One of my favorite--and strangest--trips with RD was in 1984, when the two of us drove to Tuolumne on a Saturday, climbed Mount Hoffmann with 15-pound packs, then went over and did Tuolumne Peak--and slept atop it, right next to the summit register. A great flat, sandy place to sleep! At dawn we thought about that day's pivotal 49ers game and so raced down to the car and were back in time for the 1 p.m. kickoff (on TV, not at Candlestick). We had been gone from town 30 hours, and had climbed two peaks and driven 390 miles!

Another memory, this one much calmer. We had backpacked into the Vogelsang area one September day, both of us vying to have the lightest possible pack on this three-day non-climbing exploration. One afternoon we were lazing around and telling stories in a little valley and RD heard splashing sounds coming from a nearby drainage. He jumped up and saw tiny trout flailing in several 6-inch-deep pools--with no means of escape, since the stream wasn't flowing. I said "Oh, well, survival of the fittest." RD exclaimed, "We gotta save them!" So we got out our aluminum pot, captured every last fish--about a dozen--and carried them a few hundred yards to an active stream we'd seen earlier. I told RD that the shock of the icy water would kill the little guys soon, but he just grinned and said they'd be okay.

In town RD was not as decisive as he was in the mountains. We must have had 100 restaurant lunches together over 20-odd years, and every time he would stare at the menu for three or four minutes before asking, "Steve, what are you getting?" I would always say the same thing: "Probably the Thai chicken salad. But it doesn't matter. Order what YOU want." The server would appear and RD would ask: "What's good today?" He or she would offer a few suggestions and RD would exclaim, "No, no, that's not that I want." Finally, I'd say, "Why not bring us a bottle of the house chardonnay and maybe we'll be ready by then." Five minutes later the bottle would arrive and RD would say, "What's the Thai chicken salad like?" I finally learned to be amused by all this.

One day about ten years ago RD called and said he'd bought a basketball and could I come and play. "A BASKETBALL!" I shouted. But I remembered how much I had loved the sport 35 years earlier and agreed to meet him at a Berkeley playground, even though I hadn't touched a ball since my teens. We clowns in our fifties had enormous fun over two hours, missing 90% of our distant shots and even layups, but incredibly making about 50% of our free throws, about the same percentage as Shaq! Thank God no kids were watching our antics!

The first RD climbing story I ever heard concerns an adventure on El Capitan. Way back in 1980 he and Brock Wagstaff decided they were ready to tackle the Salathé Wall. Partway up, they felt a strong earthquake--but they continued. Then, the next morning, another monster quake rocked the Valley, and their bivy ledge heaved and distended. They instantly packed their bags and rappelled. As Brock wrote later, "There really wasn't a need for discussion: we had gotten the message."
Not because of this event, I'm sure, RD soon turned to big mountains instead of granite walls, and this is where he shone. Peru. Denali. An early repeat of Mount Alberta. The classic east ridge of Temple. Four attempts, then success, on Robson. In the gym, whenever he hesitated on a 5.10 move, I would yell up, "This is the man who climbed a new route on Waddington?" Then we would both laugh hysterically.

In 1990, as everyone knows, he began a new career--long expeditions to the Himalaya's 8,000-meter peaks with his Polish buddies. He went every other year, telling me upon his return from each trip that he'd never go again. Apparently it took two full years to recover. And to forget some of the travails in the well-named Death Zone. And to earn more money. He got within a ropelength of the top of Gasherbrum II on his first trip and reached the summit of Dhaulagiri in 1994. On other expeditions, to K2, Kangchenjunga, and Nanga Parbat, weather or sickness hit while he was low down. But he never complained about this, for he wasn't summit-oriented. Just being in that spectacular environment, with good friends, was enough. He died in a majestic place, with friends nearby, and I dare say he was a very happy man until shortly before the end. The kid from the flatlands of Kansas discovered early on that the mountains were where he belonged. He couldn't have known that that's where he'd end up forever, but I'll bet he wouldn't have minded in the least.

Some climbs I did with RD. Not many, I'll admit; we were mostly city friends.

• The Royal Arches, in 1985--RD taught me about the new sticky shoes.
• Many trips to Lover's Leap, 1987-95.
• A Tenaya Canyon exploration, 1986
• Many backpacking trips to the High Sierra, 1984-94.
• North Palisade, 1988. RD taught me about the new stiff crampons, which of course I didn't have.

- Steve Roper