Despite a not so ideal weather forecast and some initial hesitation on crowds on the routes, we had a great Labor Day weekend up in the “middle of nowhere” Wyoming on this absolutely insane rock formation called Devil’s Tower. This was a long overdue trip that we had been wanting to put together for a year or more. Devil’s Tower certainly did not disappoint. Its an amazing rock formation with the highest concentration of quality crack climbs anywhere in the country. I believe there is something like 220 different routes on the Tower. At first I thought the rock had the look and feel of granite, but its actually molten rock or magma formed 50 million years ago via a subterranean volcano. Over the millions of years the sedimentary rock eroded away exposing this awesome formation that rises almost 1,000′ above the surrounding meadows and rolling hills of northeast Wyoming.

J and I made the 7-8 hour drive from Vail Friday evening rolling into the KOA campground around 1:30am to find our good buds Jesse, Andy, & Derek beginning to set up their cowboy camp by their car as they had just arrived about 30 minutes earlier from Denver. Nico & Celeste and their two small kids Blake & Clara had rented a tiny one room cabin and we all basically camped in their yard out front. It worked out nice. Since Saturday was the good day of weather, we decided to climb the classic Durrance Route to the top as this was our main priority for the weekend. Despite being one of the two easiest routes to the top on the Tower, the Durrance Route is listed in the text Fifty Classic Climbs of North America by Steck & Roper. The Durrance Route was first climbed by Jack Durrance & Harrison Butterworth in September 1938 and was the second free ascent of the Tower following the first ascent by Fritz Weissner in 1937 up the Weissner Route. Durrance has 6 main pitches though we did a 125′ “direct start” to this route by default. That is, we missed the primary approach route to the base of the “Leaning Column” Pitch 1 in the pre-dawn light and found our way up to the base of the Tower’s southeast corner always having the “leaning column” in our sights. Nevertheless, this gave us an extra pitch of technical climbing so we were all glad we missed the approach route to start. We all really thought we would be fighting the crowds on the most popular Durrance Route, but we were the first ones on the route that Saturday morning and we only saw one other team of two behind our three teams of two the entire day.

After a 4:30am wake-up call, some breakfast, and coffee, we were at the base of the direct start by 6:30am. Derek and I teamed up as did J/Nico and Jesse/Andy. Derek has not done a lot of lead climbing, especially trad, so I was happy to lead every pitch. However, one note about Devil’s Tower rock climbing ratings. They are stiff! A 5.7 anywhere else, in our experience, would be at least a 5.8 here at Devil’s Tower no doubt. They are old school ratings and I heard the term “cowboy” ratings several times this weekend by several climbers. J & I believed we would be getting on several 5.10 trad climbs at the Tower, but there was no way, especially when we were not familiar with the rock, routes, or ratings. Maybe another trip up there. Though, who knows. 5.10s at the Tower are serious undertakings and are easily 5.11s or higher anywhere else. Durrance is rated as a 5.7 climb with a few easier 5.4-5.6 pitches, but we all thought the hardest pitch, the Durrance Crack, was easily 5.8 based on our collective experience. Plus, the rock was smooth and slick attesting to the fact that this route gets a lot of traffic.

Our “Direct Start” Pitch 0 went smoothly and I belayed Derek up from a tree at the base of the “leaning column”. The “Leaning Column” Pitch 1 was fun yet fairly smooth & slick and protected by a few pitons. I think I placed one cam on Pitch 1.

It sure was fun looking down on our entire crew as we ascended this awesome tower. The Durrance Crack was next and it looked challenging. However, once I got in the double crack system and got a few pieces in, it went fairly smoothly. However, it definitely felt a lot tougher than 5.7. I kept thinking to myself – “cowboy” ratings 🙂

Derek cleaned the pitch well and we combined the next two pitches, The Cussin’ Crack & The Flake Crack (Pitches 3 & 4), into one pitch. The 30′ Cussin’ Crack had a legit move or two to begin with protected by a nut in a flake to a ledge and then has an 8′ off-width chimney in which there was no protection up to the belay. However, there was an easier crack around to the right, which made more sense and I passed the word along down below. The 40′ Flake Crack above was pure fun, nice folds, and smooth movements.

We were at the base of the Chockstone Crack (Pitch 5) and again this was solid climbing with protection to be had deep in the crack.

