Good scrambles in RR

More progress today on exploring the "grand ridge traverse" of the Calicos.
Pretty much have it scoped out end-to-end. But getting worried I don't have the endurance for that much low 5th class climbing in one day.

Today started NW end at Sandstone Quarry parking. Hiked over to NE end and traversed S over Red Cap peak, then hit as many "nubs" close to the crest as possible along the way S to Tank Peak. Then returned down the maintained trail.

Rather interesting half-day adventure in itself, with several "false leads", and lots more short low-5th-class than I'd have guessed. It's rather complicated terrain. I'd do it again.

For the full traverse ... guess I need to build more endurance and wait till later in the season. (Meanwhile there's Sierra skiing to be done).

Ken

P.S. shuttle between Start+Finish?
well ... Driving out on the Scenic Loop road made me pretty sure I'm not doing the end-of-day shuttle back to Red Springs on a bicycle.

kenr wrote: Wow -- that's amazing! Great that you're stretching our vision for the Las Vegas area. meanwhile, back to "mortal" scale . . .

kenr: If you're referring to my little limestone crest essay, thanks, but the praise is a bit unwarranted. My partner and I are just ordinary climbers without common sense or the ability to rightly judge our abilities and stamina, yet still prone to hubris. We did the limestone traverse on our "rest days" between long moderates up on Black Velvet and in the other canyons. And we got totally drilled. The day after the traverse we went to the Black Corridor around Noon (with several rest stops on the approach) and just laid around in the shade drinking Gatorade and occasionally falling asleep.

Calico Hills -- back to Las Vegas for another fun day out exploring -- this time from the 2nd Pull-Out on the Scenic Loop Rd.

Finished connecting the "grand ridge traverse" (the section between Red Book Point and Calico Peak) in a much more "ridge-y" way than I was expecting.

Key new things for me:

* found a way to connect the main Red Book Point ridge farther NW to another ridge which connects better toward Calico Peak (by way of the "Middle Pass")
. . . (previously I had taken in interesting _gully_ down from the NW end of the Red Book Point ridge, which connected well (by way of the Middle Sand Flat) to the Calico Peak / Tank Peak Pass -- but didn't have ridges).

* found a nice "SSE Ridge to SSE Groove" route to Calico Peak summit ridge from the 2nd Pull-Out parking. Lots of fun interesting ridge climbing -- which can also be used in the "grand ridge traverse".

* SE Gully route to Calico Pk "south viewpoint" from Middle Pass (usually reached from 2nd Pull-Out parking) -- I used as a descent. Gully didn't look good from a distance, but turned out to be rather fun - (details see Branch Whitney book, Hiking Las Vegas, page 75, "Calico Hills II Overlook Route").

* made the connection between the Middle Pass and the Middle Sand Flat -- It's an obvious gully, interesting, but not so easy.

Hope I get some time soon to write up more details.

Ken

Calico Peak summit ridge (N36.1602 W115.4381) -- some details of route "SSE Ridge to SSE Groove"
. . . (as best as I can remember, likely with some misleading points or actual mistakes).

From 2nd Pull-Out parking (N36.1518 W115.4374) on Red Rock Scenic Loop road, follow trail N down into wash, and traverse N a bit to waypoint (N36.1550 W115.4364) - (not far from the "Black Corridor" sport-climbing sector). Next N up the obvious gully which goes toward the "Middle Pass" (N36.1581 W115.4368) - (which could be used to connect between 2nd Pull-Out and Calico Basin parkings). But about 50 meters before reaching the top of the gully, see a wide drainage above left, with a ridge forming the right side of that drainage. Get over to the bottom of the ridge, around (N36.1576 W115.4371). 

Climb the ridge (much slabby 4th class, with a 5.4 section higher) to the top of a tower (N36.1581 W115.4372) with a chasm behind it. Down-climb delicately into the chasm then traverse Left to another ridge. Up that to another high point (N36.1584 W115.4375). W into a gully, and NNW up the gully about 75 meters. Around (N36.1591 W115.4380) turn right and go NE about 30 meters across an easy wide gully (the SouthEast gully route). Then up a ramp diagonal right to the base of a chimney (N36.1593 W115.4377). Up the chimney and N up a groove to another high point on the Calico ridge, then N up to a short overhanging groove (5.6-5.7) to pop up onto the South end (N36.1596 W115.4379) of the Calico Peak summit ridge. Ridge lovers can continue another 120 meters to the North end of the summit ridge (N36.1606 W115.4386).

