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Classics Climbs
The best routes at the best crags. Don't cut your roadtrip short before bagging these.
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 Razor's Edge - Superstition Mountains, AZ
A dacite-core formation, the Hand was first climbed by desert and wall master Bill Forrest circa 1965, with Gary Garbert and Ky Punches. The men raced up the tower 45 minutes, using only hexagonal machine nuts for pro, via what’s now known as the Razor’s Edge.  The Nose (5.8), Looking Glass, NC
No need for haulbags, speed records, or poop tubes on this Nose. Looking Glass Rock's beloved romp is a rousing moderate on granite every bit as good as the Valley's . . . if one succumbs to far-reaching comparisons.  Sea of Holes (II 5.10- R)
It’s a bit hard to call an R-rated route “classic” — you don’t want people whipping off and breaking their legs and whatnot. But then again, most R-rated routes aren’t the Sea of Holes, the two-pitch jug ladder up an eye-pleasing convex buttress on the Front Side, at Hueco Tanks.  Comic Relief (III 5.10b)
In 1983, Ed Webster and Chester Dreiman, two peerless Black pioneers, ducked into morning shade in the SOB gully. Their goal? A clean, grey thousand-foot buttress walking the thin line between spectacular multi-pitch trad and begging for a tasty epic.  Dark Shadows - Red Rocks, Nevada
Hiking into the shady north fork of Pine Creek Canyon, to climber's right of the 1,000-foot, pyramid-shaped Mescalito formation, you'll enter a pristine wilderness that becomes darker and cooler with each step. One of Red Rock’s best climbs, combining fun face and steep cracks, Dark Shadows is in deep shade all day ...  Vertigo, Cannon Cliff, New Hampshire
For as long as it’s sat high above Franconia Notch, in New Hampshire’s White Mountains, Cannon Cliff has been slowly but surely losing its battle with gravity. If you have any doubts, just look at the giant talus slope running more than a half-mile along its base ...  Lotus Flower Tower (V 5.10)
Hardly anyone has actually freed the crux 16 th pitch (rated 5.10c, but more like stiff 5.11) of the LFT since Steve Levin, Mark Robinson, and Sandy Stewart made the FFA in 1977. It’s a dirty, wet roof. A perfect hand crack beckons to the left, however the topo calls this temptation A1 to 5.9 R. If your ethics allow it, just stay on route, pull on a piece and get it over with.  Zoo View - Moore's Wall, North Carolina
The 300-foot quartzite cliff band, situated within North Carolina's Hanging Rock State Park (a mere 30 miles from Winston-Salem), stands as one of the state's finest crags. The wall, first climbed in 1959, is known throughout the Southeast for its bold, traditional lines, put up in the old-school, ground-up style.  Yellow Spur, Eldorado Canyon
Either the Naked Edge is the 5.11 Yellow Spur, or the Yellow Spur is the 5.9 Naked Edge. Both are Layton Kor direttissimas — the Spur climbed in 1959, the Edge three years later — and both take Eldo’s most prominent arêtes, the Spur beelining up the vibrant-yellow pyramid of Redgarden Wall’s Tower One, the Edge towering 800 feet above the tumble of South Boulder Creek on Tower Two.  The Mace (III 5.9+), Cathedral Rock Group, Sedona, Arizona
Often called stout for the grade by desert neophytes, climbs cracks and chimneys on the flip side of the tower, before the infamous notch-spanning step-across directly above the rappelling climber.  All Mixed Up, Thatchtop Mountain, RMNP
There are few perfect introductions to thin alpine ice climbing. Most are too thin, too slabby, or too fat. All Mixed Up is one of the few. Situated high on the east face of Thatchtop in Colorado's Rocky Mountain National Park ...  Walk on the Wild Side, Joshua Tree
As one of the largest climbing areas in the world, with about 5,000 routes to choose from, Joshua Tree could keep you busy for a lifetime, though it hardly registers as a place to go for longer routes. One notable exception is Walk on the Wild Side, a 600-foot beeline up the right side of Saddle Rock, the largest stone in the Monument.  Conn Diagonal, Black Hills, South Dakota
This unforgettable 300-foot, three-pitch climb sits in the shade on Outer Outlet, one of many striking formations in Custer State Park, South Dakota. Although certainly not the hardