[TR] Vegas Beyotch! - Red Rawks Romp 4/1/2013

[ivan]

Trip: Vegas Beyotch! - Red Rawks Romp

 

Date: 4/1/2013

 

Trip Report:

spring break once again, that celebrated season of the year - after 3 trips to zion, thought it might be time to sample the classic moderates of red rocks and get out of the fawking aiders for awhile...

 

in brief:

day 1 - cat in the hat

day 2 - frogland

day 3 - april fools on mt wilson

day 4 - johnny vegas n' solar-slab

day 5 - geronimo

day 6 - crimson chrysalis

day 7 - olive oil

day 8 - calico hillz bouldering and fly back

 

in bitter, stream o'consciousness detail:

 

friday: pre-flight burgers w/ the fam @ red robbins - emergency bomb disposal after my fuel canister set off the southwest lady (perhaps if i just hide it somewhere in the airport i can recover it next week? ) - rendezvous w/ my attorney, half-crazed from his cross-town commute - the flight out - many beerz in the back of the plane - the las vegas strip @ night - madness in every direction - a half-fruitful search for climbing medicine concluded, we retire to our chalet for senior citizens to booze out the back end of the day and prepare for our great red-rawks gang-bang

 

saturday: a sound sleep-in followed by a whole-foods cluster-fuck, then we cast down charleston, hat-on-a-cat bound - a dusty stumble-fuck through the desert after a crazed slalom-fest along the loop road - crowds at the base of course, and half them born during the bush presidency - the second bush - the second second bush term at that - christ, all 3 of their ages together wouldn't be enough for them to buy a beer, and one would be enough to floor the lot of them - the climbing the kidz handled fine - the simul-rap, hanging from their father's johnsons not so much- many long waits on cush ledges, chain-smoking and passing comments with air-force captains, lost louisanians, and random canuckistanians - easy, satisfying clambering to a ho-hum top-out too far below the true summit for a dog-fearing mountaineering man to thole - three parties team up for the rap, all copacetic until a rope gets stuck on the next to last pull - an extra hero-lap for geoff in the dark, sans headlamp - burgundy on the way-back to village view

 

tasty views near the top of the cat in the hat

not the worst place to have to sit for an hour while folks figure out that whole rock-climbing thing...

geoff on the last pitch (the best of the bunch)

top of the first rap

sunday: easter, the sweet-chocolate-baby-jesus back from the dead! frogland our plan for the day, and for our sins we were given it - a bumpy-ass ride through the desert in our svelte kia soul - more crowds at the base - kitchy san franciscans made their ascent w/ rabbit-ears duck-taped athwart their helmets - frogland a fuck-sure worthy route despite the waits for your fellow meat-popsicles to finish passing through - fun for the whole family, though shiverish in the breeze and shade

 

frogland on the descent

strangers on the fine first pitch

my attorney around pitch 3 i reckon

mid-lead on p4 - fun face climbing and a traverse w/ a difficult move to reach a prime stance

dog-bless geoff, he just let me keep on leading the next pitch had a kewl chimneyish burrow-through to a sweet belay atop the jammed flake

the city of sin guarded by an ocean of cacti n' cinders

monday: april fools day, and we pulled a doozy on ourselves - solar slab was the plan, and somehow my medicine-deprived mind got it set that therefore we'd be climbing this monster - the best excuse i can manage is, in true dirt-bag style, i'd xeroxed all my beta and been content at the time to make do w/ mega-fucked pictures

so, long-story short, we wandered high and low like jackasses for hours through burning sun and bristly plants, building up in me if nothing else a burning desire to return to do the resolution arete someday...

