Royce Butte Wildfire

Royce Butte Fire, originally uploaded by Hanmi.

Here is a set of images from the Royce Butte fire last month. When we drove around a bend in the highway we saw a small puff of white smoke... by the time we neared Crescent Lake Junction, it was a large white plume. A couple minutes after we pulled over it was a big, black, ominous cloud. In fact, when we slowed down to speak to a state trooper, I could feel the heat of the fire (though I couldn't see the flames) on my face. After I took a few shots we got back into the car, and stopped again at the top of the hill where I took a few more shots. The fire was clearly spreading very quickly. Pretty scary stuff. Click the image to see more.

Equinox : Part III

Please see Part 1 and Part 2 of this story for the complete epic tale.


It got late quickly. Each rap was pretty straightforward, but long and sometimes overhanging, leaving our feet to dangle. Caleb and I simul-rapped for speed, leaving Hanmi had to wait in the pitch black for a bit, then carefully thread the rope into her rappel device and descend in total darkness. She asserts that it was quite exciting. Bats and the occasional ringtail cat kept her company.

Long-exposure shot from the top at night

We had no problems rigging the raps all the way down. We were very tired and dried out, but the cool breeze of the night woke us up and the rappels kept us sharp. Nothing is more dangerous in climbing than the rappel. You’re usually tired and prone to mistakes. Rappelling also relies on fewer redundancy systems than in ascending. There is no climbing ability involved with rapping, which can leave a climber feeling more helpless. So, we were all checking one another and talking aloud and employing auto-blocks on the ropes for addition safety.

Then, some minor disasters: Twice Hanmi’s ropes became tangled in trees, causing her to have to wrestle them free in order to continue down. On the next to last rappel, we descended to a ledge couldn’t find the anchors. After some tense searching, they were found along the ledge some distance away requiring more scrambling on loose rock in the dark. Then, during another overhanging rap, a knot of rope got bound up in my rappel device. I tried in vain to free it, then to set up a system to ascending the rope above to unweight it, but the slings I had didn’t hold. Then Caleb, also dangling next to me in the darkness, grabbed it with his teeth and pulled like a rabid dog until it came out. We got to bottom and quickly loaded up the water bottles from a nearby spring.

Top of the, um, mornin' Mom!

By now it was after midnight with moon almost full and bright across the valley. We thrashed our way to the road, giddy with mineral-water-laden bellies, knowing that the final straw to secure this day as an “Epic” was drawn: The free shuttle into and out of the park was gone. We had to walk the five miles out with the gear.

Looking up, we saw the formations we had descended, now bathed in moonlight. The scale of the wall from the base was so much greater than the hundreds of individual inch-by-inch movements we’d used to go up. Some off-the-cuff calculations put the total ascended gain at over 1300 feet.

After some food and more water – couldn’t get enough – we started marching. Then soreness took over. In a flash at one point, Caleb dropped his pack and yelped “I forgot! I have ibuprofen!” A few animal sightings later, with some strange noises along the creek and amazing moon-shadowed canyon buttresses, we arrived at the lodge.

The lodge was closed. It was locked, with folks were asleep in their rooms at 1:45 AM, as we expected. Caleb managed one bar on his cell phone and called a friend. 20 minutes later, we’re stepping out of the car at our campsite.

I go walkin', after midnight...

Our bodies took a tremendous beating. The off-widths and chimneys were exciting but tiresome. Scratches appeared were normal climbing would never touch. Our hands, although initially taped, had worn down to skin and beyond in many places. I crashed in the tent, with a gear sling still on my shoulder and still wearing my tape gloves. Hanmi and Caleb still had some adrenaline that kept them up for a bit.

Grade IV routes are described as “one long day or two days”. In review, we weren’t organized enough at the belay stations to tackle such a climb in one day – we could’ve done more to snack and rest while someone was climbing. Instead, we chatted and savored the view until we had burned too much time. Route finding and weather also played against us, but ambition and adventure always make climbing the exhilaration we seek – and we got more than enough that day.

