Red Rock (the 1st)

May 2024, we took our first trip to Red Rock Canyon. Well, it was part of a more general trip to Las Vegas, and we set aside two days to go climbing. Luckily, it had not rained in a while, and we were there the last week before it got super hot (it was about mid 80sF in the canyon. The day after we left it was up to 90-100F). 

We used the 2nd edition Handren Red Rocks guide book and mountain project, both served us well. Colton graciously lent me his GoPro so we have some consolidated footage linked here, though I used a chest harness so the footage isn't particularly great. I did have some commentary on it starting around an hour and thirty in. We are new trad climbers so don't judge us too harshly for our long gear placement times. 

Day 1: Sport!

The Hamlet

We started day 1 with some sport climbing to readjust to climbing outside, as none of us had really lead climbed for about a year (we were climbing partners but we all moved away after graduating college). 

For the first half, we were at The Hamlet, a nice crag in the first pullout area of Calico basin. The approach was pretty short, and the area itself has a nice view of the canyon. Reed and I each warmed up on a nice easy sport route, which confirmed that we did still remember how to lead climb and belay. 

The approach to this climb is actually pretty funky. You first scramble up some hills to find a rap station, which you use to then rappel down into a little valley area which has the base of the climb, shown below. We also scrambled back up around the right of the rap station to get back out, which was a little sketchy. There is supposedly a way you can hike around into this area instead of rappelling down/scrambling up, but we didn't see anything super clear and decided to go with what was obvious. 

I led up the first pitch, which was on the white stone and nothing too interesting. The belay station at the top of the first pitch is still a little nestled in, but the entire route got sun (wear sunscreen!). Here's Colton and Reed being belayed up, at basically the same location. 

Reed led the second pitch on the redder rock, and the second pitch had more interesting movement. 

There's a great view of the parking lot at the top! Also of the rest of the canyon too. 

Our friend Bill took a nice photo of us rappelling down the route, and you can see the difference between the color of rock in pitch 1 and 2. Overall a great two pitch climb!

The next two mistakes happened at the top. The first wasn't really a mistake, rather me just taking a super long time to make an anchor (again, this was my first ever trad lead! My only prior experience was climbing with a guide the previous fall). 

The second was with regard to the descent. There is a rappel station around a tree to the left of the top, shown below. Ok, cool no problems there. The problem was my dumbass didn't properly coil the rope, I just sort of bunched it up and carried it over, which tangled the heck out of it. Which meant I spent a super long time untangling the damn thing before I could actually rappel down. 

All this time lost was adding up. We had entered the canyon around 640am. We left Willow Springs around 1050am. 4 hours for one pitch of trad climbing didn't bode well for our next choice... 

Dark Shadows

Should we have chosen Dark Shadows as our first ever trad multipitch, with me being the only one who had ever trad lead before? Probably not! Did it help that we were about 2 hours behind schedule and certainly did not plan to be starting the climb around 1pm? Nope! We barely had enough water (we ran out about halfway on the hike back to the car), and did not pack lunch as we were planning on leaving for an early dinner. 

Luckily the approach was not that bad, only about 40 minutes. We got to the base of the climb around 1230pm, and started climbing at 1pm. There is this fun little stream you have to step over 

Heres a picture looking up the route, while I was leading the first pitch. The first pitch I would call mixed, there was two bolts going up and then very easy low fifth class climbing to the anchors. The initial bit was actually kind of tricky, very crimpy and needing to find decent feet, but nothing too difficult. 

You can link the first two pitches together but I was a little worried about rope drag because the second pitch has a little traverse part out left, so we didn't link it. 

Reed led up the second pitch (his first trad lead! You can see where he was sowing it up). The second pitch I found very enjoyable, it climbs a crack/dihedral with a little traverse left afterwards. 

Reed took a cool photo of me on the traverse at the top of pitch 2, and here's all three of us at the belay station! The belay station at the top of pitch 2 is actually really nice, a little alcove with plenty of space, we definitely could have fit another person there too. 

So far, things were pretty smooth. In fact, we were making pretty good time. With all of us at the belay station at 230pm, it only took an hour and a half for all three of us to climb two pitches. However, pitch 3 is where things start to get real slow.

Pitch 3 is the main pitch for Dark Shadows, 120 feet of 5.8 crack climbing into some exposed face climbing on slippery varnished rock. Since I don't really count pitch 1 as a true trad lead, this was my second ever trad lead. And I don't really know how to crack climb, so I laybacked any part that required crack climbing.

Pitch 3 was the definition of type 2 fun. Looking back on it, it was a super cool experience. But during, I was pretty scared the whole pitch. At no point do I think I was ever actually going to fall, and I certainly took a lot of times, but again, this was my second trad lead. And it was a super long pitch, taking me about 30 minutes to finish it. 

The anchors at the top of pitch 3 were much more cramped, but at least it wasn't a hanging belay. Colton was up next to follow, but he got a bit spooked at the beginning crack section of pitch 3 (which is totally fair, he was probably out of practice the most). So I lowered him back down and he held the fort down at the belay station. I belayed Reed on up and it was up to him to lead the 4th pitch. 

Unfortunately, since we weren't three anymore, there wasn't anyone to take cool pictures of Reed leading up pitch 4. Pitch 4 was shorter than pitch 3 but was probably overall more exposed. Pitch 4 wasn't anything as special as pitch 3, more of the sort of crimpy face climbing up. But we got to the top!

The top of Dark Shadows is super cool, with that roof being such a great feature to look at. At this point, it was 430pm, so still actually ok time just looking at the climb. However, we had been out since 6am, were all hungry, and running out of water. Taking so long at Dream Girl really screwed us on the rest of the day (and that was mostly my bad, woopsies). Anyways, we weren't out yet. We still had 4 rappels before we could get onto the ground and start the hike out. 

The first rappel down goes to the rappel station of chasing shadows. I couldn't find it at first, because it was further right than I expected, around a corner. Luckily there was another party rappelling down from the full Dark Shadows who told us to keep going right to find the anchors. It also spooked me a little bit that the rappel was made only with the rope stretch (seeing the rope bounce up and away from me after I went off rappel did not make me feel good). Here's Reed going coming down the rappel. 

Afterwards though, the rappels just went down the route. It still took us about an hour and a half to rap down the whole route (we got back to the ground around 615pm). Rappelling as a party of three (which we had to do for the last two raps) is super slow, and I think in the future we are going to try having two people simul rap down first to speed it up. 

Overall though, we didn't die and we learned a lot. So 10/10 experience, would climb again. I have more of a reflection in the video linked at the very beginning, beginning around an hour and a half in (it is timestamped in the description).