Descent: Finding the SouthEast Gully route works nicely to get back down to Middle Pass and then to 2nd Pull-Out parking.

Ken

kenr wrote:

Could you post up a photo or a topo of this? I'm having difficulty envisioning it.

NorthWest ridge traverse down from Red Book Point (N36.1558 W115.4336) to "Middle Pass".
. . . (as best as I can remember, likely with some misleading points or actual mistakes).

NW from summit along ridge about 150 meters (over various interesting nubs). Before the main ridge cliffs out, down-climb Left delicately into a gully (N36.1570 W115.4350).
. . . (then descending the gully is rather interesting and leads to the Middle Sand Flat, but instead . . . )
Step across the gully and traverse to a sub-ridge descending NW. Actually there are 3 sub-ridges separated by narrow gullies. Seems like the east sub-ridge was the most interesting and difficulty (and loses the most vertical) which the west sub-ridge is easier. (Likely one or more of the gullies could also be descended, but this is supposed to be about "ridge traverse"). At the base of your chosen sub-ridge is a gully which rises to the South. Up on rock along L (E) side of this gully to a big boulder (N36.1571 W115.4354) which forms the high point of another gully from the other side. Get onto the big boulder. Climb a little 5.6 sequence to get directly up onto the next ridge, or avoid this by descending NW, then up and around to the W and SW to get to there less directly to the SE end (N36.1570 W115.4355) of next ridge.

NW about 50 meters on this ridge: see mushroom boulders ahead. Avoid these, instead turn Left (SW) across gully to SE end (N36.1573 W115.4360) of next ridge. NW about 100 meters on this ridge to reach the Middle Pass (N36.1581 W115.4368) - a nice shade spot. 

Continuing the ridge "grand traverse" up to Calico Peak?
The easiest way is to take the SouthEast Gully route: scramble up roughly N to (N36.1588 W115.4371), then NW up thru (fun) narrow slot and continue into wider gully to around (N36.1593 W115.4378) where can exit the gully to the right to join the "SSE Groove" route to the South end of the Calico summit ridge.

The more "ridge-y" way is to join the "SSE Ridge and SSE Gully" route, by going South down the obvious gully from Middle Pass for about 50 meters, then traverse West to reach the base of the ridge (N36.1576 W115.4371).
Or possibly there might be a more direct way to connect to higher on the SSE ridge, by making a rising traverse W on a ramp up from Middle Pass, then some serious 5th class sequence of unknown difficulty to get onto the ridge. I did not attempt this today because I did not then know if the ridge was actually climb-able and I did not want to be required to reverse that sequence - (anyway it just seemed difficult and scary for me).

Ken

Austin Baird wrote:

Could you post up a photo or a topo of this? I'm having difficulty envisioning it.

Yes I understand. I'll work on that.
But just now I've got to pack and prep to catch the red-eye flight to New York.

(As an entertaining exercise, try paying money to purchase Branch Whitney's guidebook, and discover that it has no route maps -- only detailed descriptions and photos and GPS waypoints -- no overall map of where the route goes to).

And while we're at it, how about complain to MP management about how to post GPX or KML tracks for climbing routes.
(which the main Euro counterpart to MP --  www.CampToCamp.org has enabled for years and years).

I've created some more 5th + 4th class route descriptions for peaks + ridges in the Calico Hills, under
mountainproject.com/v/calic…

Be glad for corrections and improvements -- and more routes.
Still need to add more photos.

Routes w much more detail than the reports I posted previously​ on this forum thread are the ones on Red Cap and Tank Peak.

Other key missing piece is a description linking up the ridge segments into a single "grand traverse" of the Calico ridges from S end to N end.

Ken

P.S. eager for cooler autumn weather to arrive for more exploring -- and actually climbing some longer link-ups of traverse sections.

