Part 2. New fashions.
A. Keywords
rock climbers, climbing equipment, climbing course, physical conditioning, mental conditioning.
Vocabulary
rugged, spine, prairie, craggy, creek, accomplished, sedimentary limestone, grizzly, piton, spike, rafter, rappel, sling, crack, toe- and handhold, integral.
You're going to hear a radio program called "Scaling the Rockface".
One of the Canada's best climbers, Barry Blanchard will tell you something about his own experience with rock climbing.
A1. Listen and consider the following questions.
If you follow the rugged spine of the Rockies north from Colorado, the mountains take you into Canada.
And there they rise out of the Canadian prairie like a huge craggy wall.
In the province of Alberta, the Rockies reach heights of over 12,000 feet.
It's not surprising that this area has become home to some of the best rock climbers in the world.
Here at the head of Heart Creek, Barry Blanchard is making his way through an evergreen forest alongside a rushing creek.
He's on his way to First Rock, a favourite practice spot for accomplished rock climbers.
Blanchard has climbed all over the world, but finds the Canadian Rockies very special.
I guess the situation here is a lot different than a lot of other places.
For instance, the Italian Dolomites are very similar geologically to the Rockies, sedimentary limestone, but you know, the culture around the bottom is a lot different.
Here, we have a lot of wilderness, and in Italy, there's...there's none.
I live in Alberta largely because many of the other mountains places you can live in the world, there just isn't a lot of wilderness.
I mean, here, in this valley, we can see a grizzly.
In Europe, there hasn't been a bear that size in a long, long time.
First Rock, were Blanchard stops to begin climbing, is about 25 meters high.
It's an afternoon's workout for a man who often climbs rockfaces 50 times that height.
As he unloads his backpack, he explains that the purpose of climbing equipment is to attach the rock to the rope, and the rope to his body.
Okay, there's a piton hammer. We use that to drive the spikes into the rock. You had to trust those little things, pretty... pretty much, eh?
Yeah, yeah, but I mean, with...with experience, putting them in and taking them out, you learn to judge them pretty well. Learning to judge them.
In a sport as dangerous as rock climbing, a climbing course would seem to be the only way to begin.
Blanchard explains how he learned his craft.
Well, for me, it was a lot of reading actually, and got some equipment and basically practiced around the house in the neighborhood on buildings.
Around the house? Yeah, around the house, I used to...Literally climbing the walls.
An, yeah, yeah, yeah, climbing the basement rafters and used to have my brother sit on my bed so there was enough weight that I could put the rope around the leg of my bed and rappel out of the second-story window.
The I got th chance to go out, and one point, with a friend who'd taken a climbing course,
so yeah, climbing courses is a great thing, for all kind of beginner climbers because it's a risk sport, I mean, there's... there's heavy consequences to be paid for a fall.
He hammers the piton into the rock, loops his equipment and slings around his body, and begins to climb, a graceful exercise where he moves freely up and along the rock.
Blanchard is thin and in peak physical condition.
The muscles in his legs and arms each appear to operate independently as he uses the tiniest cracks in the rock for toe- and handholds.
It often looks as if he is magically sticking to the side of the smooth rock.
Back at ground level, Blanchard explains that physical conditioning is just one part of the sport.
Mental conditioning is every bit as important.
You also have to learn to think, you know, as you get started to get scared because you're beginning to expose yourself to a fall, or maybe the holds are getting smaller.
You have to think why you're afraid. I mean, you have a fear that's coming up, and the nice thing about this sport is learning to control fear like learning to... to just use it rather than have it consume you.
For Barry Blanchard, rock climbing is an integral part of his life. It provides him with challenges and opportunities that most people miss.