the nostalgia project: Darkness at Noon, USA (2018)

What is the nostalgia project?
What happened to 2012-2017?

The route

Smith Rock is a unique climbing area in Central Oregon, widely considered to be the birthplace of sport climbing in the US. The rock is a colourful volcanic tuff.

Darkness at Noon was established by Smith Rock pioneer, Alan Watts, in 1985. It was the hardest sport route in the US at the time (though Watts pushed grades several notches higher over the next couple of years). The route tackles a 35m vertical wall in the Dihedrals sector which tilts outwards a few degrees in its top third.

The first half of the route is technical on very small crimps and pockets, and is sometimes climbed as a route in its own right, finishing at the mid-height anchors of Heinous Cling. The steeper upper part of Darkness has better holds and tests endurance more than technique. According to the guidebook's first ascent notes, Watts actually climbed the lower and upper parts as independent climbs in March and May 1984 respectively, then linked them in March 1985.

Hallowed ground: the left-side of the Dihedrals sector at Smith.
Climber on Sunshine Dihedral. Notable routes working leftwards from there:
To Bolt or Not To Be, Last Waltz, Moondance, Wedding Day,
Heinous Cling, Darkness at Noon, Chain Reaction

Tighter, though foreshortened, view of Darkness, the faint chalk line just left of centre.

Heinous Cling is the heavily chalked line just right of centre.

The unmistakable (?) Chain Reaction is the left arete.

Though considered a sport route, the bolts are widely spaced. As cordless power drills were not available in the mid-1980s, and hand-drilling was very laborious, developers naturally tended to ration bolts. In the early days of sport climbing, there was also peer pressure to keep routes somewhat bold, as rappel-placed bolts were considered unethical by many at that time. However, even relative to other early Smith sport routes, Darkness is runout and it does not seems to be led as often as most of the other well-known Smith 5.13's.

The route's name comes from the wall's perfect east-facing orientation and laser-cut structure, such that it does go abruptly into shade mid-day. From the Smith visitor centre in the morning, two other well-chalked climb lines stand out on similarly-oriented faces to left and right of Darkness: the classic 5.12a, Dreamin', and the notorious 5.14a, To Bolt or Not to Be.

Afternoon shade on Dreamin', Darkness at Noon and To Bolt .. © smithrock.com

The context

As I have mentioned before in this blog, Smith Rock was all over climbing magazines in the mid-80s. Photographs showcased a cool climbing scene where the world's best climbers posed in their lycra tights on blank-looking routes. Even the colour of the rock was shockingly different; few of us in the UK had seen bright orange cliffs before. Two photographers in particular, Beth Wald and Heinz Zak, assembled portfolios of Smith shots that became ubiquitous. The authoritative Mountain magazine had Zak's photo of Alan Watts on Chain Reaction for the cover of issue 107 then Wald's photo of Craig Smith on Darkness for the cover of issue 117 (low quality scan below).  Both left a strong impression on me and defined what "hard climbing" looked like in my 20-something mind.

A collector's item: Mountain 117. Sadly mine is flood-damaged.
Craig Smith on the first crux of Darkness at Noon, photo Beth Wald

I visited Smith twice from the UK during the 1990s. Both times with Shoko, though more as a road-trip stopover than with serious climbing intent. On the first visit we camped for one night in the state park campground, which was - this seems extraordinary now - empty except for us. We pitched the tent right by the canyon rim and watched the sunrise light up Smith's weird formations the next morning. On the second visit we stayed in a hotel in Bend for a few nights. The climbing highlight was doing Superslab, a fun multi-pitch trad route. We wandered over to the north side of the park to view the extraordinary Monkey Face spire afterwards. Overall, though, Smith was much too far from the UK to imagine having a serious project there (though it has been done).

The Monkey Face spire at Smith

For a Squamish-based climber, Smith is a fairly reasonable destination for frequent visits. Though a long'ish drive (about 10 hours including the border crossing and a couple of breaks), it is the closest major area with reliable dry conditions in early-spring or late-fall. My first US climbing trip after moving to Canada was to Smith, with my local friend Todd in October 2016. I had just climbed Pushers at Horne Lake and was feeling optimistic about my climbing. I hoped to at least cover the ground on a classic 5.13 there. Churning in the Wake, a very popular route, was top of my list.

As often happens with visits to places you don't know well, expectations and reality were not well aligned. Churning looked quite hard and anyway almost always had a team in situ. During our week my best actual send was a flash of Heinous Cling Start, a classic 5.12a. However, as Todd did not get the flash, we went back to that corner of the Dihedrals sector two more times so he could redpoint.