I posted the "grand traverse" of the ridges (and highest peaks) of the Calico Hills here:
www.mountainproject.com/v/calico-peaks/112487877 
. . . (a ways down on the page, under "ridge traverses").

with links to the detailed route description for each of the five sections.

At least one short sequence of 5.6 required. Lots more short segments of 5.2-5.4.
. . . (because of my requirement to stay on or close to the crests of the ridges as much as possible).

Total effort is about
+2250 vertical feet uphill over 3.8 miles distance
. . . (+675 vertical meters over 6.1 km distance).

Doesn't sound like much to me. 

But key qualifier is that more than half of the length is 5th + 4th + 3rd class. So like
12000 feet of climbing and scrambling.
. . . (which is a 30-meter rope length 120 times).

plus Route-finding.

To me that sounds like way over my limit for a single day.

But having now done all of it one section at a time, I feel it's very interesting, and very scenic.
. . . and I give some ideas for shorter link-ups of multiple sections, without undue "connecting the ends" shuttle-setup effort.

Ken

kenr wrote:

I posted the "grand traverse" of the ridges (and highest peaks) of the Calico Hills here:
www.mountainproject.com/v/calico-peaks/112487877 
. . . (a ways down on the page, under "ridge traverses").

This looks fantastic! Thanks for posting all of this stuff. Great "rest-day" adventuring in gorgeous surroundings!

following..

Interesting varied scramble not far from the road with some 5th-class sections is the South Ridge of Calico Peak. The lower part leads to a great viewpoint on South side of Calico Peak, and then there's an interesting 3rd class descent.
. . . [ photo ] . . .

I soloed it last year, but I've been wanting to take Sharon up it, so I wanted some anchors so I could give her a belay. Couple of days ago I was very lucky that Dan Young was free to support me in the labor -- and show me some better ways to do it. So now the route has 4 two-bolt belay anchors and 2 intermediate directional bolts. We also added a couple of intermediate bolts in the hardest section for the Leader, just in case a rock hold might break.

Sharon loves to climb, but her knees and ankles are not so good for steep irregular descents and approaches, so being close to the road surely tilted me select to this route.
Later I noticed it is way visible driving up the Loop Road from the Visitors Center.
. . . (Left from the South Ridge is a more aesthetic arete up to the Calico South Viewpoint -- to think upon for the future).

Ken

Should you advertise bolt placement in the wilderness if there is a ban.

splitclimber wrote: Should you advertise bolt placement in the wilderness if there is a ban.

not all of calico is wilderness..more like wild west.

splitclimber wrote: Should you advertise bolt placement in the wilderness if there is a ban.

Suggest you compare some of the GPS latitude longitude locations given in the MP route description

with a digital map showing wilderness boundaries for the Calico Hills.

There have been lots of well-known well-published bolted routes in the Calicos for many years. Our approach route went close by some popular sectors.
Indeed right under Sweet Pain wall.

Ken

Did the Rainbow Direct route this past weekend, descended via oak creek. Highly Recommended! Oak Creek had a lot of flow, what a treat. 

While i dont agree with the massive amount of fixed rope the "extreme hikers" plaster all over their scrambling routes, most the routes really are pretty spectacular days out in the canyon. Easily 50+ good scrambles with great info on summitpost

https://www.summitpost.org/mount-wilson/150885

Scroll all the way down to the bottom of the page and you'll find a list of nearby peaks in RR and spring mountains, each page has just enough info on the hikes to keep em entertaining.

Next time you do rainbow direct, go down the north face

https://www.summitpost.org/juniper-canyon-scramble/405876

Up and over rainbow mountain is phenomenal.

The east gully/couloir of White Pinnacle Peak (aka Bearclaw Spire) is truly an amazing scramble. Lots of unique obstacles, easy routefinding, and a classic pointy airy summit.

https://www.summitpost.org/white-rock-pinnacle-white-pinnacle-peak/179947

Hey look, this site gives it 10/10 for exposure, difficulty, and danger. What more could you ask for?
https://lasvegashiking.org/white-pinnacle-peak-las-vegas-hiking/ 

The fixed ropes on rainbow direct were, for the most part, unnecessary for climbing. They did come in handy for hauling my pack up the chimneys though.