On the via ferrata and fun on all 3 levels
Did you know there are different types of fun? Endurance athletes often talk about the fun scale with various activities. What are the different types of fun?
Type 1 — Fun is fun, right as you do it, like riding your bike down a stretch of flowy single track through trees and by mountain streams in Breckenridge.
Type 2 — Not like “wheeee!” fun in the moment, but you look back on it and say, “wow, that was fun.” (eg, many marathons or ultra events where you suffer in the moment, but are happy after it is done).
Type 3 — Not fun. Like when you’re experiencing an anxiety attack before you go on a mountain climb with your friends.
About one month ago my friend and teammate, Hap, sent me a link to a new adventure experience in Colorado: the via ferrata at A-Basin. The via ferrata, Italian for “iron path,” is a protected climbing path with origins in the Dolomites in World War I, when Italian troops set up ropes and cables so they could safely traverse and attain the high ground in the mountains with gear and equipment. Via ferratas have become popular among outdoor enthusiasts, with many in the Alps and now in the USA. Not to be outdone, Arapahoe Basin just opened the highest via ferrata in North America, topping out at 13,000 feet.
And not to be outdone, my adventure-loving friend, Hap, put this out there as a most excellent challenge for the undertaking. We recruited friends Sidra and Tim, and then we set off for adventure.
After getting our harnesses, helmet and box lunch, we set off up the ski left with our guide. Dawson, then onto a shuttle up to a short hike to “Schoolhouse Rock” at 12.000 feet. Here Dawson taught us how to use the carabiners, rungs,” gas pedals,” and iron cables to chin to the rocks.
Right after our training as I looked up at the East Wall of A- Basin, it really hit me that this was more than I had expected. I wondered if once I started climbing the wall if I would have acrophobia, and experienced what I can only describe as a brief anxiety attack. “Ready?” Dawson asked each of us, and with tears in my eyes behind my sunglasses and a quivering voice, I decided the only way to see how I would do was to see how I would do. So we hiked to the base of the via ferrata over boulders and sure, and set off up the mountain.
It took me a long time to feel comfortable going up the mountain. I climbed slowly and deliberately, because although then were iron footrests and rungs in places, in other places you had to find natural places in the rock to hold onto. I had envisioned a hike up the mountain with a series
of these ladder-like climbs, but this literally was scaling the side of a mountain, handhold after handhold and foothold after foothold. I turned my pre-climb panic into problem-solving, and worked on the mental puzzle of finding a path up the mountain, one foot of ascent at a time. As we ascended, Time asked me, “Are you having fun?” And I answered “I’m not really sure. Maybe this is type 2 fun.” Truth is I felt like the weak link, climbing so slowly, so I was fighting that mental game too.
We got to about 200 feet from the top at around 1:30 PM and broke lunch there, and then we made the trek back down. Although I was worried with technical downclimbing that the panic would return, surprisingly I felt better, and we made our way back to the base. Despite it still being technically difficult, I felt more relaxed, and even started to laugh. Type 2 fun transitioned into Type 1 fun. We celebrated with food and beers at Cabin Creek Brewing in Georgetown (great place!), and reveled in the day, and made plans to do this again next year.
And later that evening I reflected on what I learned:
Climbing is so much of a mental game. It is overwhelming to look at a rock face and realize you’re going to scale it. As you climb, if you too far ahead or behind, it can cause you do freak the f- -k out. So to get through it, you have to really get hyper-focused on what is immediately in front of you and take it one step, one rung at a time. And there is a definite calm to be found in that concentration of the present moment.
I not only survived a day with my friends on the side of the mountain at Arapahoe basin, but I experienced the full “fun scale” on our daylong adventure. How rich is that? Pretty amazing, if you ask me. And from this experience, my goal is to bring this focus and calm into my regular life today as I round, work in clinic and work to catch up on a literal mountain of work and “Just following up my previous email” emails that have stacked up as I transition from last week’s vacation and regaining my work focus in this week’s back to real life. Whatever challenge I’m facing, I’ll attack it one rung at a time, and I hope find a certain joy in that present moment.