The crux was mantling the chockstone at the top of the crack, which was pretty fun. The views and pictures down the route from the top of the Chockstone Crack were amazing.

We had two choices for the remaining climb to the summit. Either do a “jump” traverse looker’s right to the “Meadows”, a larger angled ledge on the Tower’s east side from which a exposed 4th class route leads to the summit or an additional direct pitch of technical climbing called Bailey’s Direct to the summit. We chose the technical pitch and soon I was off on this lengthy 150′ 5.7 pitch directly to the summit.

I am so glad we did this direct finish to the Tower’s summit. In my opinion, it is much more aesthetic and fun than a “jump” traverse and scramble. I finally topped out at a nice belay ledge and two bolt anchor and belayed Derek up to me. J was on Derek’s heels leading the final pitch and soon enough he and Nico were up with us as well.

We hung around for a bit, went to the summit itself, and came back down to the top of Bailey’s Direct hoping to scope out Jesse & Andy coming up the last pitch. They soon appeared and I got some video footage of Jesse leading the final section up to the belay ledge:

It was great seeing these fellas top out on Durrance.

We were all soonon the summit of Devil’s Tower around 10am this awesome Saturday morning. Sadly, we did not see any evidence of alien activity as in Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind. What was funny is that our KOA campground played this movie every night at 8:30pm. Pretty funny.

Since Derek & I had topped out, we spent close to 2 hours on the summit, which was just awesome. And, our crew had the summit all to ourselves – pretty special. The team of two who were moving extremely fast up Durrance behind us soon topped out. The leader had no helmet and he seemed to have maybe 3 pieces of gear on him. His wife was extremely nice and offered to take our pics. They didn’t have a second rope for the descent rappels so we gladly offered them an extra one of ours since we had three. His wife then told us her husband was John Bouchard and to “google” him. We looked him up later and found out he is a pretty legendary rock climber and alpinist in his own right and is the founder of Wild Things mountain gear and equipment. They currently live in Portland, OR and are on a roadtrip across the country with their children, who apparently don’t climb. John and his wife had not climbed Devil’s Tower in 20 years or so and they seemed happy to be back on it. It was great to meet them up high on the Tower. No wonder John had no helmet and probably placed three cams the entire 600′ of the Durrance Route.

We made a double-rope rappel off the summit plateau to the Meadows and then traversed right to the beginning of the Bowling Alley rappels down to the base of Durrance.

The first of three double rope raps led us to a small ledge at the top of one of the thousands of hexagonal towers that comprise the Tower. I landed first, but then soon realized 6 climbers is going to be extremely tight on this ledge. It will no doubt get comfy. Nico came next, then Andy, Derek, and followed by a simul-rap of Jesse and J.

It was tight yet fairly entertaining. The tourists down below who by now had gathered along the Tower Trail to watch the climbers must have thought it a strange situation.

We then pulled the ropes and Jesse and I flaked out the two ropes, fed one through the bolts and re-tied our figure eight follow-through. Nico & I simul-rapped down and then the other four rapped down behind us to the last rap ledge and two bolt anchor.

Soon enough we were all safe and sound on level ground at the base of the “direct start” to Durrance where we had started approximately eight hours earlier (4 hours of climbing, 2 hours on the summit, and 2 hours to rappel). It was a great day and I think we all felt fortunate Durrance had worked out for us. We met up with Celeste and the kids back at camp and actually hit the swimming pool to cool off and refresh ourselves. Andy cooked up awesome fajitas for dinner and we actually turned in fairly early due to the short night of sleep the night before.

J had brought his mega-tent and we all slept in there except for Jesse who thought he was too good for us and slept in his car. Nico’s clan was in their cabin. Sleeping in Sunday morning felt great and we got up and decided to check out a few other climbs on the east side, which has the same approach as Durrance, so it was not entirely foreign to us and we new essentially where to go. The route El Cracko Diablo (5.8) was highly recommended to us the day before from two very nice local climbers and so we headed in that direction. The other recommended route was Soler (5.9), but there were groups on that route and others lined up for it. The weather forecast was really the deterring factor for the day, but we felt lucky El Crack Diablo was open. J and I were off running on it and J led the first 100′ 5.7 pitch up to a two bolt anchor.

