Geronimo Grade II; 5.7****

    Gear Used:
  • 2 60 meter ropes
  • rack to 3 inches
  • slings
March 26, 2007

The Approach

After spending a few day's in southern Utah, I caught the St. George shuttle to the Vegas airport. I forgot about the time change so I spent an extra hour sitting around waiting for my friend James to pick me up. James was driving in from the Sedona area of Arizona (4-5 hour drive). He showed up around noon and we headed straight for Red Rocks.

We decided to climb Geronimo on Jackrabbit Buttress. It's less than an hour hike and only 4 pitches so we were hoping we could do it before dark. We parked at the Pine Creek parking area and headed up the canyon. I am pretty used to this trail as it is the one that goes to Dark Shadows which I have climbed 3 times before.

To get to Geronimo, you cross the creek by the old homestead and and take a left up the nicely graded bank. Hike the trail for about 10 minutes and take a right towards Cloud Tower. A lot of trials intersect each other in this area so we just kind of kept hiking the trails that received the most use. It was a pretty easy approach and took us about 50 minutes.

There was a team leading the first pitch so we sat down and waited for them to get up the route.

The Climbs

Geronimo 5.7 ****

Pitch 1, 5.6 160 feet

I started up the first pitch and it was exciting to get back on to the perfect sandstone of Red Rocks. It took a second to get used to trusting those edges again. The 1st pitch was mainly face climbing using a great crack for gear. The climbing was easy and juggy. I set up an anchor on a huge slung boulder at the top of the pitch. As I was belaying James up a party was descending and decided to rap down the climb instead of the original gully rap. At first I thought they would be in our way but it actually worked out well. It was good to know that if we could descend this way as apposed to single rope rappels down the gully.

Pitch 2, 5.6 180 feet

We had to move our belay about 10 feet to the back of the ledge. James lead up this pitch which was another fun one. Basically face climbing with another great crack for gear. James is more of a crack and chimney climber and he got a little bit nervous leading out on the face. He sewed it up with gear pretty good. It was very good climbing with a couple of little steep bulges to overcome. Near the top of the pitch James traversed left which we are not quite sure if this was the route or not. I think it climbs straight up an exposed arete to some chains. James made a gear anchor after the traverse and I continued up to a tree belay right below the next pitch.

Pitch 3, 5.7 160 feet

Pitch 3 was a very exciting pitch. I lead off on black varnished plates straight up and a little to the left skyline. Protection was great and ate stoppers the whole way up. I continued face climbing until I reached a very dark corner that had some cool jams up to a gear belay. The belay was a little weird and felt like you were sticking cams in a hollow flake.

Pitch 4, 5.5 65 feet

James lead off on the last pitch which was wild arete. He climbed up and a little to the right placing gear in flakes and horizontal cracks. This was a short pitch which was good as it was slowly getting dark. He made it to the top and threw me on belay.


James climbing the 4th pitch on Geronimo.
| | Top | |