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In addition to Pervertical Sanctuary on the Diamond, our other big summer goal was to climb the Scenic Cruise in the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. The Black Canyon is famous for high adventure, poor rock quality and generally scary climbing. Bits of this are found on the Scenic Cruise, but luckily those parts are few and far between, separated by some of the finest sustained moderate free climbing I’ve ever seen. The climb is about 1700′ long and it feels as though more than half that length is on moves 5.9 and harder. In the middle are two beautiful sustained 5.10 pitches, and in between them the fearsomely reputed 5.10- pegmatite traverse. With the shorter days of fall, we knew we’d have to move fairly quick to finish the route in the light. This seemed like an easy proposition as we quickly dispatched the first few guidebook pitches. By the time we encountered the first sustained 5.9 pitch, the true nature of the route revealed itself. From here on nearly every pitch would present some form of challenge. We kept at it, running out of water regrettably early in the day. We brought 3 L compared to 6 L by the party climbing behind us. Chris did a great job on both of the technical cruxes, while I dispatched the peg traverse with only minimal whimpering and a few hesitations. The climb had so many memorable passages, it is staggering. It certainly ranks among the very best climbs I’ve had the luck to complete.

Chris scopes out the route while we wait for daylight

From black canyon

Chris starts up the 5.9 boulder problem. Next time we’d probably just take the 5.7 start to the left.

From black canyon

The first of the challenging pitches sets the tone for the next 1000+’ of climbing

From black canyon

Chris on the sustained 5.10 crack

From black canyon

Chimneying up the giant flake before the wild 5.7 step across

From black canyon

The higher traverse pitch. The climbing starts with an awkward hand traverse before some difficult 5.9 face climbing with 2/3 of the bolts belonging in a museum.

From black canyon

Pano

From black canyon

At the Rim

From black canyon

From black canyon

A day after returning from Europe, I was eager to get out climbing. I wasn’t too psyched on waking up early, but for the right adventure, I made an exception. After perusing various pictures of rocks in RMNP, we settled on an attractive looking buttress on Otis Peak. We have no idea what the buttress is called, or if it has ever been climbed before. We certainly didnt see any evidence on route.

The buttress is located in the center of this photo, just right of Otis Flower Tower

From Otis Peak

After the short approach, we broke out the binoculars to look for a climbable line

From Otis Peak

From there an only slightly unpleasant scramble up the gully led to the buttress

From Otis Peak

From Otis Peak

From Otis Peak

The climbing started at an obvious ledge, where Joe took the first pitch. The rock was occasionally loose, but still fun. It started out nondescript before entering a nice right facing corner (5.6).

From Otis Peak

From Otis Peak

From Otis Peak

From Otis Peak

I took the next pitch, moving left from the belay, then back right to the obvious ledge below the roof. Generally solid rock, and easy enough to outweigh any spice factor. (mid 5th)

From Otis Peak

Chris took the next pitch, which even from below was obviously going to be the crux. Initially we thought the line might go directly through the roof. Chris started from the right side of the ledge, with just enough pro to keep things reasonable. After sussing out the direct roof, he instead opted for an awesome, airy underclinging traverse to the right. It took some pressing from me and Joe, but eventually he committed to the moves. After the traverse the climb entered a great right facing corner, reminiscent of the upper pitch on the SE corner of the Saber. One more spicy move, and Chris found a decent belay to bring us up. Even on TR, the climbing was quite exciting. Definitely a great lead by Chris! (5.9)

From Otis Peak

From Otis Peak

From Otis Peak

From Otis Peak

From the belay, it looked like a cruise to the top. Joe took over, and was immediately stumped by the 5′ headwall in front of him. It turned out to be some fairly tenuous 5.8 climbing that then broke way to much easier terrain above.

From Otis Peak

From Otis Peak

From there we hiked up to the most logical high point where it took us about 10 tries to get our jumping high-5 summit shot.

From Otis Peak

To descent we hiked south along the ridge top, passing the true summit of Otis Peak before descending a gully to Andrew’s tarn.

From Otis Peak

At the end of last summer, Chris and I decided that our goal in the park this season would be to climb Pervertical Sanctuary on the Diamond on Long’s Peak. Although we often climb harder at the crags, the climbing on the Diamond is all above 13k feet, making things quite a bit more challenging. We kicked out of work a bit early on Friday so we could make the nice approach to Chasm lake with daylight. As usual, it was hard to sleep with fears of snaffelhounds and other rodents all around us. By 4 AM, we were more than ready to get up, but unfortunately, on the first great weather weekend in a while, so was everybody else. We made it up to the north chimney and almost got suckered up to fields by some misguided folks. By soloing 90% of the chimney, we managed to pass two other parties headed for our route, leaving only the folks bivying on broadway to contend with. Luckily none of them were planning on PV, so we were good to go. Within minutes of reaching the base, the other parties caught up, but we were there first, so it wasnt much of a concern anymore.

