Rock Climbing the Iron Way: Via Ferrata Comes to the USA
CLICK, CLACK. CLICK, CLACK. The clatter of aluminum carabiners clipping and unclipping fills the air on this late summer afternoon. Pendulous clouds drape the upper slopes of Spruce Knob, the highest peak in West Virginia, and threaten rain. At the moment, though, only a fine mist penetrates a canopy of oak and locust at the base of Nelson Rocks, where guide Josh Armstrong and I watch nine climbers, led by guide Jason Cain, scale a 100-foot-high quartzite cliff on ladder-like rungs anchored in the rock. Each climber wears a harness with a pair of carabiners on lanyards clipped to a steel safety cable that runs alongside the rungs. At 6-foot intervals, when a climber reaches one of the eyebolts that anchor the cable to the cliff, he or she detaches one carabiner from the cable, clips it back on the cable above the bolt, and then does likewise wit h the trailing carabiner. Click. Clack.
"You're up," Armstrong says. He isn't a rock-climbing guide in the traditional sense. No rope runs Âreassuringly through his expert hands to my climbing harness. He can't catch me if I fallâ€"and falls are heavily discouraged. Slipping off the metal rungs might cause more Âinjury than a fall while roped and on Âbelay in conventional rock climbing. "We don't have a dynamic rope to catch us, or someone on the ground to absorb the shock of our fall," Cain said before the climb. "We are falling on stainless-steel cable. Doesn't stretch much. These lanyards? Not going to stretch much. We can generate a lot of force with a fall. It's Âgoing to hurt. So no falls."
No falls. Okay. A familiar nervous anticipation overtakes me. I have a fair amount of experience on rock, though it's been a while since I've ascended anything higher than a 30-foot climbing wall. But with all this metal support, I'm confident enough to clip bot h carabiners to the steel safety cable, grab a rung, and start to climb. I won't unclip for 5 hours.
The Tools of Via Ferrata Rock Climbing
A fixed anchoring system like the one at Nelson Rocks is known as a via ferrataâ€"Italian for "iron road." It stays put while the climbers move on: no ropes to lug, no specialized gear to buy, no esoteric techniques to learn. These networks of ladders, cables, and bridges were developed in the ÂDolomites during World War I, when they were used to move supplies and infantry through Âotherwise impassable terrain. After the war, mountaineers took over the routes, and today, hundreds of via ferratas enable even raw beginners to access dramatic ridges and peaks in the Alps and Pyrenees.
On this side of the Atlantic, however, via ferratas are practically Âunknown. The route at ÂNelson Rocks is one of only a handful in the U.S. and Canada, although Whistler Blackcomb in British ÂColumbia and other ski areas have discovered that the iron roads can complement summertime ziplines and waterfall canyoneering.
At the Nelson Rocks Outdoor Center, the 1750 feet of ¾-inch aircraft-grade stainless-steel cable (tensile strength: 11,800 pounds), the 115 stainless-steel rungs, and the 145 iron bolt hangers that went into building the via ferrata open one of the most unusual geologic formations in the East to exploration. Parallel fins of exposed ÂTuscarora quartzite rise high above the North Fork Valley like the bony plates on the back of a stegosaurus. Just 220 feet separate those fins, and in an inspired feat of amateur engineering, the via ferrata's builders link them with the route's most spectacular featureâ€"a suspension bridge spanning the distance.
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