Told you can't climb because of a photo shoot? How do you respond?

Let's say you're on vacation for three days, you want to do three towers on those days. Then let's say you hike up the Castleton talus cone to do fine jade, but two chicks with radios tell you you can't because some prominent free soloist is getting filmed by a helicopter? How to you respond?

If the answer you have is, walk over to Castleton, that "choose your own adventure" ends with said film crew's fixed rope all up in your grill.

"Sweet. I'll tell my friends to look for me in the video! Now get the hell outta my way!"

Did this happen to you?

Smile, and tell them that I always wanted to be in a video and proceed to the tower.

So, did this happen to you? If yes, what did you do?

Some folks tried to do that to us once. I told them to get the F out of the way, that it was on PUBLIC property!

Locker wrote:There's a lot of rock out there.

Yeah, there are a bunch of routes like Fine Jade up at The Rectory.

I would tell them that they are fuck sticks for not at least posting something at the trailhead, next go on a rant about how lame videos of free soloing are, then start racking up.

+1 for that. If they say something at the trail head that's one thing. Rack up.

On second thought... if they were cool about it and ASKED if I could PLEASE go climb something else, I might consider it. Being told I "can't" would really rub me the wrong way. There are a lot of routes, but we all need to share. If they got there first, then they can climb the route first. However, they do not own every pitch. After they are done with a pitch, IMHO it is fair game.

climb

"Sweet. I'll tell my friends to look for me in the video! Now get the hell outta my way!"

LOL +1

that's tough... because you don't want to disrespect anyone's request, yet you have just as much right to climb there. I guess you should get your own camera crew to tell others they can't climb there! What kind of authority does a camera crew have anyway? Don't let a two-way radio fool you!

I don't know how this can be said without sounding like a dick, but you could explain you took 3 days off work and spent a lot of money to travel there to do those towers, and if they don't want you to climb there, then they need to reimburse you for your travel cost and opportunity cost (missed work). Of course, if they get this on film you could be memorialized as being a real big dick, esp w/ the help of strategic film editing.

I know it's not about the $$ but it could get them exasperated w/ you so they "let" you climb there. And, those two chicks are there for the money, the free soloist is getting publicity, and this enterprise is presumably doing this shoot for profit & has enough dough to retain a helicopter.

I'd ask to see their permit. Depending on the response there are a number of possibilities for the next step.

Yeah, true story, told to wait till 5:00 to climb on the rectory, and Locker, yeah, we went to all that "other" rock, and there was a fixed rope on the first pitch, in the crack. It was up for a couple days apparently.

A fixed rope put up by the same film crew. "Never Stop Exploring" I guess...

Having worked on several of these types of jobs over the years, I have to agree- being told you "can't" climb something because of a shoot is bullshit. What every climber should know if they find themselves in this predicament is this: If you are told you can't climb something, ALWAYS DEMAND MONEY. Big production companies usually have cash money on location to bribe climbers to stay off routes. I've seen two lucky dirtbags walk away with $400 once.

This filming was posted in the threads beforehand:

mountainproject.com/v/filmi…

But that's pretty lame to crowd multiple trade routes with fixed lines on a weekend. I would have climbed it anyway. You can't tell someone that they can't get on a multipitch climb...wtf?

willeslinger wrote:"Never Stop Exploiting"

Fixed it for ya.

Micro-perboly: Bill Nye came to our rock once at Marymore Park. He was doing a spider episode. His crew rigged a Cotten (why does autocorrect exist!...lowercase c, otten) rope net at the step across with some kind of hoagie in the middle. He traversed in, addressed the audience and took a bite of the sandwich. We were put out, but didn't actually rebel. No climbers were paid that day...and no one brought ant weed as I recall either.

mcarizona wrote:(why does autocorrect exist!...ant weed...

It exists for expressions like "ant weed." Or maybe that was just a typo.

I'll use a more accurate type writer next time.