On the way into Joshua Tree National Park to our camp at Hidden Valley we passed the road-side crag called Trashcan Rock in the Quail Springs picnic area. Since it didn’t look like anyone was there on this Friday and they had some easy and moderate rated top rope climbs available we headed back after setting up camp for Heidrun’s first rock climbing experience.
On the west side of the formation were a couple climbs that we could access from one top rope anchor, Karpkwitz (5.6) and B-3 (5.3). We scrambled up the north end of the formation where I built a solid 3-point anchor of cams and then dropped the rope down the face.
I explained a few basics of climbing to Heidrun and then belayed her as she tackled B-3. After lowering off I taught her the basics of belaying and had an idle climber standing around back her up as I repeated the route. Testing her, I took a few intentional falls so she’d know how to catch me.
After climbing we each climbed Karpkwitz on top rope we practiced rappelling from the top of the formation.
Speeding right along on her first day climbing, I next climbed B-3 again, but this time placing protection in the crack as if I was leading. Once at the top of the climb, I pulled in the slack and had Heidrun climb up and clean the gear off the climb – important practice if we’d do any longer routes we couldn’t top rope or any multi-pitch climbs.
While at the top, I moved the anchor further south to line up above B-2 (a 5.3 rated climb).
After we both rappelled down I pulled the rope after us. This time I’d really lead the climb and belay Heidrun up afterward while she again cleaned the pitch.
Heidrun then rappelled down, this time using an autoblock backup since I wouldn’t be below her to provide a fireman’s belay.
Once she was safely down I sent down the rope, and then dismantled the anchor and walked off the north end again. We hung around for another 30 minutes packing away gear, chatting with other climbers and watching a few ascend routes we’d just done. Then it was back to camp for black bean quesadillas, craft beers and a warm camp fire.
Friday was pretty cold so we stayed in until the sun was up before a breakfast of coffee and pancakes.
Since it was no officially the weekend and the camp ground was full, we figured the easy access places like Quail Springs might be plenty busy. Instead we hiked around the formation we camped right next to (The Blob) and took the most circuitous route to the climb known as The Bong (5.5). I was just about to start climbing when another party showed up to wait in line. The Bong is a pretty popular route and we passed by the start several times later that day to always see a line formed at the base. We were lucky to get on the route first.
The route is pretty sure, but is was a fairly consistent climb up a crack with the crux passed by a few layback moves in some parallel formations. I thought the route was a lot of fun, but knew it would challenge Heidrun since it required more pure crack climbing techniques (hand and foot jams) than anything we practiced the day prior.
Once Heidrun reached the top we enjoyed the view, spotting climbers on nearly every other rock formation within sight. To get down I belayed her walk down a slab to a ample ledge. Here I joined her and built another quick anchor to belay her down some class 4 terrain were we eventually passed the base of The Bong again to watch other climbers tackle it.
After lunch we returned to The Blob’s western side for a final “easy” climb. A party was just finishing up on the 5.2 route called “Beginner’s Two” so we scrambled up to the start and I got ready to climb. Right way I realized this was going to be harder than “5.2″ as the start was one of the cruxes and I ended up doing some tenuous face moves to avoid the flaring off-width crack. I figured the climb would mellow as I got higher, but the off-width crack remained and I climbed a good portion of the route by slithering up with half my body in the crack. Protection wasn’t super abundant either in the flaring crack. Once I topped out I spent a while trying to build an anchor I trusted in the still flaring crack. Finally, I pulled in the slack and hollered at Heidrun to start up. I knew she wasn’t going to like this climb.
Sure enough, she had trouble getting started and through the first crux. She probably had trouble reaching the gear I’d place fairly low down which had been a bit of a reach for me and I’ve got 8-9 inches on her. She asked to be lowered back down and didn’t think she could make it up.
After thinking about what to do for a while, I had her untie and then attached my end of the rope to the anchor. After double and triple checking the setup, I rappelled down on the single strand to clean the pitch of the little gear I’d placed. Once I arrived back at the start I then had to walk around past The Bong, then scramble up our earlier descent route to the top of that route. Then I found some 5.0 slab climbing to reach the top of Beginner’s Two. From here I could take down the rope and all the gear I’d left, then reverse my route.
However, I didn’t really want to downclimb the 5.0 slab, so I found a giant hole near a water pocket I could pass the rope through and rappel this section. Retrieving the rope was a bit of a fight on the textured rock, but it eventually came down and I downclimbed past The Bong and returned to Heidrun. With that, we decided to call our climbing to a close and take a hike.
Straight from camp we headed toward the nearby Barker Dam. It was only about a mile and a half away, but we missed where the trail crossed a park road and ended up walking the road for a ways until we picked up the other crossing.
It was nice to just hike without being loaded down by ropes and climbing gear, or the mental tasks of trying to decipher approach routes and pick out specific formations. Instead, I just enjoyed the desert views and the park’s signature trees.
We didn’t see anyone else on the trail from camp, but once we hit the one mile loop we also hit the crowds. The dam itself held only a little water.
Swimming also wasn’t advisable, or maybe even possible.
We stuck to the trail on the way back and spotted some rabbits – they largest wild life we saw in the park on our short visit. We did hear plenty of coyotes that night calling to each other.
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