“Ugh,” I thought to myself.  “This is no damned fun”.

 I was having troubles- hanging on a rope with arms on fire, less than halfway to the top, and with no way out but up, I was getting worried about whether I’d be able to make it out of there on my own.

A half-hour ago I’d rappelled down into the canyon to reconnoiter a possible put-in, only to discover that what had looked pretty viable from the canyon rim above was only barely doable- and that was just the put-in.  The creek itself was a milky torrent, much steeper than it had looked from above.  Strange boiling on the surface hinted at deep water, more volume than I wanted.  This river constricted in places to a channel less than 4 feet wide at the bottom of this canyon.   I didn’t like it- I was climbing out rather than having my boat lowered to me and paddling downstream.  This run would wait.  It was just too dangerous. 

The canyon was a cut in solid rock, polished smooth and sculpted into outlandish shapes- deep enough that a long rope was needed to get in, and narrow enough all the way up that the sky was a mere band of blue above, fringed on either side with bits of green as the forest canopy above extended partially overhead.  We’d spent the last several hours scouting this stretch from various points on the canyon rim, and we’d been looking at this river, some of us, for years with an eye toward possibly running it one day.  Prior to this descent, we’d lowered a video camera in here to get an idea of what to expect- but to the best of our knowledge, nobody’d been crazy enough to go down here.  …That is, until I’d rigged up my descender, dropped our longest rope over the edge and slid down it to see if our prospective put-in was a reality or a bust.

 It had been a heady experience, boldly going where nobody blah blah blah, complete with video footage rolling for posterity.  I had smiled and waved to the camera on my way down.  That felt like a year ago already. 

Once at the bottom I had taken the time to really look around- I marveled at the beauty of it.  The rock itself was smooth, worn that way by water, with cuts here and there that suggested long ago this had once been a grotto, there had been an undercut, here a pocket of softer rock had given way and formed an eddy… it looked strangely organic, a scene from another planet.  The roar of the water below reverberated on the walls, giving another meaning, I thought, to the term ‘living rock’. 

 The ledge we’d eyeballed from above as being a ‘maybe’ put-in was significantly higher off the water than we’d guessed.  Below it was a narrow ledge that was of marginal potential.  I was discouraged.  I also was not encouraged by the way the water looked- boiling, surging, angry silt-laden water coursed through the bottom of this canyon- up close and personal it told a different story than it had from the canyon rim.  Just downstream the first two drops combined to present a significant gradient, one that promised not to let up until the end of the canyon.  I’d expected it to be steep, but actually seeing it for the first time from water level was a whole different experience.  This run would be really steep. We’d identified several areas with possible undercuts downstream, and several areas where we just couldn’t see the whole river- no, today was not the right day to do this, it felt wrong.  I had rigged up a makeshift set of ascending tackle and started back up the rope to convey the bad news.

 I was getting exhausted on this damned rope.  My arms were starting to shake with fatigue, my breath was coming in gasps, and I was overheating in my drysuit.  Dirt, dislodged from above by the rope, had rained down in a dusty powder and stuck to every inch of my exposed skin, which was soaked with sweat.  Fifteen minutes ago I’d begun a straight rope ascent, working my way slowly upwards, parallel to the wall but never touching it- I hung 6 feet away from it now, with the end of the overhang just ahead.  Upstream, I regarded the boulder- a huge, house-sized mass of rock that must have fallen into the canyon at some point ages ago and lodged between the canyon walls.  It was an oddity, hanging forever some 70 feet from the bottom.  Moss had grown on its topside, but underneath it was naked and rough.  I dearly wished I could get to it and rest.  Discouraged, I began to swear sulphrously.  It was a little over a hundred feet away, a little less than the distance I had left to go to the top.

 I’d underestimated the difference that climbing back out in full paddling gear would have on me.  That, or I’d overestimated my endurance.  I hated the fact that I had nobody to blame.  For a brief moment I hated this place, wished I’d never come, but before the thought was fully formed I knew it was a lie.  I loved this place.  I stopped recriminating, stopped climbing, stopped focusing on the rope and my ascenders, and changed my plan.

 I took one of my extra biners and hitched it through the safety harness of my PFD, linked it through the one in my seat harness, and attached it to my top ascender.  Slowly at first, I leaned back, forcing myself to breathe deeply and fully, until I hung horizontally from the umbilicus I had fashioned.  I let my hands open, and released my grip on my ascenders, trusting them to hold me.

 I spun slowly in the breeze as the rope above me sang a deep note, too low to hear.  I let my arms and legs splay out, and allowed my head to arch back until I was fully reclined.  I closed my eyes.  At first they didn’t want to stay put, darted restlessly beneath my eyelids as if compelling me to open them, to let them see.  I denied them, rolled them back into my head, and slowed down my breathing until I stopped twitching.

A lot of things crossed my mind.

I could feel the emptiness beneath me, yawning behind my back, imagine myself falling…

I dismissed the thought and focused instead, eyes still closed, on the feel of the rope. I rested that way, twisting slowly in the breeze, feeling the rope hum its single note, focusing on that deep vibration until the burning between my shoulder blades subsided and I could no longer hear the blood hammering behind my ears or feel it flushing my face.

For some reason, just at that moment, I remembered another time, a day spent with my father when I was about 10.  We were adrift in our zodiac in the ocean, maybe 10 miles offshore, when a whale took a detour out of its way to look at us.  I recalled having been frightened and upset- it was very large and we were very small, and far from shore.  The whale regarded us briefly, and continued on its way.  We decided to motor into shore, and neither of us spoke about it.

We had both been scared, and we both, I think, resented it.

Only later did we admit to ourselves, and later to each other, how foolish that had been.

We had let our fear get in the way of our sense of wonder.

Pondering this, I was finally able to relax.

 I opened my eyes and regarded my surroundings anew, this time from an upside-down perspective.  I arched further backward, purposefully looking down the length of rope I’d come so far.  Strange, from this angle the height wasn’t so dizzying.

I let my regret about backing out of the run go.

 I also took a moment to re-rig the stirrup I’d been using- I attached it to the top ascender, and girth-hitched it through my harness before proceeding.  This turned out to be much more effective than the method I’d been using to this point- I had essentially been doing pull-ups this whole time, rather than walking up the rope the way you’re supposed to.  My progress became easier and more rapid… and I realized that I didn’t want to leave this place, not just yet.  I stopped again, this time with my back to the wall, and I looked around me again.  I tried to see the whole place at once, letting my eyes fall upon a single point and using my peripheral vision to take it all in.

 It was glorious.

It was nothing like what I’d expected.

It was fully worth it.

 I emerged from the canyon with none of the bravado I’d entered it with.  I was dehydrated and tired, and the late fall air had a chill to it.  This run would not be successful today, but in the following weeks, as the water continued to drop, I would return.

 I occasionally think back to my first time in the canyon, and even though the details are starting to get fuzzy in my mind, the sense of awe and wonder and discovery haven’t faded.  …And I’ll be disappointed in myself if they ever do, because that, I think, was the most valuable thing I came away from that day with.