(18)

Smoke Signals

(19)

Be Here Now

The Good Times... Are Killing Me!

Chile Line

Tsunami

Brave New World

Debt Ceiling

Welcome to Utopia

Zipper Club

Modest Mouse

Thin Places

Oppie

Brown Berets

Baba Ram Dass

Black Mamba

We All Float On

Aldous

Humpty Ass

Sons & Lovers

I Came As A Rat

The Monkey Wretch Gang

The Man...Who Brought the Gear!

The Man... Who Killed The Deer!

One Chance... To Get Everything Right

Adios Compadres

Whitey on the Moon

Meltdown

Fourth of You Lie

Nat Love

Monarch Migration

Pyrocumulonimbus

Walking Rain

Start in sparse finger corner to powerful roof with stemming crux up high to slab exit.  Finish in easier trad crack to anchor. Very gymnastic and sequential, hard onsight for grade.  

Smoke Signals(film) with Sherman Alexie, Native American author and twice winner of the Taos Poetry Slam.

Right side of upper tier grassy ledge below and upstream of parking spot. Ignore all the traffic turning around. Bouldery start using layback crack at left and high right horizontal hold.  Move from wide stem to layback pinned flake at start (awkward crux) to blocks above (solid today).  Finish on right flare crack.   

  Named for the book by Ram Dass

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remem…(book)

The crux is getting over the small roof and onto the steep headwall. Classic route, cool moves on great basalt.

High first bolt can be reached by stemming up corner.  Traverse in from right (5.11 b) to reach horizontal pockets.  Crux move up into left facing corner.   Direct start at low overhang (5.12) 

  The Chile Line was a narrow gauge rail that ran across the mesa above these climbs (west of Carson) from 1887 until 1941.  Frank Waters wrote about it in The Woman at Otowi Crossing

 

This week we witnessed the 9.0 earthquake and tsunami that followed on northern Honshu in Japan. 

  Boulder start is crux past stick clip bolt.  We used undercling at right to get high foot on right to balance move to horizontal below bolt. Crux continues up to ledge.

Crack climb right of Bolted (4) face climb at boulder field.

Just like the debt ceiling debate, this thing should have been easier that it ended up being.  Bolted left facing corner made possible with large mailslot jug at right wall.  This crux leads to a leftward traverse at 3rd bolt.   stay low and avoid blocky exit to right.  Continue to second crux at upper corner then to 2 bolt anchor.

Open book on nice red rock.  Easy moves to ledge (some loose stuff here), then harder climbing through third and forth bolts but well protected.  Small wires could protect these moves (bad fall potential).  Upper wall pocketed and fun.

Blocky start just right of Black Mamba.  Tricky start, small pro early in climb.  Crux at first corner. Some loose rock in upper third on easier terrain.

The crux is painful flaring off-size fingers.

Offwidth, protects with large gear but can be run out (easy ground) with hand sized pieces. 

travel.nytimes.com/2012/03/…

thinplaces.net/openingartic…

Crux passing first bolt then again finishing at chains. Traverse to turn roof on left. 

Oppie

Be Here Now 

ramdass.org/

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ram_Dass

   Good pro in mixed quality rock, needs a good cleaning.  

 

Start of the thin, overhanging, black corner.  

  Getting past the third bolt is the crux. Sequential climbing at the start (V6 move) leads to a ledge and nice 5.10 climbing in the upper corner.  

  At the crux, strike hard and fast.

Short powerful route on excellent basalt.

Cool little route with a mix of bolts and gear.

2 Bolts for technical moves through slanting finger crack leads to easy trad climbing.

Tips crack to plated face (loose/crumbly).  Tricky stemming problem at base on nice rock, the climbing above is less interesting.

Scramble up easy rock for 12 feet to reach a fun (but much too short) wide fingers corner that is best tackled via laybacking to a decent ledge. Continue up steeper but positive climbing in the shallow corner to the top. Watch your head on the piñon tree branches at the top. 

  The route protects very well and is not very sustained so it would make for a very good beginner gear lead.

Left of Black Mamba.  Monkeywrench your way around the pinned horn to reach slab and move behind arete to alcove.  Powerful and technical roof (small undercling to layaway finger lock) up to excellent pocketed face.  Varied and interesting climbing on nice rock. 

 

Short stiff fingers from start in the obvios left facing 20 ft. corner, then hard move above stance to exit left.  GUOS.

Bouldering moves right off the ground. Getting past the second bolt is the crux. Good climbing above with good gear.

Bouldering start...leads to cool climbing above. A little loose rock below the upper section, be careful.

The crux is getting over the roof and onto the steep slab. Classic, short basalt route.

A fun, positive right-angling crack with no feet leads up for about 10 feet to a wide slot and a decent stance. Despite the appearance you don't need big gear. Pull up and right out of the slot along the crack and then test your flexibility with a big leg stretch left to a good ledge and a rest. An all-too-short perfect hand crack goes up for eight feet to easier ground to the top and the tree for an anchor.  

  When Kit Carson passed away in May 1868, a month after his wife Josefa, his last words were "Adios Compadres".

Start at overhanging face to right handed layaway.  Move through blocks to short corner.  Step out on to arête and follow pockets to ring anchor. 

  Gil Scott Heron RIP 

youtube.com/watch?v=otwkXZ0…

Short broken corner with finger layaway to ledge.  Follow up nice rock with marginal pro to walk off. Onsite, ground up, sketch fest.

"Y" crack just below entrance climb down.  Start in alcove below first bolt. Direct start bouldery 5.11 move.  Alternate easier layaway start at left.  Both reach second bolt in shallow corner.  Crux at overhanging finger section to stance at chains.   

rastafarispeaks.com/cgi-bin…

news.nationalgeographic.com…

This thing will slap you back.  Crux in shallow corner moving past 2nd bolt.  Nice rock to start turns to featured mudstone above.

Monarch is to right on the short grassy  bench.  Named for the cloud of migrating monarch butterflies riding the spring winds south to north along the canyon rim. 

  Upstream of I Came As A Rat.

Start on blocky column to large detached flake in corner, felt solid.  Wind up through either corner to anchor.  Difficult and suspect protection.  GUOS.

 The pyrocumulonimbus cloud (pyroCb) is a type of cumulus cloud formed above a source of heat such as a wildfire and may sometimes even extinguish the fire that formed it. It is the most extreme manifestation of pyrocumulus. According to the American Meteorological Societys Glossary of Meteorology, a pyrocumulus is "a cumulus cloud formed by a rising thermal from a fire, or enhanced by buoyant plume emissions from an industrial combustion process.". Unreal example was visible over Los Alamos due to the Las Conchas plume.

Start at right of Welcome to Utopia on nice in cut right hand rail.  High first bolt protects move to dirty ledge.  Thin crimps sequence to pocketed face.  Traverse to anchors for "Welcome",

Short, steep cragging above the Rio Grande at the gorge rim. The first significant wall you come to after hiking along the rim from Dead Cholla. Some anchors easily accessed from the lip.

Description

Protection

Routes in (A1) Utopian Vista Upper Tier