Ethan Villalon still remembers one of his first mountaineering trips in the Pacific Northwest — a trip to Mount Rainier. Originally from Minnesota, Villalon is no stranger to the outdoors, but this trip stuck with him.
“We had someone die in front of us on the mountain,” he said.
The climber, Chun Hui Zhang, died while descending the Disappointment Cleaver route on a private climb with friends.
While there is uncertainty on whether the climber was roped in on this section of the climb, Villalon says he was not.
When a friend from home called him this year to say he wanted to climb Mount Rainier with little training or experience, Villalon reacted skeptically.
“I was like, ‘Dude, I don’t know that’s pretty scary,’” he said. “There’s ice collapsing on you throughout the day, and things loosen up on the mountain, and literal boulders will fly down at you.”
At a university that markets itself as an outdoor playground, sitting close to both snowcapped mountains and a gorgeous coastline, there is a gap between what the University of Oregon advertises and the support the average student needs to fully and safely enjoy the rugged terrain.
Villalon has tried to address this gap by starting a mountaineering club, but says the idea was shot down by ASUO because of the risk involved.
He understood the reasoning, but noted the whole point of the club would be to “teach newcomers to the sport how to practice safely.”
Fundamentals include using crampons correctly on icy slopes, using an ice axe during a fall and traveling in rope teams on glaciated terrain so that one person’s slip doesn’t turn into a deadly accident.
“We were kind of confused, because there’s risk in everything, right?”Villalon said. “There’s a mountain biking club here, and you could eat it on a bike and paralyze yourself.”
UO does offer resources. The Outdoor Program Rental Barn rents gear at low cost, and free avalanche kits are available for mountaineering expeditions. The university did not respond to a request for comment. But for many students, those options exist unknowingly.
For ZiZi Brown, a member of the UO climbing team, the first barrier is just getting there.
“If you want to go outside climbing, you’ll need a car, or you’ll need to know somebody with a car,” Brown said. “For underclassmen, it’s a bit harder to make it feasible.”
Carpooling happens, but it’s informal, “more of just going with your friends… nothing official,” Brown said.
Once transportation is figured out, costs pile on fast.
“The gear for climbing outdoors is really expensive,” Brown said. “Bouldering pads average $250 for a decent one, and you’ll need three of those to be safe. Then ropes are a couple of hundred dollars plus all the draws and all the safety equipment.”
The Outdoor Program rental barn exists partly to address this, but Brown says even her own team doesn’t know about it.
“I think there’s, like, pad rentals and maybe rope rentals, but it’s not super advertised,” Brown said when asked about resources. “Most of the team doesn’t even know.”
Looking back, Brown wishes she’d found the outdoor community sooner.
“I just wish that when I was a freshman or a sophomore, I’d have reached out to some more of the outdoor clubs,” Brown said. “I realized how welcoming and super informative they are to talk to.”
For Brown, the lack of visibility of resources goes against the very reason she chose UO.
“I just wish the outdoor resources that we have were talked about more, because that’s the main reason why I came to Oregon — to enjoy the outdoors,” Brown said.
