I Just Had to Get Out of the Office

While working at the Bozeman Chronicle some 20-odd years ago I was offered the chance to take part in an adventure race.

Not knowing exactly what an adventure race entailed, I nonetheless jumped at the opportunity to get out of the office for a week.

A multi-discipline, team affair, the race consisted of mountain biking, hiking, rafting, riding horses, and rappelling along a 200-mile course through the surrounding mountains.

I was quite comfortable with everything except rappelling, about which I knew nothing.

My three teammates, however, were all experienced rock climbers, and volunteered to show me the ropes.

Literally.

A couple days before the start of the race we took a trip up Hyalite Canyon to Practice Rock where I was fitted with a climbing harness and shown how to control my descent.

“You’ll be fine,” they said. “Just trust the process and the equipment.”

But three days into the race I wasn’t fine.

Following an initial biking leg which began at the Museum of the Rockies, a hike along the Devil’s Backbone, and a float down the Gallatin past House Rock, I found myself dangling all alone off a cliff high above the river.

I was out of sight of the race organizers, who had been thrilled to come up with a 600-foot climbing rope for us to use, and I had gotten it stuck in a crack. I was not far enough down the rock face to see the teammate who had preceded me.

It was simply me time.

Working across the cliff, I was able to whip the rope free and continued my descent.

Shaking, I reached the ground, my leather glove smoking.

I haven’t rappelled since.

At least not for real.

I still return to that cliff in moments of need. It’s become my calm place.

Strapped to an operating table last month, getting prepared for surgery, I felt panic start to rise when a nurse began placing an oxygen mask over my face. I get a bit claustrophobic in certain situations and this was one.

Instead of freaking out, though, I closed my eyes, breathed deeply, took the rope in both hands and stepped backwards off the cliff.

And I was fine.

Parker Heinlein is at [email protected]