We were a bit weary of the opening pitches and their reported runout nature, but they turned out to be very reasonable and quite pleasant. The climb ramps up nicely in both difficulty and quality. The wall becomes steeper and the features more defined. Wild climbing on the third pitch brought us below the crux hand crack. As usual I psyched myself out pretty well going in to the lead. The climbing was exhausting at the altitude, but I managed to hold it together for the 100′ of difficult climbing. The splitter crack continues on for the next crack. Chris had good beta to keep moving up his large cams, and made steady work of the nearly 200′ pitch. From an awesome, comfy belay ledge, it was just one more moderate pitch up to table ledge. As the first party on the raps, we had no waiting to endure, making for a relatively care free descent back to our camp.

Overall, an outstanding quality climb. The only downside was the dangerous feeling race up the north chimney in the morning. I think in the future I’ll keep my Diamond climbing to weekdays.

PHOTOS:
At the end of last summer, Chris and I decided that our goal in the park this season would be to climb Pervertical Sanctuary on the Diamond on Long’s Peak. Although we often climb harder at the crags, the climbing on the Diamond is all above 13k feet, making things quite a bit more challenging. We kicked out of work a bit early on Friday so we could make the nice approach to Chasm lake with daylight. As usual, it was hard to sleep with fears of snaffelhounds and other rodents all around us. By 4 AM, we were more than ready to get up, but unfortunately, on the first great weather weekend in a while, so was everybody else. We made it up to the north chimney and almost got suckered up to fields by some misguided folks. By soloing 90% of the chimney, we managed to pass two other parties headed for our route, leaving only the folks bivying on broadway to contend with. Luckily none of them were planning on PV, so we were good to go. Within minutes of reaching the base, the other parties caught up, but we were there first, so it wasnt much of a concern anymore.

We were a bit weary of the opening pitches and their reported runout nature, but they turned out to be very reasonable and quite pleasant. The climb ramps up nicely in both difficulty and quality. The wall becomes steeper and the features more defined. Wild climbing on the third pitch brought us below the crux hand crack. As usual I psyched myself out pretty well going in to the lead. The climbing was exhausting at the altitude, but I managed to hold it together for the 100′ of difficult climbing. The splitter crack continues on for the next crack. Chris had good beta to keep moving up his large cams, and made steady work of the nearly 200′ pitch. From an awesome, comfy belay ledge, it was just one more moderate pitch up to table ledge. As the first party on the raps, we had no waiting to endure, making for a relatively care free descent back to our camp.

Overall, an outstanding quality climb. The only downside was the dangerous feeling race up the north chimney in the morning. I think in the future I’ll keep my Diamond climbing to weekdays.

PHOTOS:

Loaded up with the essential gear, most importantly a Hot ‘n Ready pizza

The Diamond near sunset.

Last minute preparations by headlamp.

The north Chimney

And why it should be avoided on weekends:

Sunrise

Almost ready

pitch 1

pitch 2

pitch 2, looking down
pitch 3

pitch 4, crux

Looking down the crux

Starting the steep fists on pitch 5

Almost done and nobody on our heels

Finished (i used a dead mouse as a handhold here)

D7 Raps

Parting Shot

buttress. On Saturday, Chris and I climbed the Flying Buttress on Mt. Meeker. Even though this route gets tons of stars on the internet and in the guidebooks, it doesnt seem super popular. I really can’t imagine why. The rock is perfect and the climbing is consistently interesting and occasionally outstanding (i.e. the roof). On the way up, Chris decided to pioneer a new approach that avoids any semblance of trail after the 1st five minutes. Aside from the constant doubt as we wandered in the dark up the treed hillside, the new approach paid off with beautiful sunrise views from the alpine ridge. The great morning light provided an opportunity to test out my new toy (camera). The new approach only cost use a bit of time, and we met it up and down the climb well before the forecast storms kicked up.

Pics from the new camera:

From Flying Buttress

Finally out of the woods

From Flying Buttress

Sunrise

From Flying Buttress

Sweaty Chris

From Flying Buttress

Morning Pano: Meeker on left (buttress splits the middle), Ships Prow in center, Long’s on right

From Flying Buttress

Moon over Ship’s Prow

From Flying Buttress

Cold and dejected Chris

From Flying Buttress

Sending

From Flying Buttress

Decisions, decisions: 5.10- direct, or 5.9 bypass?

From Flying Buttress

5.10 Direct

From Flying Buttress

Me on the roof

From Flying Buttress

Extreme nut cleaning

From Flying Buttress

More sweet climbing

From Flying Buttress

On top of the buttress, with clouds starting to build

From Flying Buttress

Go this way

From Flying Buttress

Socked in 5 minutes later

The day before we left CO for the warm beaches of CA and the soaking wet PNW, Joe, Chris and I managed to get out for a little prework climbing in the park. The goal was simply to get out and climb a popular easy ice climb, the Martha Couloir, in RMNP, then make it into the lab early enough to work a whole day. The night before I seriously weighed whether getting up early and risking not making it to work till noon was worth the trouble, but ultimately I made the right choice and went climbing. Things went even faster than expected, taking around 4.5 hrs car to car, getting us all showered and to work before 10:00 AM. Not bad for ~11 miles and 4000′.

From martha couloir

this makes waking up at 2AM worhtwhile:

From martha couloir

From martha couloir

From martha couloir

From martha couloir

Joe put together a nice little vid with his new camera:

Breakfast Alpinism from Joe Sambataro on Vimeo.