Joshua Tree

The Details: 4,000ft elevation. If you’re lucky, get a site at Hidden Valley campground. But if it's full don't try to rort the system cause you'll get booked. The rangers apparently only care about whether your car is parked in a designated area, so the trick for us was to ask some people to shuffle their 2 cars so that we could fit a third car into the parking spot. Once that’s sorted, camp wherever is flat.

The rock: Granite, very coarse and often with a hint of choss to it, but by and large it's great to climb on. Tape gloves (or those new-fangled over-priced rubber things) come in very handy as the cracks absolutely thrash your hands.

Access: Coming from LA it's likely you'll get heavy traffic along the 210 and the 10 for the first hour or more. Without any traffic delays you could get from Pasadena to Hidden Valley in 2 hours (with a healthy disrespect for the speed limit!! :-). Most routes have 5min walk or less.

Descent(s): There are lots of rap points around the place, many of which require 2 ropes.

The classic J Tree landscape, with happy climbers wandering home after a big day in this brilliant area.

Lost Horse Area

Hemingway Buttress

* White Lightning 40m 5.7/16 (OS) A nice crack system, but pretty stiff for 5.7 and the crux is a sustained handjam section (ouch!) close to the start, so not the best warm up. Follow the L crack at the top (the R crack is a 5.8 section of PaPT). Gets 3 stars in some guides but that's a bit much. *** Poodles are People Too 40m 5.10b/20 (YP) One of the best climbs I’ve done at J Tree, a totally brilliant system of very thin face cracks which occasionally widen enough for a fingerlock, but otherwise it requires faceclimbing. What's cool is that most of the handholds (fingerlocks and sidepulls) can't be used as footholds, and most of the footholds (smears, nubbins) can't be used as handholds, which makes for very interesting climbing. The gear is better than appears from the ground, lots of small wires then cams higher.

Hemingway Buttress, with climbers above the splitter crack of White Lightning.

Real Hidden Valley

Hidden Tower

** Sail Away 25m 5.8-/15 (OS)
The R crack. A very, very nice route, and very easy for a J-tree 5.8! It looks surprisingly steep for such a low grade, but it’s surprisingly slabby once you’re on it! Take a double set of wires and nothing else! Hop up ledges to a short diagonal to the base of the crack proper, then great moves lead up to a lovely balancy crux where the crack starts leaning to the R. 5m below the top, step L and move up the nice finger crack on good holds.

* Wild Wind 27m 5.8/16 (OS)
The L crack. Slightly bold down low, but then good fun crack climbing. Easily move up to ledge at base of crack. Some poor wires protect some 5.8 face moves to a horizontal break (sinker #2 camalot) below twin cracks. Sweet 5.8 moves up the thin twin cracks, then tricky hands through a bulge at the top. Save a #2Fr for the top of the crack, to protect the exciting narrow 5m slab to the summit! Gets 5.9R in the guide but that’s only if you do the face traverse 5m below the top across R to the flake directly below the chains (apparently quite nice, though a little runout).

The Sentinel

*** Illusion Dweller 36m 5.10b/20 (OS)
A mega classic pitch of crack climbing! It feels 5.8-5.9 (16-18) all the way, amazingly sustained with only a few awkward rests. (Take plenty of large wires). Thankfully the best rest is below the overhang, which hits you with a few fingery 5.10b/20 layback moves, protected by a small cam. Rap off 2 slightly underwhelming bolts. My 60m rope was only just long enough, I could touch the ground only thanks to ropestretch and by hanging by my hands from the very end of the rope after I allowed it to run out of my rap device.

Me still fairly low.

My massive fan club cheers me on.

Arty farty shot #1.

Arty farty shot #2.

Dispensing with the crux on the onsight.

My second gets penalty slack for this display of wussy laybacking!

Hidden Valley Campground

Intersection Rock

* Lower Right Ski Track 20m 5.10c/20 (YP)
Good fun! Easily toproped too, use a LONG sling around the "flying buttress" at the base of UR Ski Track, with a directional #2Fr right on the lip of the roof. All I can say is that the YDS system is totally screwed up, the four grades of 5.6-5.9 cover a huge range of difficulty, (as much as 12-19 in Ewbank grades), but then I can't even tell the difference between the 3 grades of 5.10a-5.10c!!! Whatever, this route follows a left-angling corner crack, (L wall vertical/slabby, R wall overhung) which is fused down low making for some cool face/stemming moves on ok holds, then the crux is thuggish moves through a bulge on ok holds but basically no feet: "crank & slap, repeat". The corner above is deceptively tricky, but goes ok, with a fun airy hand traverse on jugs to finish.

* Upper Right Ski Track 35m 5.3/11 (OS)
This seems to see equal traffic in both directions, as it's used by "solo hardmen" all day as a solo descent. However I was happy to have a rope and plenty of gear cause there was a lot of loose flakes, sandy rock and broken holds. It's a nice enough route though. 28m rap off chains.

** North Overhang 35m 5.9/18 (OS)
1) (* 12m 5.8/17) We did a variant start which was a flake/crack up a vertical wall about 10m R of the start of UR Ski Track. You have to sort of campus the flake to get started, then at the top there's a really unique and cool move to step L into an easy crack. Belay at the first ledge. A better alternative would be to climb it as for Overhang Bypass (see below). 2) (** 23m 5.9/18) Continue up obvious crack system to the obvious overhang, ok but nothing to write home about. Easy traverse L out under the roof to clip the 2 bolts (tough choice between using a long sling to avoid heinous drag, or a short draw to prevent a winger onto the ledge...). At the end of the traverse the footholds run out for a few moves, but the jams are absolutely sinker, so it's pretty secure to crank up on some smears, swing around onto the face, and move up into more great jams and some footholds out on the L face. Nice position, but it's all over pretty quickly and is soft for 5.9 IMHO.

