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Read The Zine – Current sale: $2 zines / $10 bundle
Apr 1 • 5658 Views • We know you’re stoked to “read the zine” and “wear the zine” so we’re now offering a...
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For 20 years Luke Mehall, publisher of The Climbing Zine has been writing climbing poems. In 2020...
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A Message From Mehall – 3.30.20
To climb or not to climb right now. I’m no Bill Shakespeare, but I am engaged to a nurse. I...
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Dirtbag State of Mind *episode 3*
While we originally planned to drop an episode a week, we are continuing to post these episodes as...
Inspiration Station Inspiration Station
For 20 years Luke Mehall, publisher of The Climbing Zine has been writing climbing poems. In 2020 he’s decided to give the writers...
A Message From Mehall – 3.30.20
To climb or not to climb right now. I’m no Bill Shakespeare, but I am engaged to a nurse. I am not out climbing right now, because,...
Dirtbag State of Mind *episode 3*
While we originally planned to drop an episode a week, we are continuing to post these episodes as quickly as possible. Here Luke Mehall...
Dirtbag State of Mind podcast *episode 1*
Well folks we originally planned to release our new audio book podcast on April 20th, but with everything going on, we figured we’d...
Dirtbag State of Mind podcast *episode 2*
Friends of The Zine: we are continuing the expediting of this new podcast. We know everyone is looking for more stories and content and we...
The Power of Close-to-Home Nature In The Time of Coronavirus by the Access Fund
The Power of Close-to-Home Nature In The Time of Coronavirus From the Access Fund Brad Mering grabs the first real hold after working...
A Message from Mehall on the Coronavirus
While this video is just the start of what we need to be sharing, it’s essential right now that climbers remain at home, and those...
Note: this poem is published in Volume 17, now available. Banner photo of the author bouldering in Coopers Rock State Forest, West...
Traumzeit: Sandstone Dreamtime by Tanager
A black fin of sandstone protrudes from the right side of the crack. I pinch it like a tufa and look up at the iron ring. Next stop, ring,...
Announcing a Climbing Children’s Book: Squeak
UPDATE: the second edition of Squeak! has been released. Same great story, with a couple updates, including The Climbers Pact from the...
Wide Eyes, High Times and Hard Times, a Story of Climbing with Mark Grundon by Luke Mehall
Say a prayer for those you love and everyone else. That’s what I’ve written on my sleeping pad, and the last words I read before going...
Just A Climber, For Bears Ears (a short film)
Just A Climber (For Bears Ears) is the result of 20 years of thinking and recreating in Indian Creek. When the new protections are...
Back…To Climbing by Greg Pettys
Note: this piece was published way back in Volume 2. That zine out of print, but you can pick one up on Kindle for $0.99. For me, it has...
Escape From The Hand Brain by Luke Mehall
Note: this piece is published in Volume 17, and it is an excerpt from his book, The Desert. Both are now available. Now some men will drive...
Seventeen Times Alive by Dakota Walz
Screams are a colorful thing. Each one has its own distinct message. An anger, a joy, a pain. The nature of each rings clear somewhere deep...
The Climbing Zine is always accepting stories, photography, and art. Below are our loose guidelines, informal pitches from solid writers...
Chuck Pratt, Liquid Sunshine by Pat Ament (Part 1)
Chuck Pratt: Liquid Sunshine by Pat Ament (note the full version of this piece was published in Volume 17, which is now available in...
The Climbing Zine Book (now available to pre-order)
For 10 years we’ve been publishing The Climbing Zine. We started off with print runs of 100, then 500, then 1,000, and now these days...
The Long Run, a profile of Alan Carne by Luke Mehall
“There were no girls when I started climbing [in England],” Alan said, in a tone more serious than joking. I’d just met Alan Carne...
I hold and turn my helmet like a classroom globe, dragging my fingers over each mark, each sign of wear. Every indent, every groove...
