Aron Ralston - Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Saying farewell is also a bold and powerful beginning.

1987 Moved to Englewood, Colorado; started middle school; went skiing for the first time

1988 First overnight backpacking trip, in Rocky Mountain National Park

1990 First trip to Utah; visited Arches, Capitol Reef, Bryce, and Zion national parks and monuments

1993 Graduated from Cherry Creek High School; rafted Cataract Canyon in Canyonlands National Park, Utah; moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to attend Carnegie Mellon University

1994 Hiked first fourteener, Longs Peak, in Colorado

1995 Was a raft guide on the Arkansas River in Colorado for the summer; moved to Lausanne, Switzerland, for a year of study abroad

1997 Graduated from Carnegie Mellon University; stalked by a black bear in Grand Teton National Park; started working at Intel in Phoenix, Arizona

1998 First winter climb on Humphreys Peak, Arizona; first alpine rock-climbing trip on Vestal Peak, Colorado; backpacked into Havasupai Canyon with my sister for Thanksgiving; climbed first winter solo fourteener, Quandary Peak

1999 Moved to Tacoma, Washington; climbed Mount Rainier and Mount Shuksan in Washington; moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico; joined the Albuquerque Mountain Rescue Council

2001 Climbed in the Cordillera Blanca in Peru; finished hiking the Colorado fourteeners in November

2002 Left Intel; climbed Denali in Alaska in June; moved to Aspen, Colorado, in November

2003 Climbed Pyramid, Holy Cross, Longs, Capitol, and the Maroon Bells as winter solo ascents; got caught in a Grade 5 avalanche on Resolution Peak, Colorado; visited Blue John Canyon, Utah

anchor:To fix a rope to the mountain by any of a variety of means, including: placing removable or permanent climbing gear into tapered cracks; looping webbing around a thick tree trunk, or around a large rock or chockstone; or drilling bolts into the rock.

ATC:Air Traffic Controller, a brand name of a belay/rappel device.

belay/rappel device:A variable-friction device that controls the speed a rope passes through it, used both to belay another climber or to rappel.

BLM:Bureau of Land Management, the government agency responsible for managing some federally controlled public lands; separate from national forest, monument, or park lands.

CamelBak:A company that makes water reservoirs and backpacks for outdoor sports; especially useful for hands-free drinking. The user sucks water through a tube connected to the reservoir.

carabiner (also ’biner):A metal link with a gate that opens and closes, allowing a climber to clip the link to an anchor, the rope, webbing, or a belay/rappel device. For better security, some carabiners have lockable gates.

chimneying:A climbing technique that uses the counteracting pressure of feet and hands on opposite walls to move up or down a chimney-width rock feature such as in narrow slot canyons. Also known as stemming.

climbing rope:A special design of rope with a core and sheath that stretches when dynamically loaded, absorbing a significant amount of the energy generated when a climber falls, as opposed to static ropes that do not stretch.

cornice:A snow feature usually found on summits and ridges where wind blows and compacts the snow into an overhanging bulge, like a frozen wave curl.

couloir:A funnel- or hourglass-shaped snow-filled gully, usually exposed to rock and ice falling into it.

crampons:Metal spikes, often arranged ten or twelve per foot on boot-length metal platforms that are strapped to mountaineering boots for climbing snow and ice.

daisy chain:A six-foot-long sewed loop of half-inch-wide Spectra webbing that is stitched to itself every five inches along its length, creating a series of load-bearing fabric links in a “chain” of webbing. Typically, at exposed rappel anchor sites, with one end of the daisy chain hitched to his climbing harness, a climber clips a carabiner through one of the links to a solid anchor to prevent a fall while working near the edge.

downclimbing:Descending steep terrain using climbing techniques, as opposed to rappelling or using anchors.

DPS:Department of Public Safety; in Utah, the DPS oversees the state highway patrol.

ECSO:Emery County sheriff’s office.

ICS:Incident Command System, the command structure and guidelines used by most government agencies and search-and-rescue teams to manage large-scale emergency operations.

Lexan:Trade name of a type of hard plastic, used in some outdoor recreation water bottles.

mixed:Combination of ice, snow, and rock terrain; also mixed climbing, climbing on mixed terrain, using crampons and ice tools on rock.

Nalgene:Brand name of a company that makes outdoor recreation water bottles.

NPS:National Park Service, an agency within the Department of the Interior that administers national monument and park lands.

progress-capture loop:A knot, such as a Prusik knot, used in lifting systems to hold the load in place while the haul system is reset for a subsequent lift.

Prusik knot:A special friction knot useful for ratcheting operations such as ascending a rope or in pulley systems. When loose, the knot can be slid up a rope but locks when tightened under downward force.

randonée (also alpine touring, or A/T):Backcountry skiing equipment similar to downhill ski equipment but with rear binding components that allow the boot heel to lift for uphill travel, then lock the heel down in ski descent mode. Unlike telemark skiing boots, A/T boots can be used with most crampons.

rappelling:Descending a cliff using a rope and a special friction device.

rappel ring (also rap ring):A welded aluminum ring that links a climbing rope to an anchor for rappelling, allowing a climber to pull the rope down from the anchor more freely, once the rappel is completed.

SAR:Search and rescue.

Spectra:Trade name for a type of synthetic fiber used in climbing ropes and webbing, stronger for its weight than traditional fibers.

stemming:See “Chimneying.”

telemark:Backcountry skiing equipment with a single free-heel mode that allows for both uphill travel and downhill skiing; named for a region in Norway. Downhill technique on telemark gear uses an alternating dropped-knee stance that advances one ski in front of the other to execute a turn. Telemark boots have a toe baffle that flexes, which is necessary for the telemark ski stance, but which makes them incompatible with most crampons.

travertine:A type of rock formed by water with high concentrations of lime that are deposited wherever the stream flows or splashes. As the creek changes course or water levels drop, lime residue solidifies into travertine and changes from white to burgundy as other minerals in the accretion, notably iron, oxidize and turn red.

webbing:Flat or tubular strips of closely woven high-strength fabric, useful for building climbing anchors. Usually used in three-quarter, one-inch, and one-and-a-half-inch widths.

yarding:In climbing, to pull hard on a handhold.

This book is a testimony to the love of my parents, Donna and Larry Ralston, and my awesome sister, Sonja Marie Ralston Elder. For the memories we’ve had together and for the ones we have yet to create, I got out of that canyon.