This route is relatively easy to find as it finishes on a large boulder perched atop a column of rock roughly 250-275 feet tall. As you are following the trail into Oak Creek it would be most efficient to keep your eye out for a faint trail near the mouth of the canyon that breaks off northwest at a large, scoop of vanilla ice cream boulder roughly the size of five golf carts or 8 donkeys of relatively equal mature stature. Continue the approach as for Johnny Vegas and its neighbors but cut north earlier - when you are even with the column of rock with the boulder on it - and aim for the southeast section of the column where you will find an obvious varnished right facing corner. Red Zinger will be visible directly to the east across a small gully.
P1, 5.7: Climb the beautiful corner to a comfy ledge where you could bivy if you got lost on the approach. This pitch is as sweet as a pint of New York Super Fudge Chunk.
P2, 5.7: Continue from the belay up and right on some peanut brittle to a short left leaning hand crack. Fire this wicked, two move splitter and head up and left to a small ledge with a bolted belay. Keep looking left for the small ledge or you will miss it like I did and have to build a belay on another ledge the size of Missouri, which works out well when you have to pee in the middle of belaying your second. Hint: if you are on a ledge the size of Missouri, you have gone too far...unless you have to pee. A decent pitch - Albertson's French Vanilla maybe.
P3, 5.6R: Climb straight up from the bolted belay to a steep but short section off of the Missouri ledge; get what will probably be your last piece of gear for 25-35 feet, then meander up and left on white slabtastic rock to a two bolt anchor. Clip this and keep going up and left on a ledge around the summit boulder until you see an obvious and perfect belay crack at about waist height. Mediocre pitch - Ice Cream Sangwhich.
P4 5.9PG: Climb up and left from the belay on steep jugs in a flakey cracky thingy, then rock over to your right and traverse the face (bit of sphincter pucker possible) to an arete. Get a good horse stance and clip an archaic rusty bolt. Head straight up to the summit and a bolted anchor doing some more cool steep moves. A good pitch with some nice monkey moves on it, well worth doing but very short. Pint of Chunky Monkey.
Descent: Rap the route with one rope. Rap from atop the boulder to the anchors you clipped and passed on the 3rd pitch.
A good alternative to the overpopulated Johnny Vegas, Beulah's Book area. 372 rope catchin', lethargic leadin', traffic jam rappin' muthas on those two climbs when we were there (wanted to do Beulah's). Not one soul on The Friar.
I climbed this route a couple months ago and thought I could add a few comments to clarify the descent beta. 1) The new Brock/McMillen guide book says, "Rappel the backside of the boulder, and then rappel the route in three rappels using 2 ropes." 2) The Swain book says you can rappel the route with 1 rope, but his description of how to do it was not very helpful, although I cannot say it isn't possible. But having climbed and rappeled the route I'm still not sure exactly how to understand his descent instructions. (Maybe this is more an indication of my intellectual abilities than it is an indictment of the Swain book's descent beta.) 3) The first sentence of the descent info, in the description on this site, is accurate if you're using at least a 60 meter rope. "Rap the route with one rope." 4) This is what we did with one 60 meter rope. From the P3 anchors rap to the P2 anchors. From the P2 anchors rap to the P1 anchors. From the P1 anchors rap back down to the base of the climb. (P.S. The rap from the P1 anchors back to the ground is a full 30 meters so a 60m rope just barely reaches.) Anyhow I hope this info helps others who, like me, hate to haul two ropes up a climb when only one is necessary for the rappel. The overall experience of climbing any given route can be made much more enjoyable if the descent is as fast and easy as possible.
i thoguht this route was a lot of fun. unique summit for red rocks. surely, it was just as fun as johnny vegas, if you're willing to do the dicey upper pitches. personally, i thought p3 was probably 5.6ish R straight up to the boulder, on steep iffy rock with no pro (serious feeling) or something like 5.3 R trending right to the shoulder and traversing back left to the bolts (not so serious feeling). then p4 was way dicey, as if a hold breaks or you burn out there is little pro, none of which is great, and you'll deck onto the sub-summit ledge. i definitely call it 5.9 R, but then- im a pansy. you may not be. the bolt is not a 1/4", but the rusty hanger is old school and the combo is not awe inspiring. you can get a decent cam in at the same place to back it up. not really much else in the way of pro.
the rap- single rope raps on every pitch. there is an anchor (good looking bolts and some slings and rings) on a hanging belay slightly up and right of the p2 anchor (further right than the friar route) which shouldnt distract you. there is ABSOLUTELY NO WAY you can rap from p2 to the ground on one 60. we rapped from p1 with a 60 and had about 10' rope on the ground. its possible swain (or whoever) rapped from p3 to the lower anchor out right (off friar route) and from that you might just barely be able to get to a ledge off the ground on a 60 with rope stretch, but it is untested and it'll be a headache so dont do it..
Really fun route- the bolt on the 4th pitch is hard to see from below, but generally, climb the obvious jugs, then cut right to a stance. From there, straight up to the top!
Beware: this route, while pretty sweet, it probably not for the beginning 5.9 leader- the last pitch is pretty spicy at the grade.
A great climb for the grade. Follow the original Red book description and it goes slightly different. Pitch three heads up RIGHT (plenty of protection) and goes under the right side of the friars cap. The original descent only takes one rope and used to go down the steep wall and gully to the north of the friars tower. Step across the gap and look for the anchors (slings - used to be OK when it was kept up). One single rope rappel takes one into the gully and a little hiking down to one short rap off a tree and to the base. More adventuresome (old school) and it avoids having to rap back down the route if others are climbing.
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