Equinox : Part II

Please remove holds before climbing.

Please see Part I of this story if you need to catch up.

This pitch was crackers

The next pitch followed a thin seam that closed in many places on a broken face, my turn to lead. The holds were typical of a varnished face: small and highly incut “plates” all over the wall. However, these were the most friable, delicate holds I’ve ever used. The protection was laughable, with just a few small RP’s in the seam (about the size of 2 or 3 stacked nickels) and a few looped plates and 1 looped little bush. I pushed a bit further than the topo’s stated “anchor” because it was a single old drilled piton that stuck halfway out of the rock as the face eroded from under it, and up to a little crack.

Tarantula hiding from Han as she belays

I had holds break many times, and one time was a full one-armed swing off the rock and a re-grab to new holds, all 20ft off my last looped horn. Dramatic and scary! Caleb had a hold break off on the way up and took a full fall, pulling me sideways a bit – we both ended up with some chewed hands on that one. Hanmi didn’t fall, somehow climbing lightly enough – or perhaps we broke off everything loose already. It was raining rocks, some as big as softballs.

Like a drink from my invisible water bottle?

There was little room for three folks at my anchor, but I had pretty much run out of gear. Caleb came up, took the remaining gear, and passed me climbing to the next anchor. Hanmi came up as I kept belaying Caleb, using the beauty of an autoblocking device and some directional pieces.

All during this time, whenever the lead climber headed straight up, small-to-medium sized rocks fell on the lower ones. There was a lot of yelling, and each rock could shatter into several more on the way down. Some of the larger rockfall could have ended our day (or life) quickly, but thankfully it either missed us or shattered above. Both Han and I had golfball-sized ones hit on our helmets and shoulders. All of us had helmets, and I began to think about wearing one even on the Zion hikes.


The final pitches were about chasing the light as the sun lowered in the sky. We were out of water and all quite sore, especially our feet, as climbing shoes always strain your feet. Climbing moved slowly, with some movements causing cramps to bind your hands, arms and legs into searing pain and strange shapes. Starting at 7AM we were watching 7PM go by while still on the wall. The last few pitches were pretty good, with another scary lead out on tiny gear (I got that one and climbed it almost delirious, singing and placing tiny nuts anywhere – my mouth dry and sticky). This high up, the ledges were full of dirt, rock and scratchy scrub brush, with the occasional cactus for some additional challenge.

Ok, who turned off the lights!?

One of the pitches was an overhanging off-width that constricted, something I had never climbed before. With just a few holds to work with, we all managed to make it somehow, and Hanmi did it dragging the 20lb pack. Above that, it widened into a box chimney, where stemming needed one’s full leg length to reach ass to foot across the chimney walls. I didn’t see Hanmi climbing it, but since Caleb and I are in the 6ft range and she’s 5ft 4, I’m sure she pulled some crazy positions to get through that part. It was almost wider than my arm span.

It the top of these Zion towers the rock levels out, but it is covered with loose plates and rocks, all set in sand. Some of the rocks are teetering, balanced on a wind-swept fulcrum that demands you not touch it. It’s like walking on a chunky dune, but you cannot allow the rocks to side off and kill the folks behind you. It’s nerve-wracking and tiresome. At one point Caleb stopped climbing above us and tried to clean up all the rocks on the ledge and stack them to one side. The sun had set and the last light was leaving us as we reached the summit. We cheered quickly and it was time to descend.

Since none of us had done this route before, and the rappel route was different than the climb, so the pressure was still on to search for the correct path. But now it was dark, and although the moon had risen we were still in the shadow of the buttress next to us. This forced us to all move slowly on some high-angle loose terrain using just the one headlamp we brought.

After some time of searching and steep scrambling to edge of a dark cliff, we found a tree with slings and rappel rings. We looped the ropes through the rings and tossed it into the darkness. Caleb rappelled down first and shouted up that he had found the next anchor. Hanmi and I rappelled next and we felt sense of relief to be on our way. In total, we had 6 sixty meter raps to the base of the wall.

