Blind Climber Comes To Mason
By Alecia Gower
Broadside Feature Writer

Frozen avalanches, 8,000-ft drops and subzero temperatures are only a few of the countless perils of mountain climbing. Imagine using only a ladder to bridge a crevasse thousands of feet deep; sleeping on ledges no more than two feet wide, with miles of sky below; climbing beyond the clouds. Now imagine tackling this hostile world in the dark, without sight or a sense of distance and perception. Impossible?

Tell that to Erik Weihenmayer, author of "Touch the Top of the World - a blind man's journey to climb farther than the eye can see." Weihenmayer shared his experiences and photos while reading passages from his book to a captivated audience Thursday night in Harris Theater. Blind by the age of 13, Weihenmayer said he used to hate everything about blindness. "I didn't know what to expect," he said. "I didn't want to be swept to the sidelines." He couldn't play basketball or baseball, and when he received a rock-climbing newsletter, he jumped at the chance to prove himself.

He ignored critics and warnings and launched into his new endeavor with fearlessness. This fearlessness seems to have become Weihenmayer's unofficial trademark, forcing him to the peak of the highest mountain in the world - Everest. Weinhenmayer, with support from the National Federation for the Blind, decided to go for it. He and his team practiced on Ama Dablam, only 22,000 feet, compared to Everest's 29,000. The team worked together and struggled to make it up the mountain. Adversity prevailed, however, when one of the team's climbers fell 100 feet down the mountain and had to be taken back to the mountain's base camp. The team went home, determined to succeed the next year with Everest. When he decided to go for Everest, critics and writers from rock-climbing and fitness magazines resisted the possibility of a blind man successfully reaching the summit. Weihenmayer was not discouraged.

His whole life, experts denied his capability as a mountain climber. The blindness is simply too great an obstacle to overcome, they told him. This was all the inspiration Weihenmayer needed. "They knew a lot about rock-climbing," Weihenmayer said. "But they didn't know me." And they didn't know him. The experts knew of the dangers and difficulties Everest offered, but they did not know Weihenmayer's 13-member climbing team and the friendship that strengthened them.

Weihenmayer described the climbing system: his friend and fellow climber, Jeff, led him in the daylight and rang a bell constantly so Weihenmayer could follow him. When darkness fell on the mountain, Weihenmayer stayed by Jeff's side, guiding him, step by step. "Surprisingly," Weihenmayer said with a grin, "I'm the better climber at night." The odds may have been against him, critics may have dismissed him, but Weihenmayer fought back. On May 25, 2001, his team, backed by the National Federation for the Blind, reached the summit of Everest.

They inched along the ridge of the mountaintop, only a few feet wide, with 8-12,000-ft drops on either side, looking down on a dizzying view of clouds. They were 29,035 feet above sea level. Weihenmayer said that, for the first time, he was glad not to see. The audience on Thursday night was inspired by Weihenmayer's courage and determination. Assad Khan, Outreach Assistant for the College of Arts and Sciences, articulated what Weihenmayer gave to Mason.

"The word 'can't' just won't live in our vocabulary anymore because you think about him, you read his book and you think, 'I'll do it,'" he said. Weihenmayer's next project is to climb Elbrus, the tallest peak in Europe.