Let’s be real, most of us who climb don’t make money from it. I am 100% included in that, especially trying to keep up with the sport while in college.
Having lived in both Oregon and Colorado, I’ve got to experience quite a few crags that cost virtually nothing to go to. Going to big walls like Yosemite are basically out of grasp for me until I graduate school.
So the next best thing I have access to that is mostly affordable, is Smith Rock.
How did I make it affordable? Dry camping in a tent, not anywhere closer than 10min from Smith.
Once you get to campgrounds closer, camp fees go up because more people want to go there and there are more things needing to be managed.
There are multiple options for camping, and it doesn’t all involve a campground.
Affordable camping options:
1) Carpool and everyone pitch in on a group site. We camped at Skull Hollow Campground.
2) Disperse camp on National Forest land for free.
3) If you have a vehicle rigged out to live in, park in grocery store parking lots, or pull off somewhere on national forest land. This will only cost you gas.
What about food?
You can always just buy cereal, milk, and ramen… but let’s be real; if you’re a serious climber, that’s not gonna cut it. You are burning a plethora of calories, especially at Smith with all the hiking to each wall.
Here’s what we did:
1) Meal prepped- we prepared a few things ahead of time using food we already had. We made apple crisp for dessert for the weekend (it was our friends 21st birthday, that’s why we were so extra). But also sliced/grated cheese, and made what we could ahead of time. What we couldn’t make ahead of time, we had planned out.
2) Split the cost of all the food- have a couple people ahead of time plan and buy the food, then do the math to see what it all works out to per person. That away you’re eating decent meals with enough nutrients and calories, but it’s not costing you an arm and a leg.
3) Plan easy, fun meals- Bratwurst are my go-to camp meal because they are east and fairly quick. When camping we usually do hobo meal packs, bratwurst (you can easily add chili to this as well), burgers, and just buy a couple bags of chips.
4) Snacks > lunch- granola bars, fruit snacks, and we even sometimes have sandwiches as just a snack to pack while climbing. We usually will get hungry on the wall, but by the time we get back to camp we are too tired to actually eat/make anything. So we found that if we snack when we’re hungry on the wall instead of waiting to go back for a full on lunch, we can climb longer, consistently, as well as still have energy at the end of the day to make dinner.
Day use fees:
Day use fees at Smith are $5. None of the machines will give you change for cash, and some of them only take card. Safe bet is to have cash and card on hand at all times.
How we only paid $1 a day at the most:
We piled AT LEAST 5 people and all of our gear into my Subaru Outback. That worked out to about $1 per person, and we could have easily gotten cozy and crammed a few more people in there.
Where to gas up:
Most places around Smith have prices jacked up for tourists. The cheapest I could find gas around Smith was $3/gallon.
After getting home and doing the math, it would have been worth it for me to drive an hour south to Bend to gas up for cheaper. This is something you have to do on your own depending on what car you drive and your gas mileage. For my Subaru Outback, it would have been worth it to do that, plus I could have checked out the Oktoberfest.
LOCK UP EVERYTHING:
Usually while camping, even in a campground, you don’t have to worry about someone messing with your stuff when you leave.
Well if you’re climbing or hiking, chances are you’re gonna be gone for the whole day. Lock everything up no matter how petty it is.
Again, Smith is well known, and there are a lot of people who travel through.
We only left out our dry box and cooler but things went missed every single day.
Day 1: The perpetrators took our Coke, but not our rum.
Day 2: They took our sliced/grated cheese, and left the lid of the dry box off.
Day 3: They must have left because nothing was stolen.
We think it was just a few punks taking things just to take them. They could have stolen a $150 slackline, and could have taken $100 worth of alcohol, but didn’t.
So learn from us, LOCK IT ALL UP.
(Photos of me courtesy of Kate Averett: @kateave on Insta)
Crag Days
I can’t count how many people asked us if we were there for Crag Days. To be honest, none of us even knew it was happening.
We would have loved to go except:
1) It was $40 to sign up and go.
2) It was way cool that Tommy Caldwell was speaking and all, but we came down to climb, not listen to people talk about climbing and their life.
3) Again, we were there to CLIMB, not sit in on climbers giving painting lessons.
4) Why would we want to camp 2ft away from a random stranger? Not even in the mountains or a secluded areas? That’s not camping.
5) We ran into Tommy Caldwell anyways, and didn’t have to pay $40 to see him. We didn’t bother him because he already had a crowd following him at 6 A.M., but the experience was neat!
How to avoid lines for routes:
Now we don’t have this down to an exact science but…
1) Climb in the middle of the week- If this isn’t an option for you, keep reading.
2) Go when there is a major event happening- Crag days kept most climbers off the wall once dusk hit. They all went back to the event to drink and mingle, we stayed on the rocks with our headlamps and sweatshirts.
The Oktoberfest in Bend also kept the trails less busy than normal making it quicker to get to routes.
3) Mornings- find out when first light hits. And be at the wall you want before the sun comes up. Once the sun is up, it’s a safe bet that there is at least one or two people waiting on the more popular routes.
4) Climb lesser-known routes- We not only hit up the less-popular routes, but also challenged ourselves and stayed off the 5.9 and below routes. We did end up putting up easier routes because we had friends joining who never outside climbed before, but those were the ones we had to wait to open up.
5) Night Climb- like I said before, even those not at Crag Days, left the park around dusk. Almost everything we wanted to do opened up once dark hit. Not many are comfortable with night climbing, but it’s definitely something everyone should try once. And if you have no problem with it, this is the best time to make sure whatever you want to climb is open.
If there is anything else you want to know about this trip, or want me to post about, let me know!
Don’t forget to follow me on insta at: @delaneypaullus
Less Than Elegant 