graphic article, and the man pushed off the cliff is alive and well. I’m warned multiple times not to broach the topic with Caldwell.
Tommy and Sonnie won’t stop.” Leinau says, “I know. This just makes it a little clearer that they are the ones deciding to climb.”
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y mid-afternoon, the sky has gone he rain slacks around 6:30 p.m., and from overcast to threatening, and the Roy and I take the four-wheeler to the temperature has dropped nearly 20 North Forty, an area with 70-footers degrees. At 4:45 p.m., I meet a couple of laced with horizontal cracks, the kind that guys from Grand Rapids near the Trading are perfect to inch along in search of a Post. They’re sitting on the back of their higher foothold. These are some of HCR’s car, taking stock. “We’ve done 25 climbs, most popular routes. The air seems lumiand we’ve been sticking to easy stuff,” says nous, everything lit with that watery halfAlan Zeitlin, a med student. “We’re not light that comes when a storm fades just sure about the weather.” He opens a bag as the sun sets. The first climbers we find of beef jerky and offers me a stick. are Caldwell and Trotter, the Patagonia “There’s the goat cave way over there, guys. Their pink tie-dye shirts from this it’s all overhanging, it’s really hard stuff, so morning are long gone, and now they’re we might look at that,” says his teammate climbing in nothing but neon green shorts. Carl Sobel, an aeronautics engineer, test- They work quickly and efficiently, without ing their rain plan aloud. much conversation. “We said we’d climb even if it rains, but Around the corner, Dick Dower — lightening? I don’t know, we’d have to at 63, the oldest competitor — and his assess,” Zeitlin says, shrugging. partner Natalie Neal, are also climbing Overhead, thunder growls ominously. through what is now a drizzle. They seem It sounds like the mountains protesting the undaunted by the water-logged rock, but weight of 270 climbers. Dower laments that the hour of heavy rain By the time the clouds break, I am with will wreck their route count. HH founder Andy Chasteen and about six Around 7:30 p.m., headlamps begin to HCR employees inside the Trading Post’s blink on. Roy greets his mentor, Watkins, tiny back office. The patch of sky that we who is competing in HH. Watkins bolted can see from the window is a rich shade HCR’s The Prophet, a grade 5.14 route (the of bruise. most difficult route in the world is a 5.15) “Nothing like this has ever happened that fewer than a handful of climbers have before,” Chasteen says, sipping coffee. successfully completed. “You shouldn’t “We did have a light shower once, it came chalk when the rock is wet,” he advises through and left super fast. But the routes, another climber. “It makes the rock slick.” when they get wet, are still somewhat grippy because it’s sandstone.” Chasteen very hour on the hour, all 270-plus is a photographer and headhunter from climbers let out something akin to Oklahoma City. Seven years ago, he and Walt Whitman’s barbaric yawp, a some friends were climbing at HCR and siren of sound that reverberates around decided to gather a group and climb as the canyon. It’s beautiful and potent, the many routes as they could in 24 hours. But wilderness version of the yogi’s om. Roy then he decided it would be even better started the tradition about three years to invite the public. Chasteen pitched the ago, to annoy a particular set of neighidea to Johnson, and that first year, they bors who had been complaining that HH had 120 competitors. was too loud. “One of the coolest things for me, people Around 8:30 p.m., I find the T-nutters come here, they make friends, they come again. “How are y’all?” I ask. back and it’s like a real family reunion,” “I’m boss!” Baka shouts. Despite the Chasteen says. fact that it’s 50 degrees and damp, he’s Just then, Leinau leans into the door- still shirtless. way and says, “Andy, are you going to do “Fine,” Sellnell practically whispers. anything more official about the weather? She’s wearing a giant camo rain slicker. It’s raining real hard, with a lot of light- She looks miserable. ening.” “Did y’all stop in the rain?” “The announcements we’ve been mak“No,” Harrison says glumly, tugging ing are that we don’t recommend climbing at his day-glo orange windbreaker. “And in the lightening at all,” Chasteen replies. I wasn’t totally happy with it. It’s not my “Maybe if you give them a break on 5 bag.” He glances at the oblivious Baka. o’clock routes, in case anybody is more “For awhile it was lightning and stuff, and worried about their route count than their it was just like, OK … and my job centers life,” says Leinau. “Because it’s not a safe around me climbing, so if I get hurt, I’m time to be climbing.” fucked.” Chasteen relays the message into his Baka disappears and then comes back, walkie so that crag-volunteers can spread still traveling at a trot. “On the backside the word. But then he says to Leinau, there are two 5.8’s and a 5.9 open,” he yells. “That’s not going to de-motivate people. CONTINUED ON PAGE 49
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LUCAS MARSHALL
PRO AT PLAY: Brittany Griffith of Salt Lake City climbing for Patagonia and Black Diamond.
www.arktimes.com
OCTOBER 24, 2012
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