As I watched my sweetheart standing on the steep rock above me, I didn’t know whether she was about to cry or scream.
Fear gripped her to the point that her legs were beginning to shake.
We were taking the shortcut last week over Asterisk Pass in Smith Rock State Park in central Oregon. The pass is named after a car-sized balanced rock that sits on top of a narrow pillar in the middle of a V-shaped pass in the rock formation. A trail leads up to the pass, then stops. To get over the pass, hikers must scramble up and over Class 4 terrain to the other side where the trail reappears. Class 4 terrain means scrambling on all fours on easy but exposed terrain. Exposed means falling could cause serious injury or even death. Some people might want to rope up to protect the scary moves.
“I’m wishing I had my climbing shoes on right now,” my wife Julie said, referring to her grippy-soled rock climbing shoes. I was helping her place her feet and pointing out handholds as she slowly moved down a steep rock ramp next to a 20-foot cliff.
When we finally arrived back on relatively level ground on the other side, we sat in the sun and ate lunch.
“I don’t want to go back that way,” she said.
On the way back, we hiked the long way around.
We found ourselves at Smith Rock State Park near Bend, Oregon, before returning home from our babysitting gig with grandkids in Beaverton, Oregon. The park features amazing rock formations several hundred feet tall with a picturesque desert river — The Crooked River — circling around at the base of the vertical cliffs.
The cliffs have attracted rock climbers for nearly a hundred years, but in the late 1970s, it became the birthplace of sport climbing (permanent bolts placed in the rock) in America. A few French climbers visited the site and bolted a few rock faces that couldn’t be climbed and protected by traditional means. It started a revolution of the new sport in the United States and eventually became probably the most popular way to rock climb outdoors throughout North America.
Other firsts for Smith Rock include the first 5.14-rated climbs in America (very difficult) and a park managed for the specific recreation of rock climbing. Besides rock climbing, people flock to the area to hike, photograph and bird watch.
Julie and I had been to Smith Rock State Park several years before, and I had been there off and on with others.
Last week, the weather was nearly perfect during our visit (cool mornings, sunny skies) which meant that visitors packed the trails and the climbing routes.
We found it humorous to see one particular route on the huge Morning Glory Wall — called “5 Gallon Buckets” — have a steady stream of climbers queueing up to climb it. We thought about climbing the semi-easy 5.8 route ourselves but there was always a crowd on it. I did climb the route next to it called “The Outsider,” a 5.9. The three-star route proved to be one of the funnest of the trip.
Nearby on the same Morning Glory Wall was the super fun route called “9 Gallon Buckets.” It was a notch or two harder, but a joy to climb.
One of the fun things about Smith Rock is that it accommodates a variety of climbing abilities. There is something for every skill level, but for the most part, this is not a beginner crag. In another area not far from the Morning Glory Wall, we saw pro climbers working 5.13 and 5.14 level routes that for me would just be stupid hard.
Because the walls are quite tall, some of the routes are three and four pitches (rope lengths). Many of these multi-pitch routes are traditionally protected, but a few are sport climbs requiring only a rack of quickdraws on your harness. A few routes are mixed sport and traditional climbs. For that reason, it is a good idea to have an up-to-date guidebook or online information to keep you on track.
While Smith Rock is an awesome place to climb, I would rate a couple of other crags, such as Wild Iris (near Lander, Wyoming) or Maple Canyon, Utah, more to my liking. Beauty-wise, though, it’s hard to beat.
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Yellowstone National Park opened to vehicle traffic April 19. Late April is a good time to visit the park before the summer crowds clog all the roads. The road from West Yellowstone, Montana, to Old Faithful has a decent shoulder for cyclists if you still want to ride in the park.
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