Was half way up a tall (115') white pine climbing SRT near my cabin not long ago and realized that I had left my binoculars in my pack and wanted to get them because the view from the top is amazing. (Especially in winter...) So I quickly debated my options, and realized that I had a choice that I hadn't read about or seen anywhere. It was one of those "Duh!" moments when something seemed so obvious, like looking all over for the salt when it's right in front of you the whole time at dinner. I tied a traditional DRT Blake's hitch using my 13mm Safety Blue split-tail around my climbing line, proceeded to disconnect my ascenders, and squeezed my hitch to descend in a nice and controlled manner just like I would if I had been climbing DRT the whole time. It was awesome. I realized I could switch over to a descent during a SRT climb at any point with no big fuss. And it made me laugh, because it brought to mind so many experiences and stories of super involved techniques of how to switch over from ascent to descent in SRT mode, some of them pretty hairy in certain situations.

So the big question is... has anyone else done this? I find it very hard to believe that I have somehow stumbled upon a new technique, especially one so simple and straight-forward. But I haven't been able to find a de_script_ion of this, so I have to ask!

Lots of Love,
Eric