Climbing Trip to Western Colorado

It was a three-day weekend and for once I wasn't planning the trip. Amy and I joined Kristie and Justin van Voorst for a climbing trip and, until a few hours before hand, we didn't even know which state we would be in. It turned out as an extended tour of west-central Colorado's less-well-known climbing areas. The climbing was nice enough, but the country out there is truly incredible!

Things started out normally enough. We rendesvoused at our house at 5 pm on Friday and set out in two cars for points west. Under normal conditions, it should be about a five hour drive to Naturita, CO, about an hour and a half south of Grand Junction. One thing led to another and we found ourselves in Grand Junction at 11 pm with a hundred miles still to go. Half an hour later we were driving through the pitch-dark Unaweep Canyon looking for a camping spot. We tried Divide Road, but all the easily accessible spots were full of people in RVs. We continued up an increasingly soft-surfaced road past a sign for the Dominguez Flagstone Site thinking it must be some sort of campsite. No luck! Finally, we gave up and parked in the weeds looking for anything that was flat. I climbed over a pile of rubble and found a large, flat area; perfect for pitching the tent. Only it turned out that it was smooth, clean bedrock with fossilized ripple marks! Neat! No problem. I put rocks at the corners of the tent, didn't bother with the fly, and fell asleep under the spectacularly starry skies with the tent-flaps open. The moon rose around 1 am and it was really something special.

At 6 am, Amy poked me out of a very sound sleep and said "I think we need to move the tent!" I could make out something red, motorized, and out-of-focus headed in our direction. Yikes! Never in my life have I come quite so thoroughly awake quite so fast! I grabbed my glasses, ignored my lack of pants, and rocketted out of the tent. Sure enough, a medium-sized tractor was driving toward us across what was obviously (now that it was daylight) the Dominguez Flagstone Quarry! I waved urgently at the driver and he waved back cheerfully. Above the roar of the engine, I asked if he needed us to move the tent. "Oh, it's no problem," he yelled back, "Happens all the time! I can work around you." He proceeded to drive all over the place scooping up large chunks of sandstone and loading them into a trailer without coming within ten feet of the tent. Nevertheless, we packed up quickly and retreated to the other side of the rubble pile where Kristie and Justin were just waking up, wondering if they should come see what was going on.

Early morning at the Dominquez Flagstone Site

The Dolores River south of Unaweep Canyon

Breakfast was had and we continued south through Unaweep and into the Dolores River canyon. In the daylight, the landscape was spectacular and I was glad we'd stopped when we did last night. Cliffs of multi-colored sandstone fenced the turbulent, silty river. Our first destination of the weekend was the Lost World crag on the north flank of Paradox Valley outside the small Uranium-boom town of Naturita. Paved road gave way to gravel followed by the hardest 4wd terrain I ever hope to drive over. Our Subaru has 4 wheel drive, but is in every other essence a station wagon, most notably ground clearance. Justin maneurvered their higher-clearance CR-V with ease, but I scraped bottom a few times and felt like I wasn't going to make it. We found our way in and out of stream gullies, over exposed bedrock, through desert with significant cactus crops growing between (and sometimes in) the wheel tracks, and wondered if we were going somewhere worthwhile. At one point, one wheel was at least six inches off the ground as I fought through the crux of the road. Finally we set up camp in a beautiful area between some scrubby juniper trees and some house-sized boulders. Above, we could see the source of the boulders, the Lost World crag itself, a long series of huge blocks 30-50' high along the mesa to the north.

The Lost World from our campsite.

After a brief lunch, we loaded up climbing gear and hiked to the crag. First stop was a corridor between the main rock and a detached chunk easily the size of a two-story house. Justin lead Hanging Judge (a 5.8 fist crack) with some difficulty and I fought through the first half of it before giving up. Crack climbing is not my forte and I could see that it was going to be a long weekend at this rate. For redemption, I lead Do the Easy Thing, a gentle 5.6 sport slab with small crystals and three bolts. Normally I do trad leading and gear placement is a significant worry. For a sport climb like this, it's a real pleasure to just clip and go. After I came down, Amy lead the climb as well (her first sport lead) getting back into the spirit of things after a long season of not climbing.

In the later afternoon, we headed west to the other end of the crag and climbed a more routes, all 30-40 feet tall on conglomerate and coarse sandstone. Justin lead Positively Fourth Street (a steep 5.8 sport face) and then I lead the wonderful Whispering Winds (a 5.6 face climb up the end of a fin) finding it just about the level of mental challenge I was looking for. We wandered around the wonderful maze of cracks and chasms at Lost World before heading back to camp for an early dinner and bed.

Me discovering that fist jams are not something I know how to do and subsequently falling off Hanging Judge (5.8)

Amy cruises up her first sport lead, Do the Easy Thing (5.6)

Sunday morning, we moved on to the other end of the ridge, a few miles from the Lost World, to a place known as Atomic Energy Crag since it overlooks a number of old uranium mines in the valley. This was higher up in the strata and the rock was a much redder and finer-grained variety. Still, the climbing was similar, 40-50' routes on a maze of fractured blocks on top of a mesa. Amy lead an unnamed, short trad crack (probably about 5.3) and worked on gear placement and anchor building. Justin lead the challenging and disarmingly-named Born to Be Mild (5.7); the first crux is the first move off the ground to gain the easy slab and the second is the gritty roof you've got to pull to top out. We watched a pair of local climbers (the only other climbers we saw all of Memorial Day weekend!) work on some harder routes. I admired the view from the top of the rocks; the incredible LaSalle Mountains west of us and the Grenadier Range to the east. The Paradox Valley below was gorgeous with various shades of green and red and overhead big, puffy clouds straight out of a vintage western floated in the deep blue sky. A steady breeze kept yesterdays gnats at bay and everything was nicely peaceful.

Eventually, we set up a top rope on Finger Fusion, a steep finger crack up a slightly-overhanging face rated at "5.10+". Justin climbed it pretty well with only one fall. Kristie tried it as well climbing it nearly as cleanly as Justin but having trouble in different spots. Amy tried the first few moves, but couldn't get off the ground. Finally, I got on and thrashed around for a while. As I've said, cracks are not my thing and my chances of climbing a 5.10 are never that high, even on a good climbing day. Justin and Kristie coached me on technique and, just as I was about to give up, I managed the first three moves in a row and gained a pretty good rest hold (for an overhanging 5.10, that is). From here, I had no choice! I continued on hang-dogging at every other move and eventually, with great effort and blue language, tagged the anchor, bleeding from the hands, wasted, and thoroughly pumped out. Definitely the hardest climb I've done to date!

The view west from Atomic Energy Crag to the incredible LaSalle range of Utah. Paradox valley lies beyond the near ridge.

Justin nears the top of Finger Fusion (5.10+) after only one fall.

Time was wearing on and Justin wanted to go to a new place, a climbing area so remote it's known only as "16Z", the name of the road it's on. And we're not talking a paved suburban street here, either. First we drove 15 miles on good-quality (30 mph) dirt road across the amazingly flat Dry Creek Basin getting lost three times amongst oil exploration roads that are newer than the maps we had. Then there were 3.8 miles of steadily deteriorating 4wd road down through Hamm Canyon past some impressive slickrock formations. We finally arrived at the surprisingly spatious and developed camping area at 16Z and set out to find the climbing. The time was 6 pm and we probably didn't have much time to climb, but we figured we'd check things out anyway before setting up camp and making dinner.

The incredible valley at 16Z. We're looking east here into the Valley of Flowers (though we didn't realize it at the time). Beautiful, wild spot!

