Starting in September 2014, Sam Bendroth and I began establishing and free climbing a route on the 1,300’ seaside cliff Blow Me Down. Our route is just right of Lucifer’s Lighthouse (AAJ 2007) and shares its initial 20’. On this initial trip, we f...
Dylan Johnson and I drove to Mt. Slesse on March 6, 2015, hoping to climb the oft-attempted but unclimbed Heart of Darkness on Slesse’s north side. The Heart of Darkness is a very obvious feature: a giant gash that goes straight up between the Nor...
In May, Toshiyuki Yamada and I climbed a new route on the northeast face of Storm Mountain (3,191m) after first repeating the Wild Thing on Mt. Chephren and Greenwood-Locke on Mt. Temple, earlier that month. Storm Mountain is located on the contin...
In mid-October, Toshiyuki Yamada and I climbed a new route on the northeast face of South Howser Tower. The best and worst things of attempting a new line are the unknowns. I constantly ask myself: Should we move on? Would I be able to find a spot...
Over the last decade or so, the 500m east face of Snowpatch Spire has been transformed into one of the finest alpine free climbing walls in North America. Formerly best known as an aid-climbing venue, it is now covered in free routes—mostly diffic...
In early May, Cheyne Lempe and I traveled to the Sam Ford Fjord of Baffin Island and established a new route on Great Cross Pillar: Deconstructing Jenga (900m, 5.9+ A3+).Three days of travel, one canceled flight, two tent bivies in town, plus a fi...
In February, Jim Taylor and I established a beautiful line he’d scoped out the year before, on a feature known as El Perfil in the Amphitheater. The route follows a crack system up to a short roof and then continues up a very prominent arête.Our i...
From March 20–22, Roberto Piriz and I climbed a new route on a rocky satellite peak of Cerro Tolosa (5,432m), known as Pico Los Zondinos (4,850m). [See AAJ 2014 for more info about Cerro Tolosa.] We started our journey from the town of Las Cuevas....
While free climbing El Capitan’s Golden Gate (VI 5.13b, Huber-Huber, AAJ 2001) in 2009, I spotted a system of beautiful cracks and corners leading out the left side of the massive, heart-shaped recess in the middle El Cap’s southwest face. The s...
On May 24, a climber in his early 20s was leading Rye Crisp (5.8) while his sister belayed him. According to his sister, he was an experienced climber who leads up to 5.11. Because the climb was relatively easy for him, he had not placed any prote...
On April 30 I was leading Diagonal (5.6) on the Small Cliff at Ragged Mountain. I fell from about halfway up, at a point where the diagonaling crack offsets to the right. I had put in a cam about 10 feet up and then a nut in a not-great placement....
I heard a scream and saw my rope falling below me. It was August 23, the day I almost died. After putting in six hours of rock climbing, we were ready to pack up and leave the Tan Corridor. I (Asha Nanda, 21) started up the climb called Reef On It...
On April 9, I had been clipping bolts at East Colfax with Mike Endicott, Leo Paik, Dave Rogers, and Doug Redosh. Mike and I decided to cross Clear Creek to climb at some other crags. The creek was too deep to wade, so an established double-rope Ty...
In the late afternoon on October 19, a party of four was climbing on the West Ridge in two parties of two. According to one of these climbers, Mark Hanna, a male climber, 42, and his partner were top-roping the first pitch of Iron Horse (5.11) as ...
Shortly after noon on Saturday, August 9, Wayne Crill (46 at the time) was attempting to lead a new route on the left side of Lower Peanuts Wall. He was belayed by Greg Miller. Crill and Miller had previously worked the route on top-rope, figuring...
I was injured in a rock climbing accident on December 13. We were climbing Friday's Folly (5.7) on the back of the Third Flatiron. I’ve climbed the Third Flatiron probably over 100 times, but almost always soloing the East Face and either reversin...
On October 11, at approximately 7:15 p.m., several 911 calls came in to the City of Boulder Communications Center, stating that someone was yelling for help in the area of the First Flatiron. Temperatures at that time were in the low 50s (F), with...
On a lovely spring day in April, I met several friends at the Oceanic Wall in Dream Canyon, a deep tributary of Boulder Canyon. After several warm-ups, I got on a 5.11d I had climbed several times in the past. The crux lies between the third and f...
Loch Vale is a popular north-facing ice climbing area at about 10,000 feet in elevation. At approximately 3 p.m. on December 21, two climbers began to free solo Mo' Flo' Than Go, a short WI2/3 route. They told a group of four climbers who were gat...
On February 23, John Scott, 66, died when he was struck in the head by a falling rock while belaying. Scott had just lowered his partner from a sport climb called Projectiles (5.7) at the Lost Wall when a large rock (described as two feet in diame...