Big Wall 101:
Skills For the Big Stone
Smith Rock State Park, OR
April 24-25, 2021
2 days
$425
If you’ve been dreaming of hanging from a skyhook high above the valley floor after waking up alone on the wall you might just be crazy, but this clinic might be for you.
It might also fit the bill if you’ve been thinking about trying a more reasonable big wall sometime, getting yourself up the Monkey Face or were just curious about aid climbing in general. Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to be mad to want to climb big walls, but you will have to learn a few new tricks.
This two-day clinic will focus on taking folks already comfortable with trad climbing and teaching them everything they need to know to live their El Capitan dreams. With an abundance of perfect cracks in Smith Rock’s Lower Gorge, we’ll start at the beginning and cover basic aid climbing how-to’s, and teach you how to use all the techniques of modern, clean aid like hooks, cam hooks, offsets, ball nuts and more. We’ll also touch on the principals of piton craft and talk about fixed gear from copperheads to rivets, as well as haul systems and multi-day tactics. With these two days you’ll be ready to get out there and tackle the walls of your dreams.
Day 1: Clean Aid Climbing Workshop
We’ll spend the first day near the ground working on a variety of skills and workshopping aid climbing techniques on the cracks of the Lower Gorge. Day One will be focused on getting you out front to practice aid climbing in a single-pitch setting with backups and coaching so that you can get to try all the techniques without any of the fear of falling.
Day 2: Common Techniques for Big Wall Climbing
On Day Two we’ll focus on multi-pitch systems, and talk about big-wall-specific anchor setups, as well as techniques for cleaning, seconding, hauling and the setup and takedown of bivies and portaledges.
Skills we’ll cover include:
Common equipment for aid climbing
Clean aid climbing techniques
Fixed gear common to aid climbs
Aid climbing safely and efficiently
Anchors for aid climbing
Fixing and ascending ropes
Cleaning and lower-outs
Haul systems
Portaledge setup and takedown
This course is limited to four people in order to give you the care and attention you need.
The first day will be instructed by long-time Smith local and climbing obsessive Chris Wright and the group will be joined by another AMGA Certified Rock Guide on our second day to climb in smaller groups. Chris has climbed walls from Yosemite to Alaska and all over the world, has been an AMGA Certified Rock Guide for more than ten years, and is an IFMGA Mountain Guide and instructor for the American Mountain Guides Association. All of that to say you’ll be receiving the highest quality instruction on the most up-to-date equipment and techniques. Come join me in our beautiful backyard and let’s climb!
