Solar Slab Descent/Rope Management Beta

I'm planning to do Solar Slab in March and am thinking about logistics, specifically about the descent. For the most part, I've been able to finagle single 70m rope descents at Red Rock, which is great because I'm lighter with a single rope and it avoids clustereffs at belays/rappels. However, I might not be so fortunate with Solar Slab.

I noticed that there is some beta about a single rope descent off Black Orpheus into the Painted Bowl. Is this the Painted Bowl? goo.gl/maps/LTzUrEdp8P62 If so, once you rappel to there, it's just a scramble down to the wash? From what I read about this descent on MP, it doesn't seem like there's too many steps to get there. However, how tricky is it to find the start of the Black Orpheus rappels from the top of Solar Slab?

Alternatively, I just bring two ropes and do the regular Solar Slab descent as described in the guide book. I have a skinny 7mm tag line, which I kinda hate. It's flexible, skinny and always manages to knot itself. So if I bring that, it will definitely stay coiled in the pack until I'm ready to rappel with it. Even then, the probability of it snagging something is considerable. I'm thinking of taking another climbing rope as the second rope, which will be pretty heavy if it stays in the pack. So I think I'd just clip it to the haul loop and just coil it and clip it to the anchor at the top of each pitch.

What are your favorite ways for managing two ropes on a long climb?

Or do I just make the investment into half ropes?

That is indeed the Painted Bowl.

I've only done it with double 60s, which requires two easy raps, but it is possible with a single. The beta here seems good:
mountainproject.com/v/solar…

These are indeed the only raps involved in the descent. Below the Painted Bowl, you just cruise down and skier's right. The last move before you hit the bottom of the canyon is a fun butt slide on super polished rock. Enjoy it!

I have some beta photos on the Black Orpheus page. Note: this is also the descent for Chicken Lips, which is why the photos are labeled as such.

If for some reason you miss the ledge system to these raps you can also access Painted Bowl from higher up. You would continue scrambling up to the next obvious very large shelf (not the summit plateau) until you see a pine tree above a gully. Downclimb or rap this gully. There were some cairns leading you to the gully last I was there (around Xmas).

climbing friend,

I come to climbing rocks of red rocks nevada this weekend coming crushing.

I also too would like to know how in your territory of nevada you manage the rappels. For example, if you must rap down a bolted route that people are climbing, yes, how do you do it and what is the etiquette in your strange territory, myah?

Do you offer the kind words? Or do you flex your neck and arm meat for intimadation? What if there are multiple parties and you cannot simply wait? How may you pass them as you rappel down and they do the climbing and thrusting up?

Aleks Zebastian wrote:For example, if you must rap down a bolted route that people are climbing, yes, how do you do it and what is the etiquette in your strange territory, myah?

This can be tricky depending on the other climbers' comfort level. I usually just snake the ropes down slowly and then ask them if it's ok to rap down and share the anchor. The anchors can get crowded obviously, but sometimes there's no other choice. To minimize the amount of stuff being clipped to the anchor, I've used a premade quad and clipped into it with a nylon sling (partner clips into the quad too). Thus, the rappellers will be anchored into the quad instead of making multiple attachments to the anchor bolts with a PAS.

Then each person sets up their rappel off their nylon sling and the first person down removes the quad and takes it with him/her. This reduces the amount of stuff clipped to the anchor bolts, gets the rappellers out of the way ASAP and also has the advantage that both rappellers go on rappel immediately and can check each others setups.

Adding to John's commentary that there's a photo of the hiking part the descent in Handren on page 116 (including IBM boulder).

Thanks John and Fossana. And thanks for pointing out the extra descent info in the guidebook. There are several options listed on a different page that I didn't see before.

Maybe I've missed it but nobody has addressed how to get from the top of SS to the top of black Orpheus. Having done both routes numerous times I still don't understand. From the big Boulder belay at the top of SS, where do you go to get to the top of BO?
Thanks

Brad, you have to scramble up quite a ways from the top of SS to access the BO raps. Quote from John W on the SS page comments: From the top of Solar Slab, head north toward the red pillars. Eventually, you'll go under the little 'arch' for the single line descent off of Black Orpheus.

The photo I attached earlier has a picture of the arch.

