Back in 1978, I had never heard of canyoneering. I didn’t know what a canyoneer was. I don’t even think the term was defined by then. I was a climber and my mission in life was to climb everything in sight.

Meanwhile on Crete (Greece) where I was living for the Air Force, I was in the Air Force at the time, in order to get some extra cash I was taking tourists down the Aradenas and Samaria gorges. But I called that hiking! That was hiking. Unbeknownst to me though, I did my first major technical canyon that year. It was a spectacular gouge out of a mountain side that looked like an enormous axe chop. The wall that in future canyoneering terminology would be referred to as ’canyon left’ was an incredible wall, probably 11–1200 feet of almost dead–vertical decently–solid limestone. The problem was that I could only see its profile and any attempt to examine the face from the bottom would ultimately lead you to having to enter the nasty pool of rancid water that lay at the bottom of the giant gash.

Meanwhile a partner and I had climbed several other routes up the east faces of the right and left blocks. I eventually gathered up an appropriate pile of gear, including a grossly pared down version of my big iron rack—what you would call a Yosemite rack. I also made some improvised flotations from some leech bottles and an inner tube. And I had a 300–foot 3/8′′ Goldline, a 75–foot 5/16′′ Goldline and a friend who was a caver. He would tolerate climbing and we would exchange favors climbing and caving. And he agreed to meet me at the bottom at 4 o’clock or later on a particular day and shuttle me back upto the church near the summit. And so it was done and there was no waterfall in there as described by later descensionists—just a few pools of nasty, foul–smelling bilge, some water grooves on the rock, a few pools and somewhere in the neighborhood of 20 rappels. I don’t remember how many there were exactly. My biggest fear was getting my rope caught which never happened. All my pulls were successful.

Everything went smoothly and I was able to meet my friend at the bottom, get a ride home, had a long soak in the tub and some wine. Then I went to an Air Force unit dinner which I drank too much wine and had an impromptu shrimp theater in which one of the uneaten shrimp from my plate played the role of my unit’s rather tiny commander. It was soon after that that I found myself back in Omaha flying four 18–hour recons every week, a result of shrimp revenge, I think.

Anyway back to the point. My point was that I was being sucked into a nonexistent world of canyoneering, cause it didn’t really exist at the time. I never mentioned it again until about 20 years later when two old climbing buddies took me through the Black Hole—my friends Pat and Jim. It was beautiful and clean. It was great trip and I was hooked. And within a year they had hooked me up with Steve Allen, exploring canyons of Robbers Roost and Lake Powell.


Dave Black



Articles by Dave Black:
  First Descent? • Dave Black
  Mae West Slot • Dave Black
  A Sh***y Trip in Heaps • Dave Black
  Fixed Ropes in the Black Hole • Dave Black
  For Pothole Puzzle Solvers • Dave Black
  On Writing Books • Dave Black
  Crete • Dave Black
  Bunfodder • Dave Black

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