An unintended consequence of being there was proximity to Darkness. I realised I could inspect the first half on top rope using the Heinous Cling anchors, and did so, discovering that I could just about do all the moves. The next day we had another Todd with us, a strong boulderer from Alaska, visiting Bend for work. A european climber asked me to belay him on Darkness while the Todds climbed together. This gave me an opportunity to top rope the whole route. I was surprised to find the upper moves to also be fairly reasonable, though I was nowhere close to linking them. In the diary I wrote "must project this route one day".

Alaskan Todd top-roping close to bolt #1 on Darkness

A year later Squamish Todd and I returned to Smith for another week. This time I focused entirely on Darkness, trying it on alternate days with a rest day on belay duty for Todd in between. From the diary:

"Day 1. Stick-clipped up Darkness then made a messy TR attempt, up to bolt 6."

"Day 2. Stick-clipped Darkness to bolt 4 then TR'd back up. Then led and TR'd the whole route with many hangs."

"Day 3. Having morale issues. Tried lead burns on Darkness. First try ground to a halt at bolt 3 at crux moves. Next try got past bolt 3 after modifying my beta with a higher right foot. Continued to bolt 6. Third try got all the way to bolt 9 but flamed out just above, very close to end of the hard climbing. Went to top after the single hang. Too worked to try again."

"Day 4. Conditions very unhelpful with intermittent rain and temperature barely above freezing. I stick-clipped to the top again and worked the moves from bolt 8 to the anchors. Then tried a lead burn in the rain but had to stop with numb fingers at bolt 2. Frustrating."

Two specific issues became mental barriers to redpoint the route. One was the necessity of stick-clipping the fixed draw on the first bolt. It is about seven metres off the ground, which is beyond the range of most clipping sticks. Fortunately the excellent Redpoint store in Terrebone, the small town near Smith, sells extra-long sticks, but even armed appropriately, it was quite a tedious battle to get the rope onto the draw at the start of each lead session. Also, I found the first move off the ground really hard, and would sometimes fall off it repeatedly, usually swinging into my belayer in a comic way. This makes good entertainment for the hordes who are usually hanging around that corner of Smith but is not good for personal psyche.

Once past the opening boulder problem, I had the moves reasonably dialled until the third bolt. However both the second and third clips are sufficiently spaced that it is hard to relax in that zone. A slip while pulling up rope for either clip could result in a fall almost to the deck. Between the third and fourth bolts is a distinct thin crux, which has both endurance and precision elements. Past that one gains good holds and an excellent rest, and can scurry off right to tick the Darkness Start. Apparently this is considered 5.12c in isolation. I found it very similar in character (for runouts and effort) to Rocket at Pet Wall in Squamish, which is considered a stiff 5.12d.

Still from video, me leading the first half of Darkness at Noon, 2017
The not-wholly-necessary "rose" move below bolt #2

Moving past bolt #2

Clipping bolt #3 (best not to fumble this one)

Setting up for the first crux, above bolt #3

The upper half of the route has two distinct sections split by a rest on a good jug with poor feet. Below the jug, past bolts #5 to #7,  is about 5.12b in isolation with one fluffable move negotiating some very small edges on vertical terrain. However the real redpoint crux is between the jug and the top, passing bolts #8 to #10 on a wall that overhangs about 5-10 degrees. The first few moves from the jug are positive on small edges, setting one up for a deadpoint to a thin horizontal pocket: the "mail slot". Apparently some people find it hard to hit the slot accurately but for me the main problem was managing the pump just beyond it, after making a strenuous clip of bolt #9. You need the residual power for a long throw to a jug rail, after which there is a glory road of jugs to the anchor. The throw is probably only V1 in isolation, but no joke after all the climbing below. My redpoint highpoint on day three was failure at the throw.

Another still from video, starting the upper half of Darkness, above bolt #5

Meanwhile Todd had finished off his project: the aesthetic arete, Latest Rage. On our last day, the weather was so poor that no-one else was in the state park; a very unusual event. It had rained hard in the night and the freezing level was so low that snow had settled just above the cliffs. Almost everything had wet streaks except Churning in the Wake. We managed to get a top-rope onto it and tried all the moves with reasonable success: "An OK way to finish a disappointing trip."

Squamish Todd latching the good hold on the last hard move of Latest Rage

Back in Squamish I obsessed over possible ways to get back to Smith as soon as possible. Todd typically only takes climbing holidays in the fall each year, so that felt too far away in time. Another friend, Travis, suggested he might be able to go in late April. That gradually coalesced into a firm plan.

One change of tactics that I insisted would be required was to book an Airbnb property rather than camp. I felt that staying in the campground was just too cold and morale-draining. In particular, temperatures drop abruptly after dark in Central Oregon's high desert, requiring early retreats to a tent. The state park campground's showers were not very reliable either. I find a reasonable degree of hygiene vital to climb "hard" as finger skin needs to stay in reasonable shape. Travis, a habitual dirtbag at that time (I believe parenthood has softened him since) agreed reluctantly to the Airbnb, after a brief financial negotiation, which was then modified again to include his buddy Ross, who would join us for some of the period.

