Our final episode for Season 1. Shout outs for the climbing podcasts that inspired us, plus Mehall reads his poem Grateful Hussle. We will be back with Season 2 in late March, 2021. This link will get you 25% off anything in our online store: https://shop.climbingzine.com/discount/DIRTBAG%2520PODCAST Read more stories/watch videos/explore: http://www.climbingzine.com Photo: John Kurtz
An Open Letter to the Buttermilks by Georgie Abel Photos by Tristan Greszko Dear person who climbed the Peabody boulders at dawn on November 21, 2015, I don’t know you who you are. Or maybe I do know you. That would be hilarious. It’s possible—the climbing world is so small. But my point is that I…
You know you’re getting old when they start replacing the bolts you used for a first ascent. That was my first thought when I heard that an anchor I’d placed, over in my old stomping grounds of Gunnison, Colorado, was getting an update. Story by Luke Mehall. This piece is published in Volume 15, now…
A remembrance of our fallen comrades, as well as the long gone friendships. Originally published in The Climbing Zine Book. This link will get you 25% off anything in our online store: https://shop.climbingzine.com/discount/DIRTBAG%2520PODCAST Read more stories/watch videos/explore: http://www.climbingzine.com
Doug Tompkins opens the door to a South American summer evening. At seventy-one—stooped and shuffling, a button-down shirt tucked into khakis and held up with a leather belt—he’s not exactly the climbing jock he once was. Looking up through kind, brown eyes, he shakes hands with us, and then he walks us into his stone-cottage…
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 one you’d follow all the way to the moon. The one who eats, drinks, and breathes climbing. The climber who is not only skilled but also a student of…
My left hand cups a full undercling while my right shades the sun from my eyes. Above me, the short arete curves out of sight, my insecurity about balancing on sloping sandstone in the full sun causes me to hesitate. Climbing to the right is objectively more dangerous. I’d be farther from my last protection.…
“If you just stop for a second, I can show you there’s no road out there!” Ben said. “I know there’s a road there; we drove it a couple years ago!” I fired back. We hadn’t even started an ordeal that would surely drive us to our wits’ ends, and we were already lost and…