The easiest route on the Tower is called Tad and is located just left of El Craacko Diablo, but climbers have to build their own belay after Pitch 1. So, Jesse, Andy, & Derek decided to follow J and I up El Cracko as a 3-man team. I then followed J with a second rope on my back up to him at the belay, we swapped leads and exchanged the rack quickly, and I was off leading the lengthy 150′ second pitch. This 5.8 pitch was more like my version of 5.9. Great moves and hand/fist jams with plenty of great protection, but the length of the pitch made it fairly strenuous and more of an endurance climb. I remember really only one good rest in 150′ of climbing, but after some grunting and heavy breathing I topped out at the two bolt belay. I then belayed J up and after Jesse saw me putting forth some serious effort on this 5.8 pitch, he decided to just belay Derek and Andy up to him for a climb of the first pitch and rappel down from there. J topped out just in time as it started to rain/hail and get fairly cold.

Two other Colorado climbers who had just topped out on Soler had two 70m ropes and we thought we could get to the base of the route with one double-rope rap with their 70m ropes. So, they traversed over to us and we set their ropes up and began the rap. It turned out we were a bit short and so we got off their ropes and used the final 30′ of Jesse’s rope to get to the base of the climb.

It was a fun rappel though sort of a bummer that the weather moved in and soaked the rock. Several other climbers up high on the Tower used the same ropes to get down in the rain storm and soon we were all down at the base of the Tower again after some very sketchy and slick down-scrambling to the base of Durrance. As fate would have it, the skies cleared up and the sun came out as we reached the cars at the Visitor’s Center. C’est la vie. We didn’t feel like going through the motions of getting back to the base of the climbs, so we all decided to go for a trail run around the 3 mile loop, which circumvents the Tower. Mainly, we all wanted to get different perspectives of the Tower from every direction. The views surely didn’t disappoint.

Back at camp around 3pm, we ate a late lunch, and then the thunderheads really moved in. Fortunately, we had J’s mega-tent and we moved all the chairs and table inside the tent and played cards.

The rains ended as fast as they began and we were soon making a campfire and enjoying J’s pasta for dinner and Celeste’s s’mores for dessert. Not to mention a few beers and some whiskey. It was a fun evening. While we were relaxing in our chairs before dinner a super nice fellow from New Hampshire named Geoff came over to our little camp as he and his older friend were staying in a cabin next to Celeste & Nico’s cabin. Geoff was inquiring as to the ratings of El Cracko Diablo and if, by chance, we had climbed it. J and I told him that we had actually just climbed it and told them it was a bit “stiff” for the 5.8 grade 🙂 By this time, Geoff’s older friend was present and introduced himself as George from New Hampshire as well. Super nice fellas and we told them what we could about El Cracko regarding what gear was used, etc. J and I told Geoff & George we will hopefully see them up on the east side the next day as we hoped to attempt Soler right next door to El Cracko.

Up at 6am, J and I wanted to go try one more climb, Soler, before we headed out hopefully no later than noon for the long drive back to Vail. The weather didn’t look like it would hold out long, but we motored to the base of Soler to find Geoff & George racking up for El Cracko 10′ away. J racked up for the lengthy first pitch of Soler at 5.8 while I chatted with Geoff as George was starting his lead up the first 5.7 pitch of El Cracko. George was amazing just sending the same crack J led the day before so delicately and meticulously. Geoff saw my wonderment on my face and proceeded to tell me about George. My jaw dropped as Geoff spoke. George Hurley was 79 years old and is one of the legends of our sport. Still going so extremely strong after 50 years of climbing. He put up 4 new routes on the Diamond on Longs Peak, has the first ascent of the Titan via Fingers of Fate in the Fisher Towers of Utah, among numerous other first ascents in El Dorado Canyon near Boulder. The list goes on and on. He has guided for most of his adult life from Jackson Hole Mountain Guides to doing his own private guiding in New Hampshire. He was really good friends with the legendary Layton Kor as well and was an integral member of that whole early pioneering effort up these towers and big walls in the 1960s. Geoff said he hired George years ago as a guide and they have been good buds since and do a lot of climbing together in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. It was so very neat to see George climb. And, so very inspirational. J had started up Pitch 1 of Soler and was doing a phenomenal job placing gear and cruising this long 120′ pitch.

