[Hide Comment] Rob and Pat Dezonia established this route Aug 4, 2008

[Hide Comment] And giving too little beta makes for a virtually useless page. Oct 28, 2008

[Hide Comment] Approach description and time? Descent? Bolted anchors? Rap the route? One rope or two? Agree with the above, a sorely lacking description not worth much besides showing off the OPs pictures. Nov 13, 2008

[Hide Comment] Climbed the route on 3.17.2008. Nothing short of an incredible route, this was my first experience in RR. I agree with Brad about wanting to preserve the adventure aspect, but I'll put up a little info for people to peruse.....

Approach was about 2-2.5 hours. Dicey scrambling was involved, as well as navigating some serious foliage. However, it's easy to see the climb at all times and stay on target. All in all, definately one of the LEAST pleasant approaches I've done.

P1: ~150ft, 5.9. Tons of chimneying. Run-out, but secure. A large red friend will be useful, if memory serves me. A 2 bolt belay resides outside the chimney, at the point where it pinches down to a stemming dihedral.

P2: ~120ft. Technical stemming (5.10a/b?) gives way to a hand crack in the right-facing corner. Take this (with a little more chimneying) all the way to the alcove base of the awesome, obvious fist/hand crack corner. Gear belay with TCUs.

P3: ~100ft (5.10c/d?). Pretty obvious: layback and jam the corner up to a 2 bolt anchor. A pretty physical pitch. You'll need a couple fist pieces and a couple hand pieces.

P4: ~170ft (5.10a). Laybacking up to and around a small roof brings you to easier climbing in a featured handcrack. Follow this up and either move inside the "cave" and climb through (watch rope drag), or stay on the outside for some challenging offwidth climbing. Lacking a large green friend, my partner opted for the cave. Beware the towering mounds of bird guano. Its gross while you're climbing in there, but funny as hell while you're drinking beer later. Pop out of the cave and do some easier offwidth moves to gain a small ledge. Gear belay, hand size.

P5: ~160ft (5.11a) The big lead. A bit of laybacking and jamming takes you to a difficult section where the jams disappear. Using small gear to protect insecure stemming on mostly featureless walls gets you through to a section of tips and tough fingers. Eventually make the transition out right onto the face. Heady climbing on small but decent holds brings you past 2 bolts to the roof. Great holds brings you over the lip to an amazingly exposed 2 bolt belay with a great view of your packs 700' straight down.

P6: ~150ft (5.8+). The climbing never gets very hard, but this pitch has sparse protection. The only bolts on the pitch were about 35ft up off the belay (and oddly were side by side...a separate belay?). Continue more or less straight up for a long and worrying excursion into a vast wonderland of questionable holds, and a thought-provoking lack of gear. Eventually you find a 2 bolt anchor.

P7: ~150ft. Easy climbing via the path of least resistance up and right, then back left, with occasional gear brings you to the top of the climb. A few hundred feet of scrambling, and you can gain the summit of the tower. To get down, rap the route using TWO ropes. Even though some belays were gear on the way up, you will be using some rap anchors on the way down that are on the face, away from the dihedral (hope this makes sense).

I hope, by posting up all this information, I'm not spoiling the adventure aspect of the route for anyone who wants to do it. I guarantee this route is a full-value experience. Enjoy. Nov 20, 2008

[Hide Comment] I think the purpose of this website is information, thanks for posting it. those that desire the adventurous, information-free ascents won't be studying this page. BTW, insulting the first ascentionists of such a proud line is, in fact, out of line. Nov 5, 2009

[Hide Comment] pat and rob share atleast 5-10 brain cells, and i dare you to tell them that in person!

pat probably wont pay any mind, but rob????? hehe good luck keeping your face intact!!!

any routes these guys put up,are going to be stout for rr. Jan 2, 2010

[Hide Comment] Very fun and strenous route. The 5.11 is a 1 move wonder. Pitch 2 is 5.10b and R.
josh Apr 18, 2010

[Hide Comment] We parked at the first Oak Creek parking area outside the loop road as shown by Handren (the one 0.5 mi from the loop road exit). I think it would be faster hiking-wise to use the Oak Creek pullout accessed from the loop road but there's the extra time to drive the loop. Here's an overview photo mountainproject.com/v/nevad… to demonstrate. From where we parked we found a good network of trails going up the right side of the pink cliffs to Ramen Pride. We made it to the base of the route in under 2 hours.

