Roped Solo Technique (old style)

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I have done a lot of solo climbing, and find these moments to be among the most rewarding and memorable of my experiences on rock, snow or ice. But it was really not always my choice. In my earlier years of learning to lead big climbs, I could not find any climbing partners. Thus, I had to go it solo. When I pulled it off, it felt like a kind of instant satori.
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There are two types of solo climbing: Free-Solo and Roped-Solo.
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"Free solo" is climbing completely un-roped. (See my early entry, below, "Breath Control and Extreme Climbing," for a sample of this insane style.) No net to catch you. This is *fall-and-you-die* climbing, not for everyone. It is my sinful secret, my favorite style.
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(Do not confuse "free soloing" with "Free Climbing," the latter term simply meaning using only hands and feet for the means of going up, without artificially using rope or anchors for aid in ascending. The Free Climber may, and usually does, use ropes for safety back-up just to catch a fall. Free soloing is a species of "free climbing," but it is a rare breed, as free climbers usually do use ropes.)
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"Roped solo" climbing is a slightly safer variation of the solo climb. Roped solo free climbing utilizes a rope and anchor system, not to help you ascend, but solely for safety, to shorten any fall. It, also, is a species of "free-climbing" but is more a type of free lead-climbing, with all anchors and ropes below you, except that you are in this case alone. It is still not as safe as having a living, thinking human on the other end of your rope, feeding out only as much rope as you need while you lead upward above all the anchors. Roped soloing uses trees, rocks and climbing anchors below you as a last-ditch means of keeping you on the mountain. If you fall, you may still fall way down past your highest anchor for a long way before the system stops you with a jolt. Maybe.
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In more recent years, I acquired and use a piece of gear called "The Soloist," made originally by Rock Exotica, which makes the whole roped soloing thing much safer. It is a truly wonderful gadget. But there was no such gear when I was really pushing my limits and learning to lead climb. So I had to rely on written advice from climber Royal Robbins' books, *Basic Rockcraft* and *Advanced Rockcraft*, and, though it was state-of-the-art at the time, it was touch and go. A bit scary.
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The technique was to tie one end of the rope to a tree or other anchor, then give yourself enough estimated slack rope-length to get to the next rest ledge above. You tie a loop in the rope at that point and clip it to your harness. As you go up, you place anchors (slings around trees or rocks, rock anchors, or ice-screws) and clip your rope so it runs through the anchor's carabiner. This is similar to the normal leading of a free-climb. If you fall, the distance fallen is at least twice the length of rope between you and that nearest anchor below you. You should not fall all the way down the mountain, but if there is a ledge below you and you have a lot of rope out you can hit it hard. The old mountaineering advice was always: "The leader must not fall." So the soloist must not fall.
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One of the tricks is to find a rest spot before the slack runs out so you can tie another loop further along the rope's length to clip into. Then you must un-clip the old loop in order to give yourself enough slack rope to move further up. Often, the rest spot is only a place where you have one hand momentarily free, and you find yourself tying and untying knots with your teeth while hanging on for dear life with your other hand. These are some of the scariest times, in which you truly get to know yourself well.
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Once you get to the top of the pitch, you tie the rope to a good anchor and rappel down the entire pitch, removing anchors, knots, slings, etc., and untying the bottom end of the rope. As you climb the pitch again, it is no big deal because you are tying and clipping into loops that are on a top-rope, anchored *above* you. Any falls now will be much shorter than they would have been on the first, leading, ascent. Essentially, you have to climb the pitch twice, so roped soloing can be slow work.
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Once you have cleaned the pitch and retrieved all anchors and freed your rope, you start the next pitch, tying the bottom end of the rope to an anchor, giving yourself slack, clipping into a loop, and going up again into new territory above.
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I have used this system countless times on rock and ice when I had no climbing partners, and it gave me that small extra margin of confidence that meant the difference between chickening out or going up.
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Not only did I teach myself how to lead climbs on rock and ice this way, I also learned a lot about facing fear of death when I was totally alone -- without fellow Marines as back-up. On my solo climbs, it was just me, my fear, and the mountain. Mountains have no sympathy. They just sit there, soaring above you or gaping below you. The rest is up to you.
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"Be still as a mountain,
Move like a great river."
~~Wu Yu-hsiang~~
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Roped solo climbing has provided me with moments of deep meditative calm and bliss at the top of the climb, but of course these zen moments are sometimes preceded by moments of sheer terror on the journey upwards. I am a richer person for having ascended these paths.
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-Zenwind.