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Tall Tales
An exclusive, online only, collection of climbing fiction compiled by Matt Samet.
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 Guadalupe Peak - High Above the Mesquite
By Richard F. Fleck - Our trail ascends the way past waxy leaves of Madrone trees with smooth and reddish trunks and on up past some blooming cholla in a cold March wind, and higher toward a limestone ledge washed with desert varnish looming above a pinon forest lending voice to the constant gusty winds of western Texas.  NON CLIMBING in the SOUTHWEST
By David Sweetland - A road trip is a good initial experience with the southwest. With Tony and Terrence, in about 1976, winter, we left from Sacramento, California. First stop Ogden, Utah, to see an old girl friend (not geriatric). Then some ice climbing in Little Cottonwood Canyon. Onto Zion and the beginning of our non climbing in the southwest — the four corners where Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, and Arizona meet. We knew — read — Pratt and Abbey as gurus and followed their lead.  Keeping Up With Mini While Climbing Mount Wheeler
By Richard F. Fleck - We camped in Taos Valley on a cold September night while Mini, my blond cocker spaniel, danced around the tent as we tried to get some needed sleep before our tiring climb of Wheeler Peak.  Watermelon Peak
By Richard F. Fleck - On a pleasantly warm February day down Albuquerque way where plum blossoms scent the air, I look through my window at Sandia Crest sprinkled with a fresh morning layer of sugar snow and I know I must arise and go to the mountain's edge where prickly pear cactus and yuccas grow.  Old #5 - A Love Story
By Kurt Krueger - Illustrations by Judy Parenlo I started out belonging to a young, romantic white liberal (read that idealistic) college guy. His boots told me he had been climbing four times. They weren't too impressive, well broken in from walking, but the edges were rounded from feet flying off small footholds. The guy obviously used a lot of arms.  The Last Cowboy Song
By Volker K.S. Dankmeyer - I stared at the broken ice axe lying among the rocks at my feet. A shattered wooden hilt and rusted pick gave a sudden eeriness to this landscape as a shiver shook my body. A few worn leather straps and the remains of a crampon ...  Specimen Mountain
By Richard F. Fleck - In my ranger days, it was my duty to lead a group of ten or twelve straight up the slopes of volcanic Specimen Mountain above Milner Pass.  Front on, Fronters - An Outsider's Season in Rifle
By Jake Hjorten - Okay, yes, I get it. You climb 5.13, probably 5.14. You're sick strong. You can get a knee bar rest everywhere with a fancy rubbery, glued, duct-taped kneepad.  BOLT RUN, my roadside attraction: Trout Fishing in the Nude
By D.S. AKA Preston Tierra - This article is NC 17! Bolt Run, my roadside attraction, is a 5.10d (some say 5.11) sport route at old Donner Summit, California, near paleolithic Lake Tahoe. Right on the old highway, hence the name, below the old bridge built in 1926, that 1950's Olympic skier Mad Dog Dick used to fly his plane under then do barrel rolls over ancient Lake Donner ...  Laramie Peak
By Richard F. Fleck - Bouncing along in a jeep toward distant Laramie Peak on the high plains of Wyoming, I think I must be some sort of charging bison stampeded by my own desire to climb a mountain of such a perfect pyramid shape standing so purple on the horizon.  The Olde Days
By Jarrett Tishmack - Now climbing in my time was a far stretch from today Wooden shoes, chain mail helmets and ropes made of hay And now that I'm old; my bones to brittle to climb I can't help but reminisce of that long ago time.  Beowulf: Tobin Sorenson, older you, and me
By David Sweetland - History has a bad habit of being ignored. I write this essay in my fiftieth year, after seeing the movie, Beowulf, and rereading the great tome that was written about fifteen-hundred years ago. In my youth — 1970's — to touch stone was to fight dragons, a need only a fiend could tell. I had the skill, psych, and spirit to go the heights (and I did!). I never wanted to be great.  A Winter's Climb of Mount Chapin
In the summer Mount Chapin isn't much of a climb being only over twelve thousand feet, but in the winter, it's quite another matter with winds so fierce that tree-line pines are given a screeching voice ...  Brocken Specter atop Longs Peak
We all look up at an eclipsing moon high in the sky as we approach the dark North Face in very crisp air of three a.m. Way toward Wyoming, streaks of Northern Lights shimmer while we inch our way to the summit over icy granite.  7-Month-old sends Flagstaff V7
October, 2007 — Infant Ella Roseborrough of Flagstaff, Arizona (age 7 months) sent the Priest Draw classic Anorexic (V7) on her 4th try. Her proud parents were there to offer moral support, Beta and to provide a spot. |
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