Indian Creek

This is the most beautiful place on Earth.

There are many such places. Every man, every woman, carries in heart and mind the image of the ideal place, known or unknown, actual or visionary….There’s no limit to the human capacity for the homing sentiment . Theologians, sky pilots, astronauts have even felt the appeal of home calling to them from up above, in the cold black outback of interstellar space.

For myself I’ll take Moab, Utah. I don’t mean the town itself, of course, but the country which surrounds it—the canyonlands. The slickrock desert. The red dust and the burnt cliffs and the lonely sky—all that which lies beyond the end of the road.

—Edward Abbey, Dessert Solitude



What are you talking ants? I’ve been up
here so long the world has evolved into talking ants.

—Kenny Dunn
Talking to his belayer while climbing the Incredible Hand Crack.

The Bridger Jacks

Driving down Highway 211, in Southwestern Utah, my eyes search the endless bands of rock that line both sides of the road. I don't know exactly what I'm looking for, but what I see overwhelms me: cliffs speckled with shades of red, brown, and tan, in sharp contrast to the blue, cloudless skies above; enormous round buttresses, one after another, lined with long, straight cracks, stretching up toward the sun; and climbers scattered across these rock faces, resembling the bugs that decorate my windshield. This is what we have been searching for. This is Windgate sandstone. This is one of the most famous climbing areas in the world. This is the crack climbing mecca, with over a thousand routes on these long, splitter cracks and dihedrals. This is Indian Creek.















Day 1
We arrived in Indian Creek just a few hours before sunset, so we had to hurry to get in some climbing. None of us had ever been there before and it was kinda funny watching all of us wander around trying to figure out where we were and where we wanted to climb- everything looked the same. Eventually, we ended up on the Blue Gramma Cliff to climb a couple of routes before the sun went down. Ben led an unnamed route (5.9+)-hands to wide hands; Kenny “The Chainsaw” Coppage and I top-roped it. Matt made a valiant attempt on Dawn of an Age (5.10)-fists. Chris and Kenny “Patches” Dunn followed with no success-Indian Creek had a lot to teach us.

Matt on Dawn of an Age (5.10).

Day 2
Today we traveled to the Power Wall, which had a long approach. I was eager to climb today and jumped on the first route we came to, Batteries Not Included (5.9+)-splitter hands to big hands. This would have been my fourth time to lead trad. (The first was the Northwest Ridge (5.6) on the Thumb, my second was Crackula (5.8) on the Techweeny Buttress, and the third was Hummingbird (5.8) on the Point; all in the Sandia Mountains). I only made it up about 10 feet before I had to come down. It was with this retreat I earned the pink bandana; we became quite close during this trip, earning me the nickname “Pinky”. At the same time, Chris attempted an unnamed route (5.8)-twin cracks, mostly thin hands-just to my right; he led about half way of the route before coming down. Kenny “The Chainsaw” finished this route.

Then Ben attempted Batteries Not Included, and climbed until he noticed a cut in the rope, the cut went all the way through the shield and into the core; we don't know how it got there. Ben backed off the climb about 10 feet short of the top. Kenny “Patches” finally finished the route; Chainsaw and Matt top-roped it.

Ben on Batteries Not Included (5.9+) right before he had to retreat because of a deep cut in the rope.

Excuses for Failure… My Favorites
1) The crack is too big (or small).
2) My tape fell off. (It took a few attempts to learn how to make tape-gloves)
3) I don’t have enough cams—used a couple of times.
4) I suck at crack climbing—I used this excuse several times.
5) I’d rather smoke crack than climb it—Chris
6) What is this, a crack for ants? This crack has to be at least 3 times this size!—"Patches"
7) The rope’s cut.—Ben

Day 3
Kenny “Patches” made us wake-up with the sun on this morning to get an early start on the Supercrack Buttress-the most popular wall at Indian Creek. We arrived at the parking lot at 8 AM; we wouldn’t even see a car drive down the road for another three hours and only one other group would climb this wall on this day. Kenny “Patches” started out on the Incredible Hand Crack (5.10)-hands; the same size crack almost the whole route-probably the most climbed route at Indian Creek. There is a slight overhang that Kenny had trouble getting past, mentally not physically, but after almost an hour, Kenny—finally— finished the route. “Chainsaw” was the only other person to attempt this route; he top-roped it.

Kenny taking his sweet time on the crux of the Incredible Hand Crack (5.10); if you can't see him click on the picture to enlarge it.

Matt attempted 3 AM Crack (5.10)-hands to wide hands-and in the process took a fall. Then he attempted to aid his way up the route, but eventually had to retreat, having a lot of fun down climbing.

Chris leading Twin Crack (5.9)-his first trad lead ever.

We spent a lot of time on Twin Crack (5.9)-twin hand/finger cracks-today. First, Chris led this route, his first trad lead ever; then “Chainsaw”, “Patches”, and I followed, all leading (finally, leading my fourth route).

Finally, Kenny made his way to Supercrack (5.10)-wide-hands splitter, the route that started all of the hype at Indian Creek—one of the most famous routes in the world. Matt was the only person to successfully top-rope this route.

Kenny making his way up Supercrack (5.10).

Day 4
Originally, we had planned to climb a tower on our last day at Indian Creek, but we realized we had too big of a group to make this feasible. Instead we went to Potash Road, just on the other side of the Moab. I was excited to get away from crack climbing and eager to do a little sport climbing but I misunderstood the guide book and the first route I looked at was both trad and crack; I decided to do it anyway.

The route I had decided to climb goes from a slab to an overhang to another slab.The guidebook says that this route receives a lot of “flailing, cursing and complaints”. I put in my first cam at about 12 feet and another about ten feet above that, just before the overhang. As I was lowering on to the second cam, to rest before starting the overhang, I let go, falling about a foot to the first cam... I did not stop. The first cam had blew out (bad placement) and. I felt the rope tighten, briefly, a couple of feet above the ground. Then I continued falling and hit. My first piece had also blown out. Seeing blood on my shirt, Kenny made me take it off, suspecting that I had cut up my chest somehow; it was blood from the cuts on my hand. I managed to escape the fall with only a few scrapes and bruises on my hands, knees, and ass; I also had two long, parallel scrapes down the back of my leg, where I rode down on a cam. I went on to a different, sport route after my fall. (I don’t have any information on any of the climbs we did at Potash Road).

Me leading an unknown route just a few minutes before my fall.

Later, we went into Moab for a great dinner; thanks Ben. Weather had been great all week, but after dinner ,when we arrived back at Indian Creek, a cold front had come it; we were glad it was our last night.

I definitely climbed really bad this week but had a lot of fun. Because I did not climb that well, I also did not get a lot of the pics that I wanted —pics looking down, not looking up. Besides gear, everyone only had to pay $25, which was for food; not bad for a week of climbing.

Newspaper Rock.