Steemers, Steemists, Steemsters: Do You Climb? 

As this fantastic social experiment may be on the way to becoming a community or another Reddit, I'd like to get to know more about the members. What hobbies do you have? What are your interests? Are we fully harnessing Steemit and how using our various backgrounds can we improve it?

Drop me a line. Let us shape this site, its content and its projectory.

This me climbing about a month ago at a place called Holy Boulders. It was named this because it takes a prophet to find the place as it is tucked away between some telephone lines, farms and beautiful Shawnee National Forest.  Like most rock in Southern Illinois, Holy Boulders consists of various formations of sandstone with occasional iron deposits. Unlike Central Illinois which is a flat prairieland, Southern Illinois has rolling hills, cliffs, lakes and forests inhabited by commonplace woodland creatures and the occasional mountain lion.

 I have little photographic evidence of most of my pastimes because selfies are difficult with your hands full (bad climbing joke) but I have been climbing for nearly nine years. I began rock climbing to help me conquer my fear of heights. Being a fan of technical knowledge and dirty, creative, off the beaten path routes, I learned how to climb traditionally first. This type of gear use, commonly called trad climbing, requires knowledge of ropes, knots, and pieces of climbing gear that are put into cracks, crevices and pockets of the rock. This type of ascention allows you to climb cliffs that haven't been climbed.  I travelled to Red Rocks Canyon outside of Las Vegas to climb multiple-pitch routes that went more than 1600 feet.  The gear is kept on a sling or your harness and is collectively called a rack. (That is what she said.)

This is my rack of SLCDs (self-loading camming devices) tricams (half moon metal pieces that expand when pressure is applied) chockstones (passive gear that is shaped in a way to slot down a crack) slings (webbing tied at various lengths so the rope can have a leash) climbing shoes (hardy ballet slippers with a grippy sole) and a tool to help remove gear that becomes jammed in the rock.

I also enjoy sport climbing where there are bolted drilled into the rock and one merely attaches a carabiner-sling-carabiner called a quickdraw from the rope to the bolt.  This type of climbing is generally on a face rather than a crack or chimney and is bolted because traditional protection is not available. Many climbing routes shown by the media requiring lots of upper body strength and little footing are sport routes.  To climb without feet is called campusing. My favorite style of route is a slab. This means the climb has sections that are less than ninety degrees. These normally have technical tricky footing and require great balance. Folks in the climbing community discuss slab along with Jedi powers.

Here is a picture of me after rappelling off a route only miles from my own backyard.  

The third type of climbing is bouldering. It is generally the most difficult in terms of strength.  Instead of being called routes, the maneuvers and path to reach the top-out is a problem. These problems are largely less than thirty feet high because unlike other forms of climbing, boulderers do not wear a rope and harness but fall to a cushion below which is deemed a crash pad. I enjoy bouldering the least but have been seeking to increase finger strength.  

I have a dinner to prepare so I will leave your mind spinning with this much jargon for now. In the meantime, let's try to share more original content and inspire one another!

Truly,

H