Trip Reports - 4/29/01 - Spring Trip to Red Rocks, Nevada

Day 1: On April, 5th, Guy and I set out from Fort Collins, Colorado for our annual trip to Red Rocks. We arrived in Moab, Utah, around lunchtime. After a quick bite to eat, we headed to Pot Ash road for a little climbing. We had heard that rain was expected, and we wanted to be sure to squeeze in a climb. After careful consideration, all the other moderate climbs appeared to be taken, we chose the climb, "30 seconds over Pot Ash." Well, either this was a sandbag, or we were extremely out of shape. Guy got his bum kicked! We decided the climb should have been called, "30 hangs over Pot Ash." We did have a local, cheerfully hollering up beta, not necessarily useful beta, but it was beta. After a considerable amount of time, we are happy to say Guy did make it to the top. But after watching his struggle, I decided that dinner was a higher priority than struggling up the climb, and we packed up and headed back to the hotel, much chastened.

See larger photo of DeDe

Day 2: That night the rains came in. Wouldn't you know the weathermen would pick this one day to have a correct forecast. They'd been wrong the past week! It was still raining when we woke up, so we drove up to Arches National Park, and drove the loop. We would hop out at most stops, and scamper up the rock, since that was as close to climbing as we could get that day. We came back and hit the hot tub, and decided to go to Jay's Pasta for dinner. This proved to be our favorite restaurant in Moab.

Day 3: The next morning we drove to Las Vegas. It was still raining, and proceeded to get worse. "How"? you might ask. Well, rain apparently wasn't enough. It began to snow on us, and a little later hail came our way. The longer this lasted the more miserable we got. The sandstone in Las Vegas is very fragile. We knew that when it finally did stop raining, we would still not be able to climb for 24 hours. The rain did finally stop that night. So the next morning we decided to go for a few short hikes. If we couldn't climb the rocks, at least we could be close to them.

Enlarge photo of Guy

Day 4: We had just arrived at the climbing area when we saw a group of climbers headed up to a popular sport area. I mentioned that we thought the rock needed a little time to dry out. The one guy agreed, saying that, "You should have seen it yesterday." Apparently he considered today dry by comparison. One local who saw the climbers was less than pleased. I can't remember the exact words she shouted, but it went something like this: "Da@! stupid  climbers, Fu#@ing climbing right after it rains. They break the fu#@ing holds off. It pisses me off!" Hearing this, somewhat volatile rant, made me very glad, we'd left our climbing packs back at the hotel.

Day 5: Unfortunately her sentiment proved true. The next day when we came back to climb, we discovered a well-chalked hold, recently broken off, at the base of a popular climb. I know it's hard not to climb, but the rock is VERY fragile when it's wet. After being kept off the rocks for 2 days, Guy decided we needed to get an early start, so we hit the gates at 7:00 am. Of course, the sun had only been up for about 30 minutes, and the area was still very cold, and very shady. We headed to Panty Wall, a popular sport area, that we hoped would get us used to the rock again. Guy led Brief Encounter, a 5.8, and I cleaned the route. I should mention that the great sandstone edges feel very sharp when your hands are freezing. Guy then led Silk Panties, a 5.7 and Boxer Rebellion, a 5.8. I decided we  needed to search out some sun. I was freezing. (We later found out that temps. at this elevation were in the 30's, unseasonably cold for this time of year.) We headed to the Tiger Wall and some much needed sun shine. Guy led Sheer Khan, a 5.10. Great climb. Unfortunately we only had one rope for the rappel, and wouldn't you know it, we had brought the short rope instead of the 60 meter. This necessitated some creative rope management and rappelling off a single bolt on the route, backed up by a quick-link to the next bolt down. Not the safest rappel we've ever done. I highly recommend the route but bring two ropes. We THINK a 60 meter rope would stretch, enough to reach the ground, but I don't know for sure.

Day 6: The next day, we decided to head to Radio Free Kansas, a 5.7+ trad. Route. It took us a while to reach the base. Guy and I can NEVER find the correct trail on the way up. But we do find it on the way down, and usually discover that we were within 20 feet of it the whole time. Our creative trail finding led to many scratches, bruises and impailments. The desert flora is not very forgiving. So we reached the base of the climb, only to see a serious looking front headed our way. Feeling optimistic, we decided to give it a go. Guy was about 20ft. off the ground when the snow started. He managed to race to the top of the pitch, and then we backed off.

View larger photo of Guy

Day 7: Since the snow had ended pretty early, we decided that it would be safe to climb today. We took a slightly later start than usual, to give the rock a little more time to dry out and warm up. I decided that since it had been too cold to enjoy the Panty Wall on our first excursion, we would head back there. I led Boxer Rebellion, the 5.8. Fun and easy. We agreed that many of the moderate sport routes in Vegas are a little soft in their ratings, but that the trad. Climbs are right on. We then moved up the wall, and Guy led Panty Prow, a 5.6. I cleaned the route, and then we TR'ed Victoria's Secret, an excellent 5.10 full of balancy face moves. Guy tried to TR Panty-Mine, a 5.10c, but was unsuccessful.