Zine Senior Contributor Q&A: Rhiannon Williams
As we get The Climbing Zine Book ready for publication we’re going to feature a few of our writers and contributors. Since Rhiannon...
A Venture Backward, Inward, and Upward by Rhiannon Williams
In Memory of Towyn Williams (1926 – 2016) I associate much of my childhood with a little white farmhouse in the Welsh countryside. My...
A Journey Through Time by Adam Ferro
The expenditure of energy on a trip of this sort is massive and one only has so much of this energy. Energy that is accumulated as a person...
Dirtbag State of Mind Hoodies Are In!
We are super psyched to announce that the new DIRTBAG STATE OF MIND hoodies are in, and to celebrate their release we’re offering...
“I’m glad Royal Robbins isn’t here to see this shit show,” I said to myself as I watched the youngsters on Yosemite’s Nutcracker...
Arno’s Dragon by Devin Dabney (a poem)
Long before we decide, the path is carved for us. Sliced through existence to be forged for this one, and beyond. The goals we strive for...
Beyonce’s Balcony by Luke Mehall
Standing there, gaping at this monstrous and inhuman spectacle of rock and cloud and sky and space, I feel a ridiculous greed and...
The Salajeet Collectors by Amanda Forrest
This story starts and ends with a chicken. On a bright morning in a high valley of the Hindu Kush, the doomed bird lay pinned atop a low...
I Got 99 Problems and a Bitch Is One by Kathy Karlo
I started seeing it sometime last year, and it got a small chuckle out of me then: #bitchesonpitches. But the more I thought about it, the...
Crowbars, anger, and new routes, from The Desert by Luke Mehall
“I’m not saying I’m going to rule the world, or I’m going to change the world, but I guarantee you that I will spark the brain that...
One of the greatest joys I have as a publisher is discovering an amazing climbing project, and then being able to share that with our...
Biophilia On The Rocks by Birch Malotky
June’s humid breath settles in waves over the Mount Washington Valley as the sun dips low in the west. A shadow Cathedral Ledge pools at...
Ray’s Red Truck by Roy McClenahan
In the rich caravan of climbers whom we meet at the crags, people come and go. Some, like the flowing of mountain streams, make a daily...
Replacing The Seamstress Corner with Dave Marcinowski by Luke Mehall
There are climbing partners, and there are the climbing partners. The partner you want to climb to the ends of the Earth and back with. The...
Perfectical Prose Perfectical Prose
I wasn’t sure if I should start this piece with being three thousand feet off the ground on El Capitan, or at the...
On Fear, Climbing, and Depression by Sonya Pevzner
Trigger warning: This article discusses topics of depression, suicidal thoughts, and anxiety. For some, the content may...
Part 2: Chuck Pratt, Liquid Sunshine by Pat Ament
This is part 2 of Pat Ament’s essay, published in Volume 17. If you missed part 1, you can read it here. If you...
Upside Down and Unconscious by Shay Skinner
I remember arguing with my partner about wearing his helmet before starting a climb for the day. “It’s only 5.9,”...
A Marriage On The Rocks by Barbara Noseworthy
It’s 1981, and I’m 22 years old, about to graduate from college, trying to sort out what happens next. And...
Zine Emeritus: a story with Shaun
This last month, as we raise funds for The Climbing Zine Book, I’ve been telling a lot of stories about how The Zine...
Reflections on Dad by Tamara Robbins
Since November, I’ve been in Modesto, California, with my family and, while here, digitally archiving the multitude...
The Prince P (in memory of Phil Schaal) by Cyrena Lee
It would have been hard to write about Phil Schaal even if he were still here—here meaning still alive. Alive meaning...
More To Give, The First Solo-Free Single-Day Ascent of El Capitan by Pete Whittaker
Walking up to the base of Freerider, I felt rested, light, but increasingly nervous. Two years ago, I’d never climbed...