The route is burly, way harder for me than Cloud Tower, partly b/c the crack size on the 10+ pitch (I'm far better at finger cracks). The 11a pitch wasn't bad. Be prepared for lots of chimneys/groveling. We skipped the last 2 pitches after getting a slighly late start; we didn't want to do the raps in the dark. Apr 2, 2011

[Hide Comment] There a different kinds of approaches for the classics of RR. There are long ones(Rainbow Wall), confusing or complicated ones(levitation), strenuous but straightforward ones(Cloud Tower), and then there are approaches where you arrive at the climb so exhausted from such heinous schwaking and mandatory 5th class groveling up chimneys and moss slabs it seems like a 5 pitch extension of the climb itself(Warrior).

Heads up there is a bolted rap anchor climbers left of the initial chimney up over and down the otherside of a big boulder that allows a rappel down the awful 4th class moss you came up on approach. Feb 19, 2013

[Hide Comment] I used a 0.4 BD C4, a yellow master cam, and a blue master cam at the gear belay above pitch 2. Pitch 4 had a bolted belay to climber's right after the cave, not a gear anchor (required a couple traverse moves to get to the anchor).

The 5.8 top part of Pitch 5 (after you traverse right from the finger crack above the crux) is definitely R rated. A fall would result in serious injury. Definitely had a similar feeling to free soloing. It's not hard technically, it's just a mental exercise in doing one movement at a time, being sure footed, and not looking at how far run out you are.

Bring approximately 14-15 alpine draws, including a double length. Also, bring a set of nuts for the crux .11a pitch.

The approach included about an hour of hiking, a half hour of bush whacking and scrambling in a stream bed, followed by an hour of vertical scrambling with several sections of class 5. We used all of the rappel stations (we found 4) on the descent (we were tired) instead of down climbing. The slings on the rappel stations looked to be in decent shape. Apr 1, 2013

[Hide Comment] Good route. Good variety of climbing - chimneys, ow, fists, runout face and a delicate gingery crux. 4th pitch is fairly memorable when the birds are home. ;) Last two pitches are very worth doing. The climbing becomes more of a runout face, but is fun and takes you to a spot with a view of Mt. Wilson. Approach took our party of 4 under two hours, but we felt it was not super straight forward. Not as many cairns compared to approaching into watana, that's for sure! Its not as bad as people make it sound, but if you have not done it get an early start! May 2, 2014

[Hide Comment] Yeah, that 4th pitch was something else. Felt like an intruder waltzin up in there and was kind of traumatic to be honest.. it was wild... besides the mountain of shit. I think they're just in there in the spring time though?

We topped out and walked off which is what I would recommend. One rope, the views and terrain are awesome and it's pretty straightforward... I think we rapped once on the ridge. It's a scrambling route... And then you're home free once you reach the canyon floor. Or you could do that splitter to the top of mt wilson.. Oct 23, 2014

[Hide Comment] If you feel confident at the grade, I would suggest bringing just one rope and going to the summit. Walk off/down scramble the west ridge - straightforward and scenic. Stout, physical, burly, wide, & aesthetic; a big-boys climb. Used the #4s, 5, and 6 on almost every pitch up to P6.

According to the summit register 0-1 parties/year actually go to the true summit of CFT via The Warrior. Apr 20, 2015

[Hide Comment] Just got off this thing and I'm still pulling desert oak leaves out of my various crannies.

The suggested protection of triples of #3s is laughable. You'll need at least four, and could easily use six especially if you have small hands. I made do with the suggested three, back-cleaning, and some large tricams.

The crux pitch (5) has lots of broken holds before the first bolt which is highly disconcerting. Blowing a move before clipping this could easily break a leg. I'd wager at least one of the major holds broke within the last month. 10- big-R (the crux, thankfully, protects well). Oct 29, 2015

[Hide Comment] Fantastic adventure route and a must do route with quality climbing pitch after pitch. If runout 5.8R slab bothers you beware. That being said, I found the rock solid and did not have concern that holds would break (or maybe most have and its cleaned up now). The rating of the route seems in line with Red Rocks ratings, but only if you have off width skills ;)
I have a very different rack recommendation than what I have read and it will afford you more gear placement on the R pitches and on the crux.
Does anyone know what kind of birds or dragons live in the chambers on pitch four?

My ideal rack:
Purple (0), blue (1), yellow (2) metolius master cam (or blue, green, yellow, gray aliens)
BD 0.5-6 with triple #2 and 4 #3
Set of nuts (I prefer metolius brass and metolius nuts for red rocks).

I brought a big bro and never bothered placing it.