J reached the hanging belay and I started up with the second rope on my back. At about the same time, George was belaying Geoff up El Cracko’s first pitch. We seemed to be the only four on the entire Tower. Maybe folks knew something we didn’t. And, then it came – the rain. It actually started to sprinkle the last 15′ of my follow up to J and I could tell it was super slick and made the climbing much tougher and dangerous. I was pretty bummed as I was looking forward to hopefully leading Soler’s 5.9 Pitch 2, but there was no possible way with it being soaked.

Unfortunately, our only option was to double-rope rap down to the ledge. George & Geoff were doing the same. It was disappointing, but it is what it is.

Nevertheless, the camaraderie and stories with George & Geoff once we all reached the east bench below made us forget the disappointment fairly quickly. It was great. Story after story of first ascents, how they did what they did 40-50 yrs ago, what types of protection they used – we could have asked questions and chatted all day, i.e. if George would be up for it 🙂 He was the nicest most humble fellow I have ever met. We had a great time and scrambled across the drenched and exposed slabs down to the Durrance area and then hiked out together. It was a real treat to meet and spend some time with both Geoff & George. Furthermore, George’s ability to be humble, do good, stay positive and healthy, and still be doing what he loves at his age (and doing it very well) is so very inspirational. J and I were definitely “punch-drunk” with admiration and inspiration.

We said our goodbyes, exchanged contact info, and told them if we ever get to the White Mountains again, we should definitely get together. Same goes for if they come to the mountains of Colorado. J and I got on the road shortly afterwards and were off. Geoff & George were heading to the Needles area near Mt. Rushmore to climb for an additional few days.

The Devil’s Tower area is such a fantastic playground for climbers and sightseers. I’m so glad we finally made it up to northeast Wyoming to get on this awesome magma formation. I would really like to try and make it back to the Tower every few years (or more often) to get to know it better and climb many more routes. We only scratched the surface – not even the surface. But, we do know our way around much better than if we hadn’t gone at all. Should make a next trip easier to find what we are looking to climb. Its also a great family camping area at the KOA campground and so very convenient to the Tower. Looking forward to many more trips back with Kristine next time, good friends, and our little gal.

Over the years Kristine, myself, and good friends J Weingast and Jesse Hill have noticed a little tower of free-standing rock on the north side of Interstate 70 between Eagle and Wolcott. We have long since dubbed it the Wolcott Spire.

Jesse in his extensive resourcefulness researched the access via a public dirt road through private property off of Highway 6, which runs parallel to Interstate 70, and he and J climbed an approximate 5.6 route circling around the tower on 3 sides. We have all since called this route the Corkscrew route as it really corkscrews around the tower. Whether this was a first ascent likely will never be determined, but at least it was a first ascent as far as our little crew and knowledge is concerned. Plus, its fun to think maybe it had not been climbed before. Its only one pitch long, but the rope drag on the Corkscrew route is pretty serious and taxing, especially for the leader belaying the follower.

The north side of the tower really only rises maybe 40′ or so above the dirt, but the south/southwest side of the tower probably approaches 70′. The southwest side is home to a large overhang that could potentially be a serious trad crack or aid line. What makes the climbing on the Wolcott Spire more taxing and difficult than the rating would indicate would be the loose rock and holds ready to pull out at any instant. Its akin to climbing the hard 13er Lizard Head in the San Juans, though potentially more loose. I recruited Mike to come join me on this climb and last Sunday the dogs, Mike, and I hiked up to the spire and gave it a shot. Its only about a 30 minute hike up, but is on steeper slopes littered with loose dirt. Fortunately, the wind was gusting pretty good so as to cool us off on this hot day. I took the rack and started up the Corkscrew route intentionally dislodging and clearing loose rocks whenever I could. Good protection and placements for cams were fairly easy to find. I think I may have placed 5 cams in total. The crux, in my opinion, was the chimney climb of sorts after the horizontal traverse on the southwest face. I think Mike and I would say this was 5.6, though maybe feels harder because of the loose rock. I found J and Jesse’s old webbing with rappel ring on top and re-slung it around the top of the tower, which provided a secure anchor. I belayed Mike from just below the summit cap and soon he reached me on the summit of the Wolcott Spire. Second ascent? Ah, probably not, but fun to think that it may be.

We soon rappelled off down the north face and I then wanted to try a new route up the spire’s weakness on its north face. The weakness was a crack of sorts with strange bulges and loose holds.