Part 3 of 3 coming up next...

Equinox : Part I

We've been in Zion for a few days. I have other notes, but this climb was awesome. I'm going to break it into several posts...

big wall, little people

While catching some lunch in the small town of Springdale, which lies just outside Zion Nation Park, Hanmi went shopping for a pair of hiking shoes. She met a clerk there and got to talking about climbing in Zion. He mentioned that he knew a bit about climbing, had grown up in Oregon, and that Zion is a great place to climb – and he guides cayoneering trips in the park and climbs elsewhere. So, we thought it’d be nice if we asked him to show us some of the more back country places to climb, not in the typical guidebook.

We met that night for dinner, and Caleb had scoured a few routes that climbers scrawl into the park ranger’s climbing log and had also talked to a friend about routes. He presented us with two choices: A 10-pitch 5.10 climb that topped the Leaning Wall in the Temple of Sinewava, or a series of 2-pitch 5.9 routes in one of the many crags along the walls of the gorge.

The park is endless beauty

We chose the larger climbing day, a grade IV called Equinox. It’s typical for the park at the 5.9 to 5.10 grade: several chimney pitches, some plants to wrestle with and possibly dirty in places. It’s one of the more-standard routes that intermediate climbers play on, but this early in the season and it not being listed in the published guidebooks assured us that it wouldn’t have any traffic. We agreed to meet at 6AM and take the first shuttle into the park (one cannot drive into the park).

All was good as we stepped off the bus and hiked the short distance to the base of the first pitch. We decided to leave our larger packs at the base, nearly empty, and carry just a small day pack for our water, snacks and shoes. It weighed a bit, but as we drank the water it would lighten up.

Gearing up

With three people climbing there’s a risk of moving too slowly to beat the daylight hours, which can strand the party on the wall until light comes around again. Our biggest worry was trying not to dry out, as the weather had warmed up a bit and the afternoon could see 95 degrees in bright sun. The second two on each pitch would climb on individual ropes and nearly at the same time to speed things up, which works well. All taped and roped up, the first pitch started.




The first pitch was a full-on chimney and off-width battle at a solid 5.7 level. The lead was heady (“rowdy” Caleb called it) since there was little protection for almost the whole thing. Hanmi and I followed, with me wrestling the bag up the chimney, dragging it behind me.

Off-width is on the topo as "OW"

Fist jams turned into liebacks, which turned into chicken-wings and kneebars, then a leg in the crack. Footstacks, handstacks, stemming and milking the face for holds all came into the playbook – what a pitch! There were two more, harder off-widths coming. We laughed with delight and awe at the intro pitch and moved over the base of the next.

Han shows off her crack technique

Hanmi lead next. It too was large for her hands, tough to protect, and mostly a run-out solo with a “psychological piece” for confidence (it wouldn’t hold a big fall but could allow her to rest if need be). As she reached the ledge at the top, a tarantula greeted her. Thankfully, it was shy and moved along. I have a thing about spiders, and I would’ve died of fright.

We traded again and I put up the next pitch, a longer crack system that ended in a nice ledge. Then Caleb put up another pitch and we were almost halfway through the route. The sun was ferocious at this point, and we were guzzling our water.

Stay tuned for Part 2 of 3!

The perspective shifts upward

all decked out... and no where to go!

If you climb, and you hear the word 'decked'... it is not, as Martha would say, a good thing. Essentially, it means you fell, and you hit the ground. This past weekend, while climbing at Smith Rock with Jim, I did just that.

It was a stellar day--beautiful weather, great friends, and uncrowded routes.


We started the day at the dihedrals, scaling cinnamon slab's 2 pitches before rapping down the backside to climb Spiderman.