Day 8: The next day we tried to hit a longer trad. climb, and we headed up to Johnny Vegas, a four pitch 5.7. Once again we managed to get lost during the ascent. I was adding to my battle scars. I had just started to clean the route when little snow flurries started flying around my head. We hung out at the belay ledge at the top of the pitch for a few minutes, but the flurries didn't stop, so we rapped off, and headed back to the hotel. So far on this trip we had done a lot of hiking but very little climbing.

Day 9: I decided that we would try to improve our hiking to climbing ratio the next day. The weather had warmed up. We enjoyed temps. around 75 and sunny. We hit Ragged Edges, a trad. 5.8 that is only about 100 yards from the parking area. Great climb, full of wonderful hand jams. Guy led the first pitch, and I cleaned it. We looked at the wider, second pitch, and then looked at the beautiful 5.10- crack to the left of the first pitch. We decided the 2nd pitch of RaggedEdges could wait, and we Tr'ed the 5.10. I'm glad we did. The 5.10 is definitely worth doing. It's a very pumpy mix of thin face, and great finger jams. We will go back and finish the 2nd pitch of Ragged Edges next time we're in the area.

Enlarge image of Guy

Days 10 & 11: We took a day off to rest, and hit the strip, but the day after that we were back on the rock. It was Easter morning, and on our drive in, we saw the Easter bunny hopping along in the brush, cute little cotton tail and all. We had set our sights on Dark Shadows, a 5.8 that came highly recommended, so we had headed out early. As usual we got a little lost on the ascent. My husband is quick to point out that we weren't really LOST, but we sure as heck were not on any marked trail! For those of you that want to do the climb, stay high on the trail until you are exactly level with the climb, then begin your descent into the gully. The main trail will switch back one time and turn away from the climb. This is OK. Stay on the trail. Even with our detour, we were the first ones at the base of the climb. We started up. The first pitch has a 5.5 PG-13 rating and 2 bolts to protect the first 50 feet. Guy managed to miss the second bolt, but arrived at the belay ledge safe and sound. The second pitch was one of the best I've done. It was a beautiful hand crack with great jams, combined with some nice face climbing. We topped out at the second pitch when the next party of two arrived. We grunted our way up the third pitch, and I was very glad that Guy was leading. This was still a good pitch, but it was awkward and grunty. Our friend Wayne probably loved it!

By the time Guy was half way up the 3rd pitch, another party of 3 arrived. They had decided to skip the 1st belay and combine the first two pitches, joining the party of two that was below us. This meant that the 2nd belay ledge was going to get very crowded, very fast. We took a look at the fourth and final pitch. It was wider, and the crux of the route. We hadn't really brought gear wide enough to protect it, so we decided to head down. This had the added benefit of avoiding the upcoming traffic jam on the route. The rappel follows the line of the climb down. So traffic jams are a bit of a pain.

The hardest problem on this route was keeping the ropes dry. The line is in the shade for the top 3 pitches, and  puddles at the belay ledges are common. A creek lies at the base of the rock, so after you've worked so hard keeping the ropes dry on the climb, you'll find that it is next to impossible to keep the dry when you pull them from the final rappel. The last rope you pull, falls directly into the creek. We had planned well, and when we set the last double rope rappel, we arranged to pull the dynamic rope. This meant that our thin static line was the one that fell into the creek. This left our climbing rope dry for the next day. On our way out we saw two more wild burros bringing our total to 5 so far. We also saw that Ol' Peter Cottontail had been squished sometime during the day - a tragic victim of road kill.

See larger photo of DeDe

Day 12: The next morning, as we drove in, we saw another victim of road kill, a rather large gray burro. Just past that, we saw three live burros, including one baby burro. This brought our total up to eight, nine if you count the dead one. For our last day of climbing we decided to hit several of the sport areas. We headed to the Magic Bus, a great moderate area. I led Neon Sunrise, an overprotected 5.8. (There's a bolt every 3 feet.) We then TR'ed Zipperhead, a 5.8 PG13. I decided to lead Technicolor Sunrise, another 5.8 PG climb. We didn't quite understand the PG rating. It seemed a normally protected climb. My guess is that it received a PG rating only by comparison to the other overprotected 5.8. Guy then TR'ed Ken Queasy a 5.8 PG13 that really is a PG13. By this time the sun was just starting to hit our rock, and with the 80 degree temperatures, we thought we'd head for the shade of the Black Corridor. Unfortunately many other people had this idea as well. All of the moderate routes had been claimed. So Guy decided to lead Crude Boys, a 5.10d. He did skip the 10d section by skirting left. He then TR'ed the Black Corridor Route, an 11a. and came down and led Vagabonds, a 5.10a.

Day 13: All in all it was a very fun trip. The last half of our trip was full of sunny skies and temperatures around 75 degrees. Perfect climbing weather. We still had the heinous drive ahead of us: 13 solid hours of driving. Ughh!! Next time I think we'll fly!

Dede and Guy Humphrey live in Fort Collins, Colorado. Dede is originally from Florida, you will find many stories of climbing with her in early Flatliners Trip reports.

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