 

we did at least make some new friends on our cactus-cruise

convincing ourselves these cairns and this curiously complicated approach somehow fit the approach description, we clambered up a well marked gully for several hundred feet before emerging into a giant ramp system under a huge face that clearly was not part of the fucking game-plan

we retreated, i to suck burgundy down in the shade - rummaging around through hill and dale, we then discovered the location of the secret rebel-base, cached our gear in the brush, then beat it back to town to find a medicine man randomly trolling the compound of octogenarians we'd established ourselves in - a little victory in otherwise a day of disaster

 

the walk back to the car - calico hills bathed in brilliant light

 

tuesday: up at dawn and on the road early to the solar slab

crowds again of course, but nobody on johnny vegas, so i rambled up the ridiculously featured face, racing to be the first for the pitches above the terrace

 

geoff following p3

we didn't quite manage to beat out the chicks from tacoma, so we took our number and followed behind, caught in the crowd that included an arkansan w/ a glorious goddamn accent n' his thai partner who were doing the sunflower route (a must do for my next return)

we eventually teamed up w/ the ladies for the long rap back down, all atwitter to not tangle our lines up - i sense i may have tried their patience - my personality, like my foot-funk or key-lime pie, a bit of an acquired taste

 

wendsday: ole'boy geoff had a hankering for olive oil this day, so i did my damnedest to fuck-up that plan too - with a trail or some sort in every goddamn direction, it don't take much time for a half-wit to get fully fucking bewildered - we ended up at the base of gerinomo instead, and said fuck it, let's just climb this - the tacoma-girls were no doubt thrilled at our arrival behind them again, they having tried to throw off the scent the day afore by telling us they were going elsewhere

 

them dispensing w/ one of the upper pitches - a great route for ledges and easy, juggy climbing on steep stone

 

home early that day, a cacti-cache again completed, i set to achieving a monstrous drunk and suceeded admirably, dreaming of crimson chrysalis the next day

 

thursday: 5 a.m. start, a true miracle - more miraculous still, we arrived at the base of this big bastard w/ no crowd already assembled and glaring at each other

 

a spectacular line, even if it does have some of the hoof-prints of a sport clamber

no pics really, my lawyer leaving all the leading to me, he fear-gripped and camera-shy, what w/ the continuously uncomfortable belay stances - a french couple who didn't quite grasp we didn't speak their heathen tongue came up fast behind us, creating quite the cluster-fuck at every opportunity

 

soon enough we emerged into the sun on a cool summitish sorta thang - woulda been the best moment of the trip i'd warrant were it not for the burning pain in my feet and the trepidation arising from the long set of raps to do down the rope-raping face

our first rap, well after the frenchies had fucked off, somehow having it in their head they were gonna go down epinephrine that same day

a painful walk out for the pair of us, our feet refusing service - for the 3rd day in a row we settled on caching our shit in the boonies in order to be spared a heavily laden stumble-fuck - we'd come back tomorrow and actually find the base of olive oil this time - the trail by headlamp - the harmony of a hundred million frogs croaking in the crick - shooting stars above the hills - constellations considered - the attorney at his business on the phone - a cool desert breeze sucking away my acrid smoke

 

friday: our last full day to climb, we woke late n' hung-over, then heaved out along our well-worn way to the sandstone paradise - no line at the base, and the climbing decidedly easier after the crimson cruise - not a single bolt to be seen the whole way, a true adventure w/o a crowd illustrating the route - fun run-outs, and the last pitch the pick of the litter - geoff here following just past the one-move wonder chimney

the best part of olive oil perhaps the descent? high-ball downscrambling at first, then down a veritable stair-case of trippy rose-colored bedrock - a great route for a free-solo?

 

saturday: a phat sleep-in followed by domestic duties - no time for a long route, we settled on clambering in the calico hillz - tremendous fun under the overcast sky, we went up and down to the ridge top over and again, picking boulder problems all along the way - a quaint area, cute and self-contained - how radical to have that in your backyard?

 

binge drinking before the flight, the profits of my huge gambling windfall dispensed with - we arrive at the airport hours early but damn near miss the plane at the bottom of our cups

 

looking forward to the day my way wends back vegas-wards - decadence in every direction, civilized or not as your savage condition might demand!

