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| Type: | Aid, 240 ft (73 m), 3 pitches, Grade III |
| GPS: | 38.2948, -109.62329 |
| FA: | Bill Duncan, John Burnham, Steve Anderton |
| Page Views: | 11,451 total · 41/month |
| Shared By: | Steve Bartlett on Feb 28, 2003 |
| Admins: | slim, Cory N, Perin Blanchard, GRK, David Crane, Nathan Fisher |
Access Issue: RAIN, WET ROCK and RAPTOR CLOSURES: The sandstone around Moab is fragile and is very easily damaged when it is wet. Also please ask and be aware of Raptor Closures in areas.
Details
RAPTOR CLOSURES: please be aware of seasonal raptor closures. They occur annually in the spring. Indian Creek Raptor Closure walls include: Echos, The Wall, Far Side, Original Meat, Tenderloins, Second Meat, First Meat, Selfish, Six Star, Cliffs of Insanity, Public Service Wall, Disappointment Cliffs, Fin Wall, Broken Tooth, Cat Wall, Slug Wall, Reservoir Wall, Critic’s Choice.
Description
The route on Trisstin's Tower ascends the perpetually shady backside. There is a description in Bjornstad's Desert Rock IV. As promised, it is superb, on absolute perfect Wingate. It goes clean, bring lots of small wires! Start in the chimney, below the obvious beautiful seam. Yes, that one. Despite its anorexic appearance, it eats good wires almost all the way up. The first two pitches are pretty similar, following this seam as it arches up the face.
1. The crux of the first pitch is only about 20 or 25 feet up, promising a potential groundfall if a piece pulls. The first belay is carefully located, next to some bomber wire placements, where it does not affect the climbing. I like that kind of care.
2. After more bomber wires, the crack gets progressively thinner, till it almost dies out altogether. Just as it does so, you can reach out left into a splitter easy crack. This eats Green Aliens, then Yellow, before finally widening up to beyond 1". I tried and tried (having brought several), but only managed to fit a single #1 Friend in this crack. The second belay is at a ledge, where you could place a #5 Camalot, or else any number of bomber hand/fist-size cams just above.
3. The crack continues, easy aiding on hand/fist-size cams, to the summit, where an awkward stem maneuver gains the rap anchor. I ran the second and third pitches together. This worked fine, as I was soloing, but otherwise bring a bunch of extra quickdraws/slings to avoid too much ropedrag.
I'm guessing this had had about two previous ascents. There's no register. Two ropes are needed for the raps. All in all, a fine desert adventure. Not a single bolt for aid, in three pitches and 250-odd feet. Sweet. Doubtful it can ever go free. (In 2002, early ascent, I used just four pin placements where the crack was too thin for #1 RPs to fit)
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