The first pitch there was dull, but the second pitch rocked. just past the first belay anchor was a tough spot where I really had to wrestle with a nut to get it out. after that I climbed back down to a good foothold to rest up before attempting a layback. Then I took a deep breath, gripped the left side of the crack and used the entire right side of my body in unison with my hands and feet to shimmy up and over the bulge. that felt amazing. The next interesting part was a roof with an undercling that took you out to this bizarre layback move. it took some thinking and
some arms to get around, but I managed to do it smoothly on my first shot.

I was super stoked because I finally felt like I was climbing efficiently. at no point were my arms pumped out or my legs shaky... I didn't hesitate or spend a lot of time looking for the right move. I was just having fun!

Once I got over the crux, Jim told me he'd saved me ‘a little’. I noted that he'd built a trad anchor and left about 15 ft to the bolted anchor at the top of the route. I already had all the ‘big’ gear from cleaning the route below; so after taking a swig of water I took off on my very first trad lead. I placed 2 cams and the biggest hex in the rack before clipping the anchors and belaying Jim the rest of the way.

I was on top of the world!

We did some 4th class scrambling around the top of the buttress before making our way back to the anchors above cinnamon slab and rappelling down to our gear. there were people all over most of the routes there, but one remained empty. I asked Jim to let me lead what turned out to be 'easy reader'. Rated at 5.6, it was a very easy sport climb. it was almost disappointingly easy... at this point we had a little more than an hour of daylight left, and after a bit of discussion, we decided to go to Lion's Jaw.

Now mind you, I was feeling VERY confident... okay, 'over' confident... at first I said I couldn't lead lion's jaw, as it is a trad route. Jim said I could, so I said okay without giving it another thought... had I been thinking, I would have realized that I probably wasn't at the top of my game--tired, hungry, feet sore... but I wasn't thinking. I was jonesing like an addict.

I tied in, placed a cam at the bottom as a directional, and started up the smooth dihedral. at the first solid footing, I placed a second cam and gave it a good yank in every direction. satisfied that it wasn't going anywhere, I clipped the rope and headed up. this is when I first sensed I might be in trouble. it took a while to get the cam into a good spot and my right foot was especially fatigued from holding the position. Jim, concerned that I maintain a good level of protection, was instructing me to place gear. I get a bit literal when I’m tired, so I started trying to place a nut right where I was... my footing was crappy, though, and I knew I wouldn't be able to last there long. I pulled off a 1" nut and tried to slot it in the crack... it was too small... I put it back on the ‘biner… at this point Jim suggested I take the whole carabiner off my gear sling and try slotting until I found one that fit... I started to take the ‘biner off, but realized my foot was going to pop at any minute, so I down climbed to the ledge next to my last piece of gear.

I rested there for a minute then headed back up, but stupidly stopped in the exact same place I was in before... finally, I realized I need to climb up, that I just couldn't stop where I was... unfortunately, I realized it a little too late... sensing my feet were about to go, I jammed both hands into the opposing cracks and scrambled around with my feet looking for anything to stand on... the wall to my left was impossibly smooth--I couldn't even get traction smearing. and then my left foot slipped off the wall entirely. the jolt caused my right foot to pop off the tiny nubbin. the crack was too smoothed out from years of climbing and all at once I was sliding straight down the wall... I don't know when my hands came out of the crack. I do know that I looked down between my feet at one point and saw what looked like high-speed film running backwards... truly bizarre. I waited for Jim to catch me at the second piece, but I don't even remember slowing down. Chances are good I actually kicked the 2nd cam out on my way down... I don't even remember hitting the ground. I remember, albeit vaguely, sitting down. Jim kept telling me I was all right and had his arms around me... I thought, 'what is that sound? who's screaming?'... then, as if waking from a dream, I realized that I was the one screaming bloody murder... and then the full brunt of the pain in my left foot took over... I screamed to have him take the shoe off. I knew in another minute or two the swelling would be so bad that they'd have to cut the shoe off... of course, the slightest touch made me scream louder.