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Scott McNamara
climber
Tucson, Arizona
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Many thanks, Steve & Mimi!
It was great!
Really inspiring.
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dtop
Trad climber
Flagstaff
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One of the best climbing events I have been to, period. Thanks to everyone who presented and Steve for organizing.
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Jon Beck
Trad climber
Oceanside
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Very well done Steve and Mimi. I was only able to attend Saturday due to a prior commitment with a jealous mistress (GCNP)
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 13, 2016 - 01:37pm PT
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"So why go? Here the lure is neither colors nor silence, and not even the incomprehensible scale, which, after all, is... incomprehensible. No, what you live for down in the bowels of the earth are the special moments of beauty that come upon you so suddenly that you are speechless. It can be a dead agave cactus, its golden tan leaves crackling in the breeze. It can be a small cottonwood tucked away in an alcove, or a canyon wren whistling a descending song so winsome as to make you imitate its melody. Often, the magical moment of the day comes at the very end, when, thirsty and staggering under a 50-pound pack, you finally arrive in the area where you thought you might camp and, yes, there is water, life-giving water! This might be a tiny stream, it could be a tiny but deep pool where rainwater has collected; sometimes it is a mere seep in a canyon wall that shines with chartreuse moss...
It took many trips, over fifteen years, before I cam to utter these words of finality: "You know, I wouldn't mind living out here." Now as I approach middle age, I dream of leaving the big city behind forever and striding from my little adobe cabin at dawn and wandering into a new canyon, or through a solitary grove of aspens, or across crimson-orange slabs so smooth that they have been given an official name: slickrock.There is so much to see in the South-west - if you know how to look. John Cleare's images show that he knows how to look, but, of course, they are photographs, and not recorded is one of the most telling characteristics of the South-west: the silence. One could argue that mountains are silent, too, but so often they have a burbling stream, the wind coursing over a ridge, tremolos of thunder, the creak of a glacier, an avalanche or rockfall far in the distance. The canyon country of the South-west is the most silent place I have ever seen." Steve Roper from Distant Mountains edited by John Cleare 1998
A lot of folks mentioned the "canyon virus" during the Festival even Roper got it though it took a while.
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pk_davidson
Trad climber
Albuquerque, NM
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Bump for never having seen Roper's quote (and having just come back from the N Rim...)
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