Fossil Snails in Gastropod Casket Canyon
Excited by a past exploration of Fossil Snail Canyon (3A IV 7r 190ft), The Team returned to the fossil laden range to visit Gastropod Casket Canyon (3A IV 8r 200 ft). We found rams horns, gastropods, other fossils, a stiff uphill and cairn-anchor-less canyon.
read more …Early Drop into Sentinel Canyon
Death Valley approaches can feel more dangerous than the canyons themselves, which I guess shouldn’t be surprising given that is how climbing can work too. This trip down to Death Valley after an overnight wind/rain storm, we headed out a little after 8am to hike to the top of Feral Ass Canyon (3A III, 9r, 230ft). We would instead decide to drop into Sentinel Canyon (3A III, 13r, 130ft) which runs along the approach early but still hit 7 rappels, mostly small.
read more …Downclimb Fest in Hidden Falls Canyon
Out on a recent trip to Red Rock Canyon I was unable to climb due to an injury and was looking for non-4×4 required canyons in the park. I found Hidden Falls Canyon (3A III, 4-11r, 120ft) on ropewiki and thought it looked beautiful and was worth the effort with its rocky watercourses, bouldery washes and endless down climbing.
read more …Fun Times in Funky Lizard Canyon
As with most Death Valley canyon’s, we have limited, but essential, beta: number of raps, longest rap, some GPX lines and a photo album from the first descentionist: Scott Swanny. Given we were warming up for the season (and most park roads were still closed) I picked a canyon from a ‘canyon-cluster’ on the SW of Death Valley that had not-too-long rappels, not-too-many rappels and a short approach to optimize for success and mitigate risk as it was likely any canyon since the Fall 2022 rain event was scoured and we’d have to rebuild every anchor. Funky Lizard Canyon (3A III, 10r 110ft) turned out to be a fun, straightforward canyon that our team breezed through.
read more …Return to Rainbow Canyon
Rainbow Canyon (3A I) first introduced me to cairn anchors back in 2019. This was back when I was still descending canyons in climber style: a two-person team with ATCs and dynamic ropes. I was so nervous I backed up the cairn anchor with a boulder 50 ft back for when I went down first. However, it was worth it for the beautiful rainbow coloration of the walls and wide views of this deep canyon.
read more …Darwin Falls: The Only Water Canyon in Death Valley
Darwin Falls is a little waterfall people can visit from a hiking trail in Death Valley, but the real gem is the 150ft waterfall unseen from the trail but just above. It is only accessible by canyoneering and in the sole water canyon in Death Valley. Darwin Falls (3B II) was our first canyon of the Death Valley season and was much changed since the prior descent in 2020.
read more …Bicycle Tour through the Mountainous Lofoten Islands
On our honeymoon trip to Norway, Sadie and I spent eight days in the a Lofoten Islands. Along the way we climbed in the rain, hiked mountains, hung out on white sandy beaches and sailed in a fjord. However the main thing we did was a six day bicycle tour from Svolvær down to the end of the road in Å (90mi 5.5k).
read more …Watermelon on Mt. Baldwin via Laurel Lakes
Ahhhhh permitting in the Eastern Sierra. When I moved to Mammoth Lakes, I was stoked for walk up permits because I could finally get them easily from the Mammoth Welcome Center the day before. However, after COVID, ‘walk up’ turned into two weeks before the entry date and all online. Great for non-residents like I used to be, but a bummer as a resident because it meant using an online system that can be hyper competitive. Thus we got a permit for Laurel Lakes just out of Mammoth Lakes and then went over the Laurel Col. to the Convict Lake Basin to climb Mt. Baldwin.
read more …Mount Huntington and the Hopkins Pass Surprise
I had this grand idea of doing a traverse of the Pioneer Basin peaks, 8mi and 4k elevation gain of ridgeline. Followed by going over Hopkins Pass, making our way out to Duck Lake in Mammoth Lakes with peak bagging along the way. Then the plan hit reality and things were more difficult than I had hoped… (the proposed route)
read more …Return to Temple Crag: Sun Ribbon Arete
Temple Crag is a huge formation out of Big Pine, CA. It hosts several amazingly long climbs from the 13 pitch Venusian Blind (5.7) to the 16 pitch Dark Star (5.10c) in the 1,500-2,000 ft long range. I made a failed attempt on Moon Goddess Arete (18 pitch, 5.8) back in 2018, but only found bad rock instead of the traverse to second tower. This time I teamed up with my friend Kevin to climb Sun Ribbon Arete (2000 ft, 22 pitches, 5.10a) car-car. I’ve never done a single day push before (most people camp at the upper lakes the night before) and was pretty intimidated but it went really well in a 17 hours continuous movement day.
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