drrieux

The climb was simple at first because I was able to walk up the steep path, but as I ascended higher I was forced to begin climbing. Large boulders provided a good route for climbing and I found myself making my way up still fairly easily. Eventually I reached a point where I could not go any farther forward and up. In front of me stood a sheer cliff that went straight up at least 20 meters. When I walked around to see if I could find another route up there was nothing except drop offs on either side. As I looked more closely at the cliff there were indentations that looked deep enough for me to use them as holds for climbing. I had only been rock climbing once or twice, but I did fairly well; however, this was a completely different situation. Here I had no safety ropes, there was no trained expert at the bottom guiding me up, and there was no guarantee of being able to find holds all the way up the cliff face. Just when I began to feel fear and doubt making their way back into my mind, I shook myself and grabbed a hold of the wall before they could grip me once again. My hands and feet gripped firmly to the wall and I was able to make my way up without much difficulty at first. There were ample places for me to grab during the first leg of the climb, but as I went higher they became farther apart. When I reached about fifteen meters up I reached a point where I stretched across the wall as far as I could and it still wasnt far enough to reach the next hold. Pushing myself as hard as I could towards the hold my toes gave way and my foot slipped out of its hold. A sudden panic came over me in that moment, but I managed to think quickly before the panic had the opportunity to conquer my judgment. With my foot free I swung my weight out towards the hold before I began to fall and I managed to jam my fingers in far enough to grip it. My fingers gripped hard as I swung back and forth like a pendulum hanging from the wall. Using my feet I stopped myself from swinging and tried to find a place to put them into the wall to take the weigh from my hand. It was then that I realized how little strain I felt in my arm, though I should have been dramatically fatigued from the climb so far and this situation, somehow I didnt feel the least bit tired. There was no hold near the one my hand was in except one that was about a half meter above it. Before I would never have been able to pull myself up with one hand, but Strength was within me now and making this jump was surely no match for my Strength. Seemingly with no effort I pulled myself up and grabbed the hold with more speed than I had anticipated, so I almost overshot it. As I grasped it with one hand, I reached up with the other searching for another place to grasp, and when I had found one my momentum only increased until I felt like I was barely gripping the wall at all. The last five meters seemed like I was flying up the cliff face instead of climbing, and before I knew it I was at the top. Though I had not yet reached the summit, the rest of the climb seemed less intimidating now and the end was in sight. Suddenly the top of the mountain didnt seem to be beyond the sky, or maybe I had gone into the heavens without realizing it. Up here the stars not only looked brighter, but much larger to and I could only wonder how things would look from the summit.