Approach As Pilgrimage by Tim Rogers
Journal entry from 10/15/2014 Zion is the word. Despite all of our differences, to so many people the meaning of Zion...
A Love Letter To Climbing by Ana Ally
In 2016 at the International Climbers’ Festival in Lander, Wyoming, we held a “love letter to...
No place soaks up sun like the Johnny Cat enclave at the Cat Wall, Indian Creek. The maroon cliffs are striped with...
The Art of The First Ascent by Luke Mehall
You know you’re getting old when they start replacing the bolts you used for a first ascent. That was my first...
Mountaineering Changed My Perspective On Beauty by Rebecca Ross
Most women, at some point in their lives, get discouraged about their appearance because they may not possess the ideal...
Reflections in The Black by Vic Zeilman
The black-and-white photograph is small and square, half a century old, showing my grandmother posing in front of the...
We Didn’t Have Much Time by Joanna Spindler (a poem)
by Joanna Spindler, published in Volume 16, now available. Banner art by Rhiannon Williams We didn’t have much time...
Hip-Hop and Climbing by Luke Mehall
The fringe is where the magic happens. Four climbers pack into The Freedom Mobile, a graffiti-ed vehicle, spray painted...
The Joy Pendulum, Swinging High and Low in Yosemite Valley by Lauren DeLaunay
As I listened to my boyfriend make his tenth phone call of the hour, I absentmindedly stirred vegetables and reflected...
Yucca Ropes: The DIY Ancestral Puebloan Static Line by Len Necefer
In the late 1300s, experts point to drought and other environmental stressors impacting the Puebloan people in the...
Silent Partners by Luke Mehall
I know he knows. Adam Lawton is proud. In every group of adventurers, there is a leader, and every great leader must be...
Finding Protection In Bears Ears by Josh Ewing
“Yucca sandals,” I say to myself. “How’d they do this move in yucca sandals?” The sheer sandstone wall below...
Old Becomes New in Indian Creek by Chris Schulte
November is closing in fast, and on this turn around the fireball, we reach a strange and interesting milestone in...
Up (and over) the Pope’s Nose by Josh Smith
“Think we could throw a haul bag out of an airplane? That would make the approach really easy.” Kennan was looking...
Do Not Go Outside To Cry by Kathy Karlo
I see it being used all around me to describe women, often by other women: badass. I have always considered it to have...
Granite Trinity by Michelle Dedischew
One thousand twenty-seven. One thousand twenty-eight. One thousand twenty-nine. My head is lost in some sort of vortex....
Elegant and Brutal by Cristina Marcalow
I. Trapped Kaiser Santa Clara Hospital, June 2018 The haul bag sits, a stuffed pig in the trunk. Cams, nuts, and two...
Going Out To Come Home by Stacy Bare
The night was cold, and where the moon and stars shone around patches of clouds, they were incredibly bright. There was...
Climbing Past War by Stacy Bare
The uninitiated, those who don’t climb, always ask me why I do. I normally begin my response with the statement that...
Suicide and Pirates by Andrew Allport
My father taught me how to climb, just as he taught me how to play guitar and ski—badly, I could say. But that...
Susie and The Gnar by Joshua Smith
Some are blessed by fate With thews and spines of steel, Some work hard and fiercely fight To rise above the common...
Climbing En Plein Air by Birch Malotky
The dance of renewal, the dance that made the world, was always danced here at the edge of things… —Ursula...
A Culture of Climbing: An Interview with Len Necefer
“I try to pursue my enjoyment with the idea that folks care and love for the land the way I do for my own home. I try...
Just A Climber, For Bears Ears (a short film) by Luke Mehall and Greg Cairns
Greg Cairns and Luke Mehall have finished their second short film together, called “Just a Climber, For Bears...
Icons In Danger and Desert Medicine by Birch Malotky
Joshua Tree National Park is a refuge. I don’t know if I’d decided this by then, sitting folded into the crook of...