My partner and I finished and rapped the route in a mild spring snowfall. Once you are back at the base of the climb there are three raps to get to the easier terrain. The first rap rings are climbers left of the wall. Walk left 20 feet from the start of the climb until you are facing a large block. An exposed but easy move gets you around to the front of the block where you will see anchors. A single rope repel will land you on a comfortable ledge but the tree anchor/slings are climbers right of where you landed and downhill. A safety line can be clipped into a red rope that will deliver you to the next anchors. Another single rope repel leads to fourth class scrambling, follow the cairns. This should be the way you came up to the route. There is one final rap anchor on the far left while descending with a whistle attached to it. You probably saw the whistle anchor on your way up. A single rope repel safely deposits you to the easier terrain and out.
Don't bother with the parking 1.4 miles from the park exit as recommended in the guide books as it adds a lot of extra miles. Instead, park in the last parking lot in the park (Oak Creek Lot), or if you want to start earlier than the park opens then use the pullout off the road at 0.5miles past the park exit and take the left trail just as you have passed Wilson's Pimple. You'll save a lot of time. Apr 16, 2016

[Hide Comment] P3 was not the Indian Creek-style splitter I was expecting, sure, the crack is pretty damn splitter, but the tight flared corner prevents you from actually getting progressive hand jams for upward progress. You can get either a right, or a left hand/fist jam, but your real movement is from arm-bars, knee-bars and chimney technique with the opposite side of your body.... Very strange pitch.

Also, for the pitch one chimney, there's actually quite a bit of gear way back in there, but good luck breathing if you squeeze all that way back in.

If you have a large build, extend your knot way below your harness, I had some fairly painful instances of my knot getting pressed very painfully against a certain sensitive anatomical area May 7, 2016

[Hide Comment] The most memorable climb I've done in Red Rocks! So sick! It started hailing on me as soon as I left the crack and had to move onto the face. Talk about intense... Apr 6, 2017

[Hide Comment] Does anyone know if the route can be rappelled with a single 80m rope? Sep 7, 2017

[Hide Comment] Climbed this a few weeks ago. Take this route seriously. Mostly, I want to relate our harrowing descent. The first rap anchors we found took us by the shoulder of Cactus Flower Tower. Then we hiked the whole damn gully, with no trails and too many prickly bushes to count. The approach was WAY easier (even if a bit scarier) than this backside descent. Unless there's a different rap station into a different part of the gully, I would not recommend descending this way. Oct 30, 2018

[Hide Comment] The pitches up the massive right facing corner corner are amazing. The final two pitches aren’t anything to write home about–typical RR face climbing on friable chips. Only worth climbing if you want to top out and walk off. The approach is desert BURL! Do not underestimate. Even so, only took us 1.5 hours to reach the base from the trailhead. Oct 17, 2019

[Hide Comment] I only have 5 #6’s. Is that enough, or do I need big bros too? Nov 23, 2021

[Hide Comment] Super fun route that is not fully experienced without finishing the last two pitches. Every pitch is memorable!

We nailed the approach by staying on the hill right of the stream until the last second when the canyon pinched down. This avoided almost all of the bushwacking. Then it is a scramble up the slot canyon with a few small sections of brush to wrestle with. There is some 4th/5th class, but it was not too bad. It took us a little under 2 hours.

Obviously the third pitch is the money pitch, but the route offers so much more. I have never experienced a bird shit filled cave that has such a cathedral feel to it. It was actually almost beautiful!

This route is definitely an adventure and not for the weak or timid. Nov 23, 2021

[Hide Comment] To answer question about 80m - I don't think it would work without some shenanigans, and the extra rope doesn't really let you link any pitches so just a ton of extra rope for not much extra reward ... I'd stick to 70 or 60 with a double, tag, or plan to walk off.

We parked at the 1.4 mi pull out (South Oak Creek), I think any of the parking are all about the same. I liked the 1.4 mi one because of the ease in walking along the old dirt road. All 6s to me.

The approach was easy, there is a good beta picture (by fossana) to get on top of the small white band and then it contours around and then into the proper gulley. Follow gulley and weaknesses up, the rappel stations are a good indicator you are on the right path. About 2 hrs.

We brought a little pack (18 liters?) and a Metolius Sentinel (46 liter) and was able to easily haul P1-P5. P6 was not too bad, but definitely more occurrences of follower needing to free the bag than any previous pitch. P7 was terrible, but the follower just followed the bag and popped it free and it was no big deal. Being able to lead and follow without a pack, and being able to store all the extra gear, water, shoes, etc. was great. I would absolutely do it this way again. If you are rappelling the route, you could still haul but obviously leave shoes, some water, etc. on the ground and you could leave the pig at the top of P5 and then just get it on the way back down. We used a 70m single and a 7mm tag.

Knee pads should be as important as the hand sized gear, the 1st and 3rd pitch really did a number and I wish I had brought them; if only one knee pad I'd use it on the left knee, in case a party of two needs to share :).

Good pitch and gear beta above, nothing else to really add.

