Send Off Two years ago, I joined the CCAJ project in order to help foster the Colorado College climbing community. What I discovered through helping collect and edit the fantastic writing submitted by all of you is that this community, an impromptu amalgamation of students, weekend warriors, internationally renowned athletes, and dirtbaggers between jobs, is a pervasive network that spans the North American continent with frequent forays to other parts of the globe. I first experienced the far reach of CC climbing’s tentacles in the summer of 2010 when fellow student Dan Rothberg (‘12) and I, flying into the Cirque of the Unclimbables from a remote fishing lodge deep in the Northwest Territories, were upgraded from a float plane to a helicopter because the bush pilot needed to pick up “some badass women” from the Proboscis cirque after dropping us off. A quick internet search revealed that the party included alumni Madeline Sorkin and Emily Stifler, and their project, Women at Work, made our expedition look like a Sunday jaunt to Shelf Road. A month later, in Yosemite Valley, Dan and I enjoyed a brilliant slideshow presented by alumni Kate Rutherford. Later that fall, enjoying a rare balmy November afternoon at the Turkey Tail, I recall discussing beta with another climber
when we quickly discovered that we’d both attended CC; he and I proceeded to work parallel routes, grunting and flailing in unison. I’ve climbed with alumni from Nevada to Idaho, crashed at their houses while on the road, and every year I hear about alumni meeting up at crags ranging from Joshua Tree to the Gunks to share a rope together. A senior now myself, and with a few weeks of school left, I still have the convenience of sharing a campus with a community of climbers. Come summer, though, and I’ll just be another guy on the road with a car, a rack, and hopefully a way to fill the gas tank. So, I’m glad you guys are out there, sending together, sketching together, and sharing a cold one at the end of the day. See you out there. -Drew Thayer (‘11)
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