** Overhang Bypass 45m 5.7/16 (OS) Start around on the main road side of the crag (the opposite side to the carpark). 1) (** 25m 5.7/16) Start up a 5.5 slabby flaring crack/groove system for about 15m. You can also boulder hop up to here from the W. Step across to a beautiful series of 5.6 finger cracks in a recessed slab. Where the recess finishes, step L out of the recess (going straight up looks hard and bold), a funky 5.7 move with toes in a thin horizontal crack and hands sidepulling a vague flake, really nice steep balancy move, with a belay ledge just above. 2) (** 20m 5.7/16) Easy crack up to the roof. Hand traverse out R under roof, with ok feet but on an overhung wall. Really funky for granite, pumpy overhung jughauling, good cams and all! Scoot across, a rest awaits at the lip, then a bolt protects a short slab to the summit, a really cool exposed finish to the route.

Me mid-crux on Overhang Bypass, with John belaying.

Old Woman

John props up a tree, with a climber just above the crux on Double Cross in the background.

Same climber higher on Double Cross (*** 5.7+).

The Blob

Heinous flat 4 minute walk. (Well, it's heinous by J Tree standards). Either rap off chains (2 ropes) on the NE side (they're on a ledge below the summit area, and it's hard to pull your ropes), or else there's a "walk-off" down the E end of the crag, which is not too bad for the upper half but we actually rapped down the lower half off a set of slings around a boulder (one rope), because the lower half looked pretty scary and it had a girl in front of us whimpering in fear!! Beginner’s Two 70m 5.2/10 (OS) The long crack/trench up a slab on the southern face, pretty slabby most of the way, but for the hard bits there's nothing for it but to get into the trench so not the most fun. But it's nice enough to be out on the rock and the gear is ok (several med-large cams). . . . . . . . . . . .

Beginner's Two (5.2/10)

Echo Rock Area

Echo Rock

** Double-Dip 40m 5.6/13 (OS) Excellent slab, surprisingly steep for the grade. A little run out between the upper bolts. Short slab past a bolt, then up an enormous booming detached flake, awesome acoustics!! (Bring a #4-5 camalot or two). The crux is a steep slab move off the top of the flake past a bolt, surprisingly tricky, my suggestion is to step R. Then it's really nice steep slabbing past a horizontal and a FH, then more comfortable slabbing past another FH before it rounds off to a doddle. DFH belay.

Echo Rock, Double Dip is the obvious worn streak on the L, Stichter Quits goes up the dyke further R, both with people on top. The elevated block at far right has the classic route (and well named!) EBGBs, which goes up the R skyline.

** Stichter Quits 40m 5.7/16 (OS)
A real tough one for the grade (5.7 should be 14, not 16!!), and the crux is 2m above the first FH, off incredibly polished footholds and small crimpy flakes which help but aren't quite enough for a full layback. Easier slabbing up a dyke to the 2nd FH, then some pure friction smearing on interesting fine grained brown rock up and L to a bulge, which thankfully has plenty of holds and a FH. Once over the bulge, go back R to rejoin the dyke, easier climbing from here but a 20m runout to the anchor (no 5th bolt as promised in the guide!). Belay each other 20m R to rap chains.

*** Forbidden Paradise 32m 5.10b
Just L of the rap route, tried toproping it but couldn’t commit to the steep friction crux at the start and gave up, making a mental note to have my 18-month-old shoes resoled (any excuse will do! :-).

Echo Cove East Side

One of my better J Tree ascents. If you've forgotten that J Tree is full of sandbags, this one will refresh your memory.... It's a beautiful vertical corner/fingercrack, which only goes at the grade thanks to a finger crack splitting the R wall for the first half and good jams and some faceholds in the second half. Even so, the first half in particular is pretty hard and bloody sustained, running it out is not an option so you have to hang off one fingerlock and 2 crappy toejams to place gear. A brilliant route though.

Me mid-onsight.

Tim starts, watched by Charles.

Wonderland of Rocks

Astro Domes

** Solid Gold 32m 5.10a/19 (OS) A great sustained crimpy slab, 7 bolts plus chains. Bring your edging shoes! I'd rename this route "Frozen Solid" - the day we climbed it we were in t-shirts in the sun, but this route is shady and exposed to the wind, and I got so cold I couldn't feel my fingers or toes on any of the holds! Consequently I found it pretty hard! :-) Anyway, in general it's not as hard as it looks from below, most of the edges are super-positive. However, it's surprisingly sustained off the deck past the first three bolts, and you only get a 'rest' after stepping R above the 3rd bolt. The 4th bolt is a few metres off to the right (extend it), then it gets thinner back to the 5th and 6th bolts, and even thinner on the 5m runout above the 6th bolt! 'Exciting' place to hit the crux..... Anyway, grab the jug on the bulge and move over bulge to clip 7th bolt, then wander R to chains. I must say this route is a prime example of why the US "lead-bolting" ethic is ridiculous: first, on a route with bolts that are otherwise around 2m apart, why have a 7m gap between bolts through the crux? And secondly, the 4th bolt is a ridiculous distance off to the right - it should be about 2m further L (and a touch lower). This would protect the moves both before and after it a lot better, and would significantly reduce drag. Sigh, another route screwed up by being hung up about "ethics".....

Peter inches upwards through deep permafrost.

PS: Blood and feathers all over this route made us theorise that the local birds feed on climbers - you have been warned!

Keys View, looking W down into the Palm Springs and Redlands Valley. Tahquitz is on the left hand mountain, while the R hand mountain is the largest freestanding mountain in the lower 48. (Courtesy Peter Monks).

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© 2002-2003 Will