BETA PHOTO: View of right third of formation from parking area...
Description
The Mustang is a south facing limestone crag. Currently there are 27 routes from 5.8 to 5.12. Most are sport, but 5 routes do require a light rack. Routes are from 90 to 200 feet long. All routes can be climbed and rapped on a 60 meter rope. Most routes are slightly off vertical with churt edges and occasional holes and pockets. Almost a mile long with an average height of 200 feet the new route potential is enormous!!!
Getting There
From Tucson: I-10 east to Sonoita exit. At Sonoita take 82 east for several miles until a twin 220kv power line crosses the road. Turn right and follow high line road for 2.6 miles. Going through 3 gates. (be sure to close them behind you!)The first gate is immediately off the main road. One hundred yards after dropping into and back up out of a wash look for a road on your right. Take this road for 1/4 mile. The cliff will quickly come into view. Park in turnaround area. Approach the cliff by scrambling into the wash and walking west for a couple of hundred yards until an obvious trail leaves the wash and heads toward cliff. Trail up to base is cairned but somewhat non discript as the summer rains did the grass a lot of good. Trail leads to the left side of the main wall.
The Classics
Mountain Project's determination of some of the classic, most popular, highest rated routes for The Mustang:
Andy, No this place is not the farm house. It's closer to Sonoita and farther off the main road. Get 'yer drill bits sharpened and go out there, Andy, there's hundreds of new routes to do!!!!
Jimbo, Cool pics! Is this an area that is access sensitive due to crossing private land or is it BLM land? Anyway I haven't been out climbing for a while so I'm out of climbing shape.. Rev. Mcleod is going to be getting out soon again and (Christian Is Interested In Heading Out There) so we may see you out there.
Heading out tomorrow with "Charlie King." He has climbed here before and knows a bit about the area.. Just hope the weather holds for a little while. If the weather is too bad to climb we will at least scope out some stuff for another day. "The ol' Bosch stays home on this trip though."
Andy, you might try a bring a good dark stout to the crags for the cold days. Pale Ale is more of a late March to late April kind of beer at the Mustang.
Direction Clarification: The mention of 220KV powerlines didn't mean much to me, since I dropped out of electrical engineering before we got to that stuff (seriously), so here's something a bit more descriptive for us lay folk: Heading east from Sonoita, you'll drive under several small powerlines. After about 10 miles (mile marker 42-43ish), you'll encounter ones that are significantly larger than the others that you've seen; turn right onto the dirt road that is just after them and immediately after a guardrail. This road has no posted name and is rather sh*tty in parts, so a high clearance vehicle (no H-Deuces, please) is recommended if you're uncomfortable driving on unpaved roads.
Braxton, I've driven a Mercedes 4 door and a Subaru Legacy wagon back into the Mustang with no problem. High clearance is always preferred but not necessary. Not to mention they graded the really rough bits sometime over the summer. Sorry about the power line discription. I should have said "the really big metal ones" that cross the road.
If it was my car, we would have driven further, but our driver thought each pebble/piece of gravel was going to damage the car. He's "careful" (Sorry Fred)
By Joseph Stover From: Chistchurch, New Zealand Feb 12, 2007
This place is awesome. It was a shock to see this 'limestone' for me because I am used to Austin, TX limestone. If you want to know what that looks like. Find one of those white blotches on the ground that looks like cement, there are a few around this crag. I am really curious on what qualifies something as limestone. Maybe the stuff in Texas just has a higher lime content and this stuff has more quantities of various other minerals? The Mustang has more friction than granite it seems to me!
The views of the valleys are just insane! Yes, this place is so humongous that you can see multiple valley floors!
This place is not for the faint of heart. The rock takes getting used to. A lot of time and energy has gone into cleaning these routes up, and yet a bit of stuff here and there comes off. Our goal is to clean off all of the death blocks. If it is big we probably put a crowbar to it. If you are worried climb lightly or avoid it. The rock has so many holds that you can usually work around things. The rough texture can be a little freaky too. It takes me a route or two to settle down. As far as falls go I have taken a couple out there on lower angle routes that were 10-15 ft. and I didn't even break a nail. The perception is that you will get pretty skinned up. To date I know of no one that has been hurt or scraped up.
Hey folks the bottom of the car can't be seen so a few scratches are not a problem. Just go slow and you will be fine. I have driven there in a Toyota Camry. You will not believe how much rock is there.
How is the development here doing, is there still some left to put up, id like to go down there and put up some nice routes. This place sounds awesome. About how far of a drive from phoenix?
It's 53 miles to the parking lot from my house, I live in east Tucson. So from Phoenix I'm guessing about 170 miles. It would be great if you wanted bolt up some new routes. Definitely go for it!! Email me if you want a tour before you start bolting. We could meet in Sonoita at the gas station or something. It's going to be hot this time of year, the crag faces south. When we first found this place it was April. We would hike up the hill at 4:00AM bolt until noon then go swim in a pond in the valley until 3:00P, then hike back up when the front face is in the shade. There's room for a hundred or more routes on this formation, many of which could be 200 feet long.
Friend of mine and I went down there this past weekend. We made some notes on directions and I'll post them here in hopes they'll prove useful to someone.
The exit to Sonoita off of I-10 is 83 South. The "twin 220kv power lines" are at mile marker 43; turn right immediately following the guard rail to start your off-roading. We measured the right-hand turn after going through the wash to be 2.2miles from 82 East.
We did the trip in a Honda Fit with only one scrape out that caused us pause. The trip out required a revved charge to get out of the wash, but was without any major bottoming out, so it can be done!
Hey Ward, glad to hear someone else is excited about this place. It is a bit early to be climbing there as it is south facing and hot until the temps drop into the low 70's. Look forward to clipping someone elses bolts.
Ward, Thanks for the trail work, and the new routes when you do them. How's the bee situation down there? Let Eric or myself know if you need any specifc info about routes at the Stang. I intend to spend some time down there over Christmas, I look forward to doing some new routes.
Watch the bees on BeeWare! There aren't just a few, benign, namesakes, but rather hordes of them that swarm out of holes in the rock at roughly the 3rd bolt. It would be a great route in the winter. My partner ended up being stung at least ten times while I madly lowered him and tried to keep from being stung myself. Other than that, it's a cool area!!
You mentioned that the rock is "not for the faint of heart". I prepared for the worse (ok lie no helmet or anything) but was amazed at how solid the rock/churt really was. To me the rock was pretty solid except obvious areas of scaring.
For a relatively new area I was pleased that I wasn't getting bombed with loose rock. Maybe we just picked the good lines?
Fun, I'll go back! But it won't be on a day warmer that 65 degrees... that thing bakes!
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