The wind howled from the south and I walked over to the cliff edge to discover one of the most surprising things I've ever seen, a small canyon stretching in both directions with a great view of the Big Gypsum Valley beyond. No more of this 30-50' short climbs, these things were 100' tall if they were an inch! After a bit of searching, we located the reported 3rd-4th class downclimb gully and scrambled down past incredibly smooth, red sandstone covered with black desert varnish. The canyon bottom was beautiful and just got more beautiful the farther we hiked. At this point, the time was late enough, we gave up all thoughts of rigging any ropes, and just explored. The guidebook maps weren't all that great for navigation (until we figured out some landmarks), and we wandered half the length of the valley. We moved from scrubby yucca, cactus and juniper to a broad grassy meadow fenced on two sides by steep walls of stone. Kristie found a baby rattlesnake no more than six inches long. Dirt, grass seeds, and thorns of all descriptions invaded the personal space of our socks and made walking itchy. We were hungry, tired, and getting a little chilled.

The guidebook mentioned that there was another 3rd-class exit on this side of the canyon in a place called the Hidden Valley and showed a T-shaped passage in the rocks with the stem of the T heading up to the campsite. We started heading north up massive tallus looking for likely T-shaped corridors and eventually stumbled upon the Hidden Valley. It was a lush, peaceful slot about 50' wide and 90' down from the rim with overhanging walls of stone on all sides. Amazing! There's no way we would have found it without stumbling in the way we did! Light was failing, but we couldn't help but explore. I found a nifty entrance into a narrow, tall canyon full of grass. Cracks between peices of massive stone broken from the cliff, or maybe still part of the cliff, formed a maze of tight, tall passages and we spent a while poking around being grateful we'd brought headlamps with us. It really felt like caving in there (except for the little bit of twilight coming in from above). But we still couldn't find the T-shaped exit route from the map. Amy and Kristie found a dicey-looking scramble up a ramp that looked like it might get to the top of the rocks and thence off the cliff entirely. But it certainly looked more challenging than 3rd class. Just as I was contemplating trying it, Justin called out that he'd found the T! The upper bar of the T was a narrow crack between two massive chunks of gray stone leading into an unknown area. The whole crack was probably 15" wide at shoulder level and narrowed to nothing 20' above our heads. Exactly half-way through this, an unexpected side crack (the stem of the T) intersected on the right and lead steeply up to the surface. In all reality, it was a cave. We emerged on the rim near a small cairn at 9 pm just as the last of the light drained from the sky. By the looks of it, there was a spectacular sunset, but we were quite satisfied with the views we'd gotten from below.

We stumbled back into camp, woke up the dog, and started the mechanics of camping. By 11 we had consumed several large burritos, a couple much-deserved beers each, and rolled into bed for a windy, wild night closer to the middle of nowhere than I've been in a long time.

The weather looked ominous all of Monday but the landscape entering Unaweep Canyon made for some dramatic photos anyway.

Morning came and the weather looked ominous. The wind hadn't dropped and heavy grey clouds showed that something was definitely brewing. Justin and Kristie wanted to get in some climbing, so Amy and I parted company with them and started the long trip home. The 4wd road was no better in this direction though at least I knew where I was going this time. Amy navigated us through a long series of identical-looking roads in flat, featureless terrain back to the paved road. From there, we drove back through Unaweep and to Grand Junction in intermittent rain and sun.

The Coke Ovens from Rimrock Drive in Colorado National Monument as the storm moves off to the east.

We stopped by Colorado National Monument to see the canyons and desert towers just as the impressive storm finally rolled through. We huddled in the car eating lunch and watched the storm front roll across the Grand Valley and onward into the western Rockies. Driving east, we kept encountering wetter and wetter roads as we caught up to the storm. Every time we stopped, however, the roads got drier and gave us some respite from the crappy driving conditions. There was fresh snow on Vail pass and at the Eisenhower Tunnel and the eye-level cloud deck in Boulder showed that the storm must have swept across the entire state with unabated energy.

It was a great trip. The climbing was nicely casual, the company good, and the driving interesting and affirming. But the country and scenery were simply beyond compare. Camping in the desert is something special, something that strikes a chord somewhere deep in the human psyche. Everyone should do it sometime, but be sure to bring plenty of sunscreen and insect repellant.

The Wilderness Journal

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