Groped atop the Second Pitch
Our bus had been waiting at the Mexican border for two hours. The cause? A guy with stringy hair who’d been pulled off by three officials for questioning.
Was it drugs? Every news story about Mexico seemed to involve gangs, cop shootings, and decapitations. Were we all safe? My large seatmate didn’t seem worried, her head was back, drooling asleep. Every minute she slumped lower, squishing me harder against the window.
An official waved the driver onward. The bus jolted to life.
The street signs were in Spanish and kilometers but Mexico looked disappointingly like just a dustier Texas: souvenir stands and highway. It was getting dark.
Why was I on this trip to begin with? I had just moved to San Francisco and did not know many people. So, when AJ, a guy I barely knew from my climbing club, invited me to climb with his friends in Mexico, I agreed, eager to avoid spending New Year’s alone. Also, it was supposed to be a short bus ride from San Antonio, where I’d visited my sister for Christmas.
But after the delay at the border, and a transfer at Monterrey to a rattling local bus, it was past midnight when I finally reached Hidalgo, the tiny town near my destination. I found a drugstore that was still open and asked the cashier in Spanish for directions to walk to the climbing hostel a couple of miles away.
“Es tanto peligroso!” she exclaimed. “It’s too dangerous, please, I will call my cousin and he will give you a ride.”
I was touched that she wanted to help me and alarmed that she seemed to think the area was dangerous as well.
The following night, AJ and his two friends showed up, too late to climb. We went out for dinner in town to a local chicken rotisserie that was supposed to be good. It was in a large tent and flies buzzed around the plastic tables, but the air smelled delicious. As the only Spanish speaker I told my crew, “don’t worry guys, I got this!”
But when I placed my order of “cuatro pollos asados,” the man looked at me incredulously.
“Esta seguro?” Are you sure?
“Si,” I replied indignantly.
When our meal arrived, I realized I had made a mistake. Four kitchen hands came out from behind the tent, each with a whole roast chicken they placed in front of us with a judging look. This was followed by four buckets of beans, four bags of tortillas, and four two-liter bottles of coke. The price was so cheap I hadn’t realized I’d ordered four whole feasts rather than four plates.
It seems I didn’t know Spanish as well as I’d thought.
* * *
The next day I climbed with AJ. We were going to do a three-pitch route, which means you climb a hundred or so feet one after another, then pull up the rope and climb the next pitch above that. We were at the top of our second pitch about 200 feet in the air, and I was scared, and I had no idea what I was doing. I had to trust AJ completely.
AJ said, “hold on to the wall a bit, I need to fix your anchor.” He unclipped my personal anchor. I was not clipped into the wall by anything, there was nothing keeping me from death except a tiny ledge and my sweaty grip. My hands shook as I clung to the wall, they shook so hard I was afraid I’d lose my grip and plummet to death. “Relax!” he said, clipping me back in. “Calm down, baby.” Hanging from his slings, he reached over and massaged my ass. “Hmm, you have a nice handful there.”
Fear froze me into full-blown rigormortis. I was so shocked and scared I couldn’t do anything.
“Ahem,” he cleared his throat. “I guess I should just climb the next pitch then. On belay?”
* * *
A while later I was safely on the ground. AJ had decided to cap the day off with a single pitch climb and I was lowering him to the ground. The rope seemed too short for him to come all the way down. “AJ!” I shouted, “I think we are running out of rope.”
“Don’t be stupid, the middle mark hasn’t even passed yet.” He shouted down condescendingly. “Watch me here, I’m going to traverse to get this jacket that’s stuck in the cactus.”
I watched him as he’d asked. Suddenly, the rope wasn’t in my ATC anymore. I was just holding his weight in my hands. “Stop!” I shouted, “I’m out of rope!
“Oh yeah,” he drawled, “I forgot. I cut fifteen meters off my rope. Can you just hang on while I build another anchor?”
As I held all 170 pounds of the man who had just groped me, I began to regret my decision to come to Mexico. But I eventually, I lowered him down, and we were both safe.
The next day, AJ and his friends left. “It is raining too much here, so we are going to drive to Austin and climb around there.”
My flight was not leaving Monterrey for a week. So, I was all alone in Mexico. At least I had a lot of chicken to eat.