 

for next time:

- anything on mt wilson

- epinephrine of course

- dark shadows

- sunflower

[matt_warfield]

As usual, ivan the terrible does not get cheated at anything and has posted another masterpiece that would never get published anywhere else due to the innuendos and epithets but apparently he has greased the palms of the authorities here enough.

 

Gotta do Epinephrine. Please don't tell anybody about it cuz its a big secret.

 

And don't make fun of Vegas just because some make money upside down on a pole while others spend money right side up on a rope.

 

You are also in the wrong generation. You would have been a perfect partner for Warren Harding.

Edited April 8, 2013 by matt_warfield

[stevetimetravlr]

Holy shit, the boys get it done.

[denalidave]

Ahhh - Vegas "The neon cancer spreading across the desert", as I like to call it.

 

"i sense i may have tried their patience - my personality, like my foot-funk or key-lime pie, a bit of an acquired taste" - Quite true, took me a while, but now I can appreciate the foul pleasure of your company, in small doses, of course...

 

[denalidave]

BTW, I'm thinking of booking a trip there in the fall, any takers???

[ivan]

if i win the lottery before then and can afford the flight

[matt_warfield]

I have been there one time but not for climbing but intend to return.

Edited April 8, 2013 by matt_warfield

[Wallstein]

Faq'ing awesome TR!

 

Hope to share a belay with you someday just for the entertainment!

 

 

[denalidave]

Faq'ing awesome TR!

 

Hope to share a belay with you someday just for the entertainment!

 

Careful what you ask for... His singing will kill you quicker than the fall.

[CaleHoopes]

Ivan! Kick ass trip! Last month went down and did Cat in the Hat & Birdland. Great stuff - was my first trip to RR. Vegas sux but RR rox (is that redundant??!?). Nice pictures and nice sends. I agree, that last pitch on Cat in the Hat before the rap from the bolts is most excellent!

[mountainsloth]

baller!

[powderhound]

Nice work rope gun

[beaconben]

What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. Except herpes, that crud stays with you.

[geoff]

Frogland

 

 

Dodge Rams

 

 

Mt. Wilson (your other right)

 

 

Solar Slab

 

 

 

 

 

Last real pitch of Olive Oil (thanks Steve for beta on where to leave packs)

 

 

 

Man ponders his future

 

 

No chalk, no shoes, no rope

 

 

 

 

Yes, that is Elvis being arrested

 

[fgw]

that's a productive handful of days in rr - Nice! always amazed that that crimson thing goes at the grade it goes and not something much higher

[yasso1am]

Nice Ivan - good tour of some of the classics and shenanigans.

[ivan]

thanks for the advice and beta, cc.retard community

[matt_warfield]

Message from the one who has unleashed the hounds of the creativity of posters.

 

All kidding aside we all enjoy your posts and TRs and if any of us don't Keep it up.

[denalidave]

I'm hoping I can afford a trip in Oct or early Nov...

[ivan]

Yes, that is Elvis being arrested

 

still feel guilty we didn't get out and Dispense Some Justice on that poor old boy's behalf - but we had to catch a plane and the augors were poor for a showdown

[layton]

sorry i couldn't hang out and chat longer brah! Good seeing you

[ivan]

sorry i couldn't hang out and chat longer brah! Good seeing you

watchu end up doing on the cloud tower? so many meat popsicles over there and too teeny-tiny far to see which was wearing cowboy boots n' hip-hop sunglasses

[layton]

we did the cloud tower route. didn't like it as much the 2nd time up, probably b/c i climbed like shit. Either way, I'm going to stick to routes that make redrocks special - trad faceclimbing. I'd keep the splitter for the creek.

[OlegV]

Great job boys! I envy you.

[ivan]

Great job boys! I envy you.

come on now, boy-o, the world's yer oyster these days - you're free, free, free!!!

 

that said, red rawks ain't caustic enough to contain ye - a vinegary man of the steppes needs bleaker vistas