Phantom Canyon Rock Climbing

This is a sport climbing area on metamorphic granite. Phantom Canyon (CO Hwy 67) can be thought of as the sister road to Shelf Road. Like Shelf Road, Phantom Canyon runs basically North-South but is well east of Shelf Road and Canon City. The road eventually empties out in the tiny mountain town of Victor. This dirt road is commonly used by people from the Pueblo and Canon City areas that work in mining in the Victor area or in Cripple Creek casinos. It is also popular with tent campers on nice weekends.

By chasing the sun or shade climbing can be comfortable year round; however, the peak Summer months can be on the hot side. It has sunny Winter days. Late Fall and early Spring are prime seasons.

There is a large amount of rock, but unfortunately most of it is crumbly and broken up. The scattered pockets of solid rock have yielded many easily accessed, fun routes. There is also a handful of longer and multi-pitch routes available.

If 5.10 is a warm-up for you, then head to Shelf, but if you're looking for fun routes from 5.7 to 5.11, roadside access, and a much shorter drive from Colorado Springs, then you might find Phantom to your liking.

There is a nice public bathroom (pit toilet) just past the Vatican area approximately 3.0 miles from the end of the pavement.

An inexpensive mini-guide for the area can be purchased online at climbingpamphlet.com.

PLEASE NOTE:
As of early Spring 2016, Phantom Canyon contains approximately 60 bolted sport routes. Only the first half of those (as driving up the canyon) have been documented here in Mountain Project. The remaining routes, i.e. those past the public bathroom, will be documented at a later time. In the interim, route info on all Phantom Canyon sport routes can be found in the above mentioned mini-guide available at climbingpamphlet.com

There are also three 2014 vintage trad routes from another Mountain Project posting that will be investigated and incorporated into this posting as appropriate.