself. Indeed, fun lies in the eye of the beholder.
A Cup of Humble Tea
Getting Schooled on Smith Rock