Ridin' Out the Storm

An excellent adventure route that takes you up through the prominent dihedral. Clip bolts for the first 1.5 pitches until you reach the giant overhanging crack, then it's trad the rest of the way to the top. A rare but worthwhile trad climb in Paradise Valley!

Named after a wild thunderstorm that happened the 1st day working on the route & this Iron Horse song that coincidentally played afterwards during the drive back down the Hinkey Summit rd.

Pitch #1 (5.8, 23m, 8 bolts): Fun pitch through highly featured rock that includes huecos, pockets, jugs, and flakes. Route starts in a hand-sized pocket, flows through some great climbing movements, and ends on a very comfortable big ledge equipped with rap rings. This pitch can also be climbed as a single pitch sport route.

Pitch #2 (5.10c/d, 21m, 4 bolts & trad gear): The $$ pitch! Much better quality rock than pitch #1. Start out with balancy face climbing and then use cracks on the left to get to the roof. After clipping the 4th and final bolt, move up and start plugging gear in the overhead crack. Traverse up and to the right through a series of fun roofs with some great hand jams in the irregular crack. Then head straight up through the excellent dihedral in a thinner finger crack, which is likely the crux. Semi-hanging bolted belay with an extra bolt on the right for the belayer.

Tape gloves recommended. Falls should be clean because of the overhang, but you may have to lower back to the start if you fall off because it can be difficult to get back onto the wall. 

Pitch #3 (5.10a/b, 27m, trad gear): Another great pitch! Climb the left and middle cracks with good gear placements along the way. After you arrive at the top of the roof/alcove, reach out and plug a #2 into the roof crack, grab for some blind holds, and consider some chimney technique to pull the funky roof. Above the big roof is lower-angle climbing up a gully-like feature until you reach a steep headwall, which can be overcome by a blind reach around to the left. Belay from a bolted anchor on comfortable ledge above the large crack.

Pitch #4 (5.6, 28m, trad gear): Easier climbing up a low-angle crack system, with only a few steeper sections. Trend slightly to the right when given a choice. End at a comfortable bolted belay ledge that's just a step up and to the right of the giant walk off ledge. Or continue to the very top by linking pitch #5 (recommended).

Pitch #5 (5.5/4th class, 17m, trad gear): A short and easy scramble up to the top of the formation for sweeping views. Recommend linking pitches 4 & 5.

Rappel (recommended): Only 4 rappels with a single 70m rope. Rap or carefully downclimb the 5th pitch. Rap the 4th pitch. Then rap to the right of the climbing route for 33m to a set of rap anchors on a small hueco ledge. These are vertically-aligned French-style rap anchors, just feed the rope through both the rap ring & the quick link (it works great to do this at the same time as you pull the rope). Then rap a full 35m straight down to the ground. 

*If you climb the route with a 60m rope, the walk off is recommended due to the difficulty of rapping pitch 2 & 3 of the climbing route. And a 60m rope is not long enough for the dedicated rapel route!

Walk Off (4th class scrambling required): Rap or downclimb the 5th pitch. Then step down and to the left to get onto the giant walk off ledge. Follow the ledge to scramble down and over the big “potato chip flake” and keep scrambling east on the ledge system along the wall. Once you climb up onto a pile of rocks (that look more sketchy than they actually feel), head down and leftish (NE) to scurry up and over/through the distinctive “notch pass”. From here it's choose your own adventure, bearing somewhat left as you go down the fairly steep gully. At the bottom you'll pass the big cave on your left before returning to the start of the route. There are a few cairns stacked up along the way. Alternatively , you could take a longer loop walk off that is less steep that brings you next to The Cleft.

*See the Ridin' Out the Storm Overview photo for all anchor locations & walk off route.

Hardware: All bolts are glue-ins (6" Bolt Products Twisted Leg bolts with MKT Liquid Roc 500+ glue). All anchors stations are bolted with rap rings. Everything is stainless steel.

Trad Gear: 0.3-3 B.D. cams, doubles of 1 & 2 (optional additional gear: 0.2, 5). Offset nuts & other passive gear are great.

*Consider walkie talkies for communication, it can be difficult to impossible to hear your partner on pitch 3 because of the overhang.

*As with all climbing in the Hinkey area, helmets are highly recommended.

Follow driving, parking, & hiking directions to get to Iron Horse Wall. Ridin' Out the Storm starts below the giant overhanging bulge with the large dihedral on it's right side. Scurry up the small hill on the left side of the wall to a flat rock belay station that sits next to a small shallow cave. 1st bolt is about 10' up.