Red Rocks – It IS Red and there ARE Rocks in It!
Red Rocks is a justifiably world-renowned destination climbing area, and contrary to the quirky 1980s cider ad by Leslie Nielsen, it IS red and there ARE rocks in it! The […]
Category Archives: USA
White Stone around Red Rocks
Las Vegas is an extraordinary story of city-building. Fuelled by tolerant gambling regulations, and the construction of the Hoover Dam, the population of 5,000 in the early 30s, has grown […]
St George – Sandstone and Basalt
St George, Utah, lies about a hundred miles east of Las Vegas, Nevada, but by a strange quirk of boundaries, it’s two States away, with the I15 nipping through a […]
Mojave Limestone and The Grail a.k.a. Lime Kiln Canyon
Whilst Las Vegas is famed for Red Rocks, and Southern Utah for Moab and Indian Creek, between these two sandstone Meccas lies a tremendous wealth of less well-known climbing – […]
New Jack City a.k.a. Sawtooth Canyon
WARNING – IF YOU ARE PHOBIC ABOUT 8-LEGGED CREATURES DON’T LOOK TOO CLOSELY AT THE PHOTO A COUPLE DOWN THE POST. The main claim to fame of Barstow, in southern […]
Pinnacles National Park and the Western Sierra
Lake Tahoe marked a decision point in our trip, with options eastward towards Salt Lake City, or extending our north-bound trajectory through Oregon to Smith Rock. Unfortunately, a major cold […]
Lake Tahoe, Lover’s Leap and The “Best VS in the World”?
Lake Tahoe straddles the border between California and Nevada in the northern Sierras. Lying at 6,225 ft above sea level, Lake Tahoe earns a few entries in the record books: […]
Around Bishop – ORG and the Buttermilks (and some Festival Schmoozing)
Owens River Gorge is just a few miles outside of Bishop and at a much lower elevation than the last few crags we posted about. Depending on your point of […]
Two Big Rocks and a Big Lake
We were (over) due a rest day, and Mono Lake was the perfect spot to spend it. This iconic geological oddity combines volcanic origins with extreme mineral abundance (due to […]
Climbing Above Bishop – Pine Creek Canyon and Gong Show Wall
There’s an absolute tonne of climbing around Bishop, the outdoor capital of the Eastern Sierra. It probably has a similar claim to “epicentre” status as say Moab or Boulder, and […]
Alabama Hills, in the shadow of Mt Whitney
After the sandbag trad and hot, grueling walk-ins of Tahquitz and Suicide, we were open to some lazy roadside sport – ideally at altitude and/or in the shade. Mountain Project […]
Tahquitz and Suicide Rocks (Not Painless!)
Idyllwild is a pleasant if touristy town in the San Jacinto Mountains, a couple of hours east of Los Angeles. It sits nestled between two giant granite bastions: Tahquitz and […]
Sin City – Too Hot to Handle
Las Vegas is a pretty logical start/end point for our West Coast road trip – not least because there’s a direct flight (outbound at least) from Manchester. Red Rocks is […]
Texas – Hueco Tanks, Big Bend, Enchanted Rock and Reimer’s Ranch
With just over a week to go before our plane home we faced the potentially dull prospect of driving a thousand miles across Texas. The first leg of our trip […]
Tucson – Mt Lemmon and The Farmhouse
Despite being in southern Arizona, in the middle of the Sonoran Desert, Tucson can lay claim to being a year-round climbing paradise. The secret to this seeming climactic contradiction is […]
Winslow to Phoenix
If Flagstaff’s claim to fame is a name-check in “Route 66” then it’s near neighbour to the east, Winslow, can thank The Eagles for its notoriety (and perhaps its continued […]
Flagstaff – from The Peaks to The Pit
There’s a tonne of climbing around Flagstaff, the epicentre of the North Arizona scene. Our previous attempt to explore some of it, at the same time of year almost twenty […]
Canyons Broad and Narrow
The cold snap in Moab gave us the nudge to join the great snowbird migration south to warmer climes (and climbs) so we set the sat nav for Arizona. First […]
Up The Creek with Too Few Cams, and More Moab
We’ve been lucky enough to visit most of the iconic American climbing areas, and many others that should be more widely known – have a browse through here if you […]
Utah – La Sal Mountains and Colorado River Road
Utah is king of the desert – at least in terms of stupendous sandstone geology. Arizona might boast The Grand Canyon, but Utah lays claim to Bryce, Zion, Canyonlands and […]
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