finger of fate

[fheimerd]

Jlag and myself spent a few days in Idaho. We began the trip with three stellar days of climbing at the City of Rocks. Over the weekend things got hot and crowded and we decided to give the finger a try. We drove two to three hours to a town around Sun Valley and got some excellent beta from folks at the elephant perch climbing shop. Route photos, recent conditions and somebody saying go for it was all we needed.

 

After the bumby road we reached the tailhead and started the hike. From the moment we left the car till the moment the sun went down we were attacked by swarms of mosquitoes. The initial plan was to walk in a few miles to the first lake but we ended up trying to escape the mosquitoes by going higher. We got to a few hundred feet below the climb and bivied there.

 

The next day we hiked to the base and had our first look at the open book we would be climbing. There was a snow slope at the base but other than that the route was completely free of snow. It looked good, damn good. Before long we were jamming and laybacking up the open book on some of the cleanest alpine rock I have ever climbed. Before long we were out of the open book and climbing up the face to the summit block. This was my favorite pitch. Awesome double cracks, sun, exposure and a great view. The decent was a cinch and before we knew it we were sitting in lawn chairs cooling our feet in the creek and sipping on PBR's.

 

Edited June 29, 2006 by fheimerd

[fheimerd]

can anybody give me a quick explanation on why my picture in the post isn't coming up and why I can't post a actual trip report in the idaho forum.

[Blake]

The picture must end in .jpg so that you are linking just the image location/properties, not a web page that it is displayed on. the idaho forum in new, maybe they forget to let you put up formal TRs?

[Blake]

The picture must end in .jpg so that you are linking just the image location/properties, not a web page that it is displayed on. the idaho forum in new, maybe they forget to let you put up formal TRs?

 

[Alpinfox]

 

Sounds great! What kind of car did you have? How bad was the road? Did you drive to the end?

 

I was in COR from June 17-27 and we wanted to go to the FOF but heard the road was too rough for a Subaru wagon.

 

What did you climb at the City?

[fheimerd]

I woudn'tgo at that road with a suburu wagon...unless it's jaced up and has fat tires but I have heard that it has been done so make your own call on that one. We had a toyotoa truck and the road wasn't an issue. Another possibility is to hike an additional five miles in from the lower trailhead and skip the shitty road. Long approach but less risk on your car.

 

The City of rocks was sweet. We climbed in the 5.7-5.10 range and ticked many sport and trad classics. M highlights were rye crisp, bloody fingers and My own provate idaho.

 

Thanks to Jlag for taking me out the and showing me the sickness.

[jlag]

anytime my friend. Thanks for the inspiration to power up to the base of that thing. Let me know when you get some pictures rolling.

[fgw]

J., nice job on the Finger Of Fate! Looking forward to trying it.

[corvallisclimb]

I did that road in a subaru outback, not jacked up, no fat tires. There was one spot we had to fill in a hole with some rocks but besides that it seemed to work just fine.

[jlag]

I think the heavy snow year really messed with the road a bit. Certainly no big deal with some clearance, sometimes rock-crawling is necessary but doable.