I trained very specifically for Darkness over the winter. In particular I tried to get as strong as possible on mono and two finger pocket holds, as there are several on the lower part of Darkness. One complicating factor was that James and Leo were having a busy winter on snowboard and splitboard respectively. In the last few weeks before going to Smith, I spent four days on level 2  avalanche skills training courses with Leo, then three days with him in the Tantalus mountains, then a week later drove James into Washington state to spend three days at Stevens Pass for his first slopestyle competition (Capita's Minor Threat - he won the U10 category).

All of this was memorable in various ways but was time away from the hangboard. However, just before Travis and I set off south I had achieved the training benchmarks that I hoped were appropriate to for Darkness; notably unassisted mono hangs on my middle fingers on the Beastmaker 2000 shallow mono pockets and four sets of an endurance circuit of forty foot-on campus moves with a matching rest period between each set.

The ascent

Back in Oregon, the Airbnb, a quiet farmhouse on the far side of Terrebone from Smith, proved to be exactly what I hoped for. An unexpected bonus was a great western aspect out to the Cascade volcanoes. One in particular - the very symmetric Black Butte - was central to the view.

Base camp, April 2018, Ross and me © Travis

Black Butte from the Airbnb

Unfortunately, despite the excellent accomodation, I had terrible redpoint nerves. Over the next four days I climbed two on/ one off/ one on. The first two days were fairly hopeless: I even managed to fail at bolt #2 on one try. On the third day I did match my October 2017 highpoint, feeling pretty good until the bolt #9 clip, then succumbed to the pump at the throw. This was very frustrating as it felt like my training had been ineffective. The only faint hope was a beta improvement I discovered, using a good pocket at bolt #9 as a sidepull to eliminate one move above.

I had intended to climb on the fifth day but woke up in a very poor frame of mind and realised I needed a break from climbing. Travis very kindly let me use his Tacoma for the day. While he and Ross went east to Smith, I drove west. I had the loose idea of hiking Black Butte. It seemed to be mostly free of snow and had a corkscrew road around it leading to a trailhead not too far from the summit. This was a good decision. The hike was short enough for a rest day (about a 6km round-trip, 500m altitude gain) but stimulating enough to be cathartic. The big views up and down the Cascade chain from Mt Batchelor in the south to Mt Hood in the north were stunning, almost agoraphobically so. My thoughts did keep circling back to the Darkness struggle but I think my angst bubble was popped.

Mt Jefferson and Mt Hood from Black Butte summit

Fire lookout, Black Butte summit

The next day I returned to the Dihedrals. It was warmer than before. My first redpoint try was lame, falling at the first crux, but I forced myself to climb to the top and familiarise myself with the upper crux again. I rested 45 minutes and tried again. This time I tried a couple of nutrition tricks. First, I sucked down an espresso gel just before leaving the ground. The caffeine buzz worked nicely through the first half, helping me to summon up the right amount of power to crush the first crux. Second, I carried up 100cc of gatorade in a small plastic bottle to rehydrate at the main rest while stopping there for as long as possible. The upper wall flowed well and I found myself eyeballing the throw while still feeling reasonably fresh, and, of course, latched it. Then I relaxed, which was an error, as the very last few moves - maybe 5.9 in isolation - suddenly felt very hard. I made one locked-off reach a little too dynamically and for a moment felt my body start to barn-door away from the wall - but was able to reel it back in. Sent! Actually, almost not, as a miscommunication between us led to Travis taking me tight on the rope as I clipped the anchors!

We still had four more days remaining at Smith. Unfortunately I found it hard to summon much energy and spent most of the period watching Travis and Ross climb. One piece of unfinished Smith business that did seem like a priority was to stand on top of the Monkey. While Travis took a rest day, Ross and I climbed Astro Monkey (with the thin Moving in Stereo start), a multipitch free route up the tallest face of the spire. Much of this climb felt a little too thin or too burly for me in my "warming-down" state but I enjoyed leading the massively-exposed fourth pitch common with Monkey Space, a pioneering Smith free climb first led by one of my heroes, Bill Ramsay.

Tradding up Astro Monkey - me on the easy second pitch © Ross

Following pitch 3 © Ross

And standing on the Monkey's brow © Ross

Subsequent ascents

I have not been back on Darkness and doubt I ever will - even thinking about all those moves makes me feel tired. I did visit Smith again in the late fall of 2018 with Leo and his friend Nic, staying back at the campground (brrr!). But I was rehabbing a finger injury and did not redpoint above 5.11. An unexpected highlight was seeing Adam Ondra and his entourage, there to film Adam's historic onsight attempt on Just Do It. As to future visits: I hope.