We topped off with about 30 min of light left and descended via the West Ridge. Lots of places to get lost, but trend skiers RIGHT as much as you can (without going off into the front of CFT), do NOT get suckered into the gulley on the backside of CFT. There are a couple rappel stations, however it may be possible to bypass them depending on your exact path. We did find ourselves going in circles twice: 1st time I think we dropped too far skiers left and eventually found the correct way by going what felt like FOREVER back right (indicating we needed to stay further RIGHT); second time was near the bottom of the ridge where it meets Oak Creek Canyon, we kept trying to stay right but it just didn't look like it would connect to the ground, eventually going back LEFT was the ticket. Once on the ground (Oak Creek Canyon) it was fast back to the car. BL: stay RIGHT until very near (at) the bottom, then cut a (little) left to meet the ground.

I have a GPX track of the descent if anyone wants it.

Awesome route! Feb 21, 2022

[Hide Comment] 2.5 hours each way on the approach. Not terribly complicated but quite the event. This route is wild! A mega classic not fully on the radar yet. Would absolutely recommend small gear and more importantly set of small and regular offsets which would have mitigated some puckering runouts. The face climbing is easy but the rock is ass as you can see plenty of fresh edges from peeled flakes. The rap was easy and straightforward with 2x60s. I think we did 4 raps to reverse all of the 5th class approaching as well.

• * I am not kidding I would bring hand sanitizer or something for your belay after the cave. It’s cool and unique but you are literally pulling on bird shit drip castles to get through it. I’ve climbed through plenty of bird shit before but I felt like I was creating a new disease going through there.

Apr 18, 2022

[Hide Comment] The bird cave is more palatial than most modern condos, and like the previous member stated, has almost a cathedral feel to it.

But after exiting it, as of 9/30/23, there are some microwave sized blocks immediately to the left of the P4 anchors, that are hanging on by a thread, and are moving. They look like tempting jugs, and are also directly in line with the start of P5. The previous anchor is in the line of fire. Please be careful. Oct 4, 2023

[Hide Comment] You ever wish you could place your first piece and get it back later in the pitch - without anyone being within arms reach of the placement? Oh and no falls or hanging. Bring a 5 and a tagline and see if you can duplicate this wizadry that 'Ero' performed (hint: try on p4).

The bird cave is unreal. Felt like you'd look up and see a bunch of pterodactyls just staring at you.

I posted a pic of the dangerous loose blocks that Ero mentions above - they're at the top of the p4 belay. Take a close look at what's holding them up... Oct 6, 2023

[Hide Comment] This is a variation I did in 2019, Climbs in between the cinnamon hedge hog and the warrior, or climbs the cinnamon hedge hog to top out. I haven't done that route, so I'm not sure if its a new variation or not.

From the top of pitch 5, (11- corner to face and roof pull) traverse straight left. through a tunnel and blocks build belay. Climb a pitch above this to the base of a varnished tower feature, build belay. Climb the Varnished Tower, Build Belay. Take the path of least resistance up, left and then back right (lower angle and run-out ) Belay at a steep crack through a bulge off a ledge on the climbers right side (back towards the warrior (tough buldge, maybe 5.10? Climbed with approach shoes and pack following). This may be on The Cinnamon Hedgehog at this point? This this crack to low 5th/4t class terrain and join the (memory is fuzzy on this part. Summit and descend the Warrior proper. Photo and line in the images for the route. Oct 16, 2023

[Hide Comment] There are three oblong white rocks resting on top of each other maybe three feet long on the bottom of the first pitch that are about to go, at the end of the traversing before going straight up. I almost knocked them off but managed to grab and keep them all in place. Would most certainly chop your rope if they go, belayer might be in the impact zone but should have time to react if they tumble that far. Easy to avoid, just start chimneying and keep your feet off the ground but if the follower feels like doing a public service stash your bags out of the way and send 'em sailing!

Was the only harder multi pitch I tried in the park and had to bail 4 pitches up due to sunlight but it's an absolutely amazing climb, just about every inch is earned. Approach certainly character building with the bush whacking but not that bad, unless you stray off path a bit... If you find yourself swimming up 5th class bushes just turn around and find an easier way. Dec 29, 2023

[Hide Comment] Approach is not bad coming from Oak Creek. If you're intensely schwacking, try another route. Only climbed to top of P4. And because there's no description for this route (isn't this mountainproject??), here's my contribution:

P1: 5.9 chimney with PG protection. Felt harder than epi chimney
P2: 5.10b PG, decently protected crux, .2 fits nicely
P3: Money. At least four #3s, three #4s, three #2s, one #5.
P4: Bring hand sani. Potentially can climb a crack out right cathedral start and then step into cathedral after the dustiest climbing. Be weary of the block next to the belay. Apr 1, 2025