The north face looked much tougher than the Corkscrew route, but protection looked solid. The only location where it would be hard to get a placement would be the bottom 8-10′ up the tougher slabby face. I got a good nut placement in a small crack and after going through the motions of getting the sequence down, I pulled the moves and made it to the standing ledge about 12′ off the deck and got a bomber #1 cam in a deep crack. I traversed right and placed a solid #3 cam and then pulled up, got a 0.75 cam in, and made the crux moves to get up into the weakness. I then ran it out on the much easier and upper section of the Corkscrew route to the webbing. It was a fun lead for sure and pretty challenging. I like the route.

I would guess that the lower 8-10′ slabby section of this route had some 5.10 moves while the overhang and getting up into the crack on the middle section of the route was more like 5.9. Mike then climbed the route on top rope and I think we agreed on the ratings. I then climbed it on top rope one more time.

A great few hours out checking out new things and exploring this little spire we’ve looked at for over a decade. Next time I go up there I will add some new webbing to J and Jesse’s old webbing to back it up or maybe replace it altogether. Its just getting a bit worn and frayed. A few bolts would make the east face more viable as there appears to be little if any places for gear on the upper half of the east face. The moves look tough as well. I hope we can put up another new route or two in the future on the Wolcott Spire. Its always fun to think about future endeavors.

In the last week or so, I’ve made the trek up to the Stratostier, aka Wolcott’s Upper “Upper” Tier, several times with Kristine & friends to check out and climb the few established routes. However, there is so much more potential for new routes up there from crack lines to sporty face climbs. Maybe we’ll have to see what we can do in the next few years in terms of new routes up on the Stratostier. For now, enjoy some of the pics below from last week:

Many thanks to Dianne Oelberger who graciously videoed me up one of my favorite sport climbs on Wolcott’s Upper Tier called Osso Bocco (5.11-). I don’t think I’ve ever had someone video me while rock climbing so I enjoyed critiquing myself. I have been having some tendonitis in my right forearm, thus the shaking out of my arm quite a bit. Maybe I shouldn’t do these crimper-type climbs and let the arm heal, but its just so hard not to. Hope you enjoy the video:

Well, springtime finally seems to be here! With the avalanche conditions still not quite within our comfort level (we cancelled our annual Mt. Sopris ski mountaineering trip because of not so ideal snow conditions), we continue to hit the rock climbing hard. Several fellow co-workers joined the dogs & I for an afternoon in the sun down at Milk Creek in Wolcott, my new favorite local climbing crag. It has lots of varied crack climbs to practice our desert traditional climbing as well as a few really hard sport routes. A few pics from Friday:

Kristine, the dogs, & myself then packed up the car Saturday afternoon and headed west for some warm desert sun, car camping, and rock climbing. We met our friends Sarah & Keith Webber as well as Lauren & Steve at the Rabbit Valley free car-camping area just two miles from the Colorado/Utah state line. It was a fun night of campfires, horseshoes, burritos, s’mores, and stories. Kristine & I got up around 6am, made breakfast, left the dogs with Sarah & Keith to sleep in for a few more hours, and drove to Colorado National Monument with the intent of climbing the historic Otto’s Route up Independence Monument. I had climbed this route last November with my good friend Jesse Hill and absolutely loved it! Check out my first climb & description of Otto’s Route up Independence Monument here. I knew Kristine would feel the same way and she wanted to climb it. In four fairly short pitches, except for the 140′ Pitch 1, you can stand on the summit of this awesome desert tower. There are two cruxes in most people’s opinion: the 5.8+ off-width chimney of Pitch 2 and the final few 5.9- mantle moves of the final Pitch 4. Kristine did awesome on these cruxes. She climbed the cruxes clean never needing to rest on the rope. Add to the fact that we were the only climbers on the tower all day long and it was a really good day. I really enjoy leading this route and we brought along a second 60m rope for the rappel down that I trailed behind me on lead. I think we began hiking the 2.5 miles to the base of the tower around 8am, summitted the tower around 11:30am, and were back at the car after a hot hike out around 2pm. The two double rope rappels down the tower are exhilerating for sure. I know we are both really looking forward to more climbing in Colorado National Monument in the future as towers such as the Kissing Couple and the numerous single pitch crack climbs are hard to resist. Pics from our climb up Independence Monument are as follows: