Rock-Climbing Fingers of Steel.
The highly-anticipated adventure feature film by Sender Films and Big Up Productions, Valley Uprising: Yosemite's Rock Climbing Revolution, zooms us in to take a look at the nascent rock-climbing revolution that bat-shit crazy and ultra-fit hippies and beatniks of the late 50's and 60's successfully ignited. This young, LSD-dropping generation literally went out of their minds and decided to climb up some of Yosemite's tallest trademark slabs of vertical rock.
In a recent NatGeo Adventure blog interview with Valley Uprising's co-director, Nick Rosen, the adventurous director talked about an unfinished psychedelic scene in the film where an 18-year old, Jim Birdwell, was rock-climbing and dropping acid by himself on a death route. Talk about the highest display of psychedelic recklessness in history. Nick Rosen accurately pointed out, "Birdwell's exploration into hallucinogenic big-wall climbing has not been matched since then."
You’ve got guys out there swinging golf clubs on manicured lawns and making five million bucks a year. Then you’ve got these dirty guys—and women—going up 3,000 feet and pushing the limits of human ability. Then they come down, get back in their crappy old car. They make a burrito out of peanut butter and tortillas and live in the dirt. That level of motivation, that really pure, soulful passion can drive people’s abilities to new levels without having a professional, money-oriented sport. — Nick Rosen
Popular out-door sport companies such as The North Face and Patagonia were also born out of the rock-climbing revolution. Break-through, rock-climbing techniques demanded new gear to be invented, which accelerated the innovation of never-before-seen technique, which, again, demanded the innovation of superior rock-climbing gear. This feed-back loop of daring creativity allowed these companies to find their niche and flourish.
I met a few rock climbers at Burning Man last year, and hearing about their adventures on big-wall rocks outside of Vegas piqued my interest in this obscure sport. It takes a special person to lose their shit enough to the point where they come face to face with an unclimbable slab of rock and death and proceed to climb up past it. I'm really looking forward to this rare, well-documented look into the origins of this extremely adventurous sixty-year old sport.
Enjoy Valley Uprising's anarchistic rock-climbing trailer!
I met a few rock climbers at Burning Man last year, and hearing about their adventures on big-wall rocks outside of Vegas piqued my interest in this obscure sport. It takes a special person to lose their shit enough to the point where they come face to face with an unclimbable slab of rock and death and proceed to climb up past it. I'm really looking forward to this rare, well-documented look into the origins of this extremely adventurous sixty-year old sport.
Enjoy Valley Uprising's anarchistic rock-climbing trailer!
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