he considered easy. At the top, Jack stuck a quickdraw (a small piece of metal with a looped end) into a tiny fissure in the rock. He laced the loop through a carabiner. This device is a four-inch long metal ring that opens and closes. Through the carabiner he hung the belay rope before scrambling down again. 3 Once below, Jack showed me how to tie a belay rope around my waist. Then holding the other end of the rope around his waist, Jack instructed me, "Just follow that crack, the one I took." His helmet created a shadow across his face On belay, yelled, stretching my legs, my stomach churning. Belay on," Jack replied I stepped up to the rock to find my first handhold, then looked around for a suitable ledge to step onto. If slipped, the rope around my waist that was attached to the carabiner at the top of the boulder would hold me in place until I could find my foothold again. took my time working up the "path," often fumbling around for which foot to put where and how to hold myself to the rock with my hands. The rock smelled dank and alive, and my heart beat wildly. When finally stepped on top of the boulder, l reveled in the feeling of having conquered it Later, Jack helped me rappel down a small 7 cliff after I'd watched some of his climbing buddies do it. put on a harness, thin strips of rope that fit around my waist and thighs like a pair of shorts. Jack helped me string a rope anchored to a tree through a carabiner attached to my harness and then instructed me to back off the top of the cliff. For additional safety, Jack had me on belay from the top. I felt like was stepping into thin air, but instead, horizontal to the ground below, I "walked" down the cliff controlling the rappel rope with my gloved hands. My entire body (especially my legs) shook as l worked my way down, but l made it. After that became one of Jack's climbing buddies too. Whenever we could get away, we'd pack up our climbing gear and head for the rocks. That summer Jack invited me to go on a climbing expedition to a section of the Rocky Mountains in Wyoming. It would be my first experience climbing a real mountain.