“I’m not a climber, but I spent the night on a portaledge hanging off a rock wall near Yosemite.”
, in the Sierra Foothills. I thought maybe we’d just jump in the car and go, but first he wanted me to watch some YouTube videos and set up the portaledge on the ground myself, to make sure I understood how it worked before he left me hanging off a cliff in it.and managed to assemble the thing, shoving the aluminum pipes and joiners into each other and cinching the straps tight. The thought of doing such things while hanging from a cliff seemed absurd.
When we agreed to postpone and eat pizza instead, I felt enormous relief. Three days later, as we hiked through the goat farm’s tall grass wearing heavy harnesses and carrying several bags of gear, I was starting to get spooked. I usually deal with fear by not thinking about the thing that scares me until I absolutely have to. But now, minutes away from dangling off a ledge in a contraption I didn’t fully understand, I was forced to confront my decisions.
Norman Pelak helps author Ashley Harrell learn to use an ascender on a boulder near Yosemite National Park.It might not be a big wall, but this slab of rock was a thrilling place to spend the night in a portaledge.As we reached the boulder, Van Leuven and Pelak worked together to raise up the portaledge, which was already secured by ropes to an anchor that Van Leuven had clipped into the top of the rock earlier.
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