Thanks Foss

Now that I look at it, I think there might be a second small arch past the first one, but that's the way to the raps: mountainproject.com/v/10581…

fossana wrote:Quote from John W on the SS page comments: From the top of Solar Slab, head north toward the red pillars. Eventually, you'll go under the little 'arch' for the single line descent off of Black Orpheus. The photo I attached earlier has a picture of the arch.

If I look at the top of the SS slab on Google Maps, it seems that you should be heading west. Or does "north" here refer to the direction relative to the climber (namely, "up"). It seems that north would take you away from the Black Orpheus rappels. Is this ( goo.gl/maps/aiQhJ2zwf8B2) approximately where the Black Orpheus rappel starts?

My wife and I did the Painted Bowls descent in November and we found that this trip report had some helpful photos: supertopo.com/tr/Red-Rocks-…

From the top of black orpheus (which you reach by continuing to scramble uphill from SS for a while), we scrambled down along a cairned ledge for a ways. There is a kinda sketchy spot where you jump onto a block, but it's not too bad. The first rappel was from some decent bolts. We rappelled past an intermediate rap station to a ledge on climbers left. Scramble along this ledge to the end to find a sketchy anchor that uses an old nut, piton, and natural features. If you hear that there is a way to not use this anchor, I'd avoid it. It didn't feel solid. This rap leads to a tree where you rap down to hiking ground. You head west along slabs until you get to a vegetated area where you can start to descend. There are lots of cairns along the way. Eventually you get to a slippery slab that you slide down and the rest is easy walking/scrambling back east along the wash.

fossana wrote:Brad, you have to scramble up quite a ways from the top of SS to access the BO raps. Quote from John W on the SS page comments: From the top of Solar Slab, head north toward the red pillars. Eventually, you'll go under the little 'arch' for the single line descent off of Black Orpheus. The photo I attached earlier has a picture of the arch.

Going through the arch puts you in the gully on the left of this photo.

Thanks! All this is really helpful.

The best way down from the top of Solar Slab or Black Orpheus is definitely the 3 single rope raps into the Painted Bowl. This can be done carefully with a single 60m - watch your rope ends, though. The start of the raps is at about the same level as the BO top-out to the climbers left - look for cairns. You don't really need to hike up from the BO top-out much at all. This is all way above and left of the SS top-out.

There is another single rope descent from the BO top-out which is much higher above (this is where the arch is) but it doesn't make sense to hike that far up to start the descent.

Once down into the Painted Bowl, many people go past the IBM Boulder and contour up canyon in to the North Fork of Oak Creek. I've done this a lot, but by going up canyon, this adds a lot of time and distance to the walk out and the bed of Oak Creek is very bouldery. Also the contouring is routefindy, exposed and slippery.

I prefer to hike over to the rap anchors above Plate of Fate at the bottom of the Upper Painted Bowl and do 3 single rope raps to the base of Black Arch Wall and then hike down to Oak Creek from there. Again, watch your rope ends. This cuts out the long hike into the North Fork. This is also the typical descent after people climb There and Back Again.

CONCLUSION:
This area presents really complicated terrain and there are a lot of ways to go. The ideal time to be climbing in this area is during cool weather so the days are pretty short and there is little margin for error when the time comes to descend. I've been up there dozens of times and I've had a number of major things go wrong up there over the years and let me tell you that your options become extremely limited if you only have a single rope. I recommend travelling through the area with two ropes until you've familiarized yourself with the area.

For example: if you don't get an alpine start, climb a lower route like Buelah's Book (5.9) at a slower pace, then get stuck behind a slow party or two on the Solar Slab, you can easily top-out at sunset. Hiking up and around to the top of BO in the dark would be difficult and navigating the Upper Painted Bowl rappels would be sketchy. I think the first time up there you should bring two ropes so that you can bail-off Solar Slab at any time just in case.

Just my two cents.

Here's where I think the IBM boulder is: goo.gl/maps/rcAZ7Qjtoj82

I compared Google Maps to p. 126 of the Handren guide. Look right to anyone? It looks like the descent is pretty reasonable once you finish the raps, but if that's the correct position of the IBM boulder, that could be useful info. It's so fun scoping out climbs on Google Earth/Maps.

Bob, that boulder looks right to me.

Bob-

There is a crazy amount of beta in this post. It's all good. Now leave a little adventure for yourself for crying out loud.

Plus there are cairns everywhere. It's pretty hard to get lost in Red Rock. People have been and bailed from just about everywhere.

Yeah, I think the descent will be fine. But planning for long climbs is half the fun!