This is me after my first climb at Smith, Walking While Intoxicated. We had just arrived in the middle of the day to find Travis and Melissa hanging out in the shade of the Ship Wreck Wall. Travis immediately threw me the end of his rope and said, "Climb". I tried my hardest and came out with an onsight and a terrible pump, and was just glad I didn't fall because I was trying to look like an experienced climber in front of my friends.
This is me on my second ever Smith climb, Blue Light Special. I got spanked on the beginning, middle, and end, hanging on almost every draw before clipping the chains. Classic. After that, Travis decided to show me around.
After a quick tour he asked me what I wanted to get on. I was so overwhelmed, the towering orange walls that seemed to go on forever, the myriads of people everywhere, and observing a guy take a massive whipper on Rude Boys was a little much. I finally pointed at the pocketed wall of the Churning buttress. "That one looks good." I said, pointing at Churning in the Wake. I had no idea what I was doing. The first clip was heinous, and I realized that the pockets looked much deeper from the ground then when I tried jamming my fingers in them. I managed to make the second clip and after that it was hang dog, draw-grabbing fest. I took a few good whips, but overall I got shut down, and rightfully so. Lesson learned.
This should be self-explanatory.
Me on my fourth ever climb at Smith, the extension to 9 Gallon Buckets. No I didn't manage to send this one clean, falling at the crux, but I did make it to the chains hauling at least 20 pounds of draws with me. This climb concluded my first full day at Smith and what a day it was. The next day Travis and Melissa split and feeling a little awkward without them I tried Heinous Cling, leaving a draw at the first bolt, Ring of Fire, another hang dog fest, before retiring to the Phoenix crag where I did the Phoenix clean before heading home. Looking back on this trip it went way too fast but I had a great time getting my ass kicked on almost everything I got on and it was awesome to get out to a world famous crag only a few months into my outdoor climbing debut. My second ever trip to Smith was a longer one, about 5 days or so, and I climbed as if the rock was made of scorpions, and lazer shooting lava monsters. I was scared. Not sure why, probably because this had been the first trip outdoors since the Winter and I just did not have very much experience climbing outdoors at all. As much as I hated it at times this second trip was responsible for really instilling in me a love for camping, climbing, campfires, hanging out with friends, and lit a fire under my ass to get out more and climb. Out of that trip I grew into a pretty decent climber, and I learned to love those moments when you don't know what the next hold will be like, or where the next bolt is, and to love the adventure behind climbing at a new crag or on a route you've never climbed before. Just the challenge of conquering something you've never done before was thrilling, and each new climb I did thereafter I tried to tackle with that same enthusiasm.
Now I'm staring down the barrel of my third outdoor climbing season and all I can think about is what to project, and how long I want to spend at Squamish this summer, or when the next Leavenworth trip will be. Scouring over the pages of my Smith Rock guide I can only help but to get psyched on all of the possibilities that await this season, I just hope I'm strong enough, physically and mentally to climb some of them.
Crack Babies.
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