My Adventure: by Kevin Keirn
Shortly after moving to Colorado from a remarkably flat midwestern state, I got down on my belly ten feet or so from the edge of a forty foot cliff. I was terrified. Somehow I’d convinced myself to sign up for a rock climbing class offered by a local school. I’d come to Colorado with a great love of the mountains, but yet a tremendous fear of heights. Even a simple ten foot drop bothered me. I didn’t like driving many of the mountain roads. But, I also wanted to climb mountains. I was totally in love with the mountain west and Colorado! This desire had somehow led me to sign up for this class.
I heard an instructor say “who wants to rappel down first?” I thought they were out of their minds. I wasn’t even able to crawl to the edge to look over. No way! This was all a big mistake. Somehow I needed to back out of this. Meanwhile, a young woman happily popped up and said “I’ll do it!”. What was wrong with her?? I remained laying down. But then she seemed to have fun, and nothing bad happened. “Who wants to go next?”. Apparently the next voice I heard was my own, although I couldn’t remember deciding to say anything. Did I say I would? What?! Then what followed was an almost out of body experience – harness on, helmet on, carabiners, rappel device, rope set up, a second rope to belay for safety, step over to the the edge of … whoa!!! My head was spinning. It felt surreal. No way out now. This was it. It was SO far down! I followed their instructions and started down and … wait. This was actually kind of fun! What was going on? By the time I was half way down the cliff, I knew something really big had changed for me. I’ll never forget that moment.
I ended up taking a basic mountaineering course for eight weeks, made a lot of good hiking and climbing friends, and learned to feel confident in the mountains. I learned how to use an ice axe, how avalanches happen, how to read the weather, and how to select proper gear. I learned to top rope (where the rope goes up from the belayer to the top and back down to the climber) and even to lead climb some. A group of friends met one night every week after work just to climb. I even ice climbed a little. Most of all, I met a lot of great people who also loved the mountains.
This helped me set a bigger goal to explore my new home state. My first 14,000’ peak was Longs Peak, and yeah, it was a challenge both in effort and the lingering fear of heights. Yet it was so much fun that I have climbed it twelve times! And there are more. Colorado has (depending on who you ask) 54 to 58 peaks with an elevation of more than 14,000’. Most aren’t that hard, but the top fifteen or so have some technical challenges that can sure get your attention. Over the four years following my first rock climbing class, I went on to climb all of Colorado’s 14,000 foot mountains, and ran the Leadville 100 ultra-marathon three times. That’s how I defeated the fear of heights.
Advice to Others:
I think that some of the best climbers started out with a fear of heights to begin with. It’s tough to overcome, but if you do, the rush of defeating it can give you a great boost in confidence. My fear never quite leaves altogether, but it’s so much better than it was before, and I know I can overcome it. Doing this repeatedly while slowly working through all of the 14,000’ mountains was so much fun. Perhaps the best part of this was that it was a goal that took years and lots of training to accomplish. I was also able to travel all over the state to places I might not have otherwise ever visited.
Many people climb Colorado’s fourteeners now. Some have even climbed them all in under ten days! People have climbed them in all seasons. There are great resources online (e.g. 14ers.com), and a lot of places offer classes to get you up and running. Perhaps start with some easier ones in the Sawatch Range. Save the toughest most technical peaks like Little Bear, El Diente, most of the Elks, etc until you have more experience. Above all, get good instruction and stay safe.
If you do decide to try to climb them all, my three pieces of advice would be 1) start very early to avoid the frequent afternoon storms, 2) save an easy peak for last, and invite lots of friends to climb it with you! Uncompaghre in the San Juans worked great for me. Finally, 3) go easy on the champagne on that last summit. You gotta hike down and the altitude makes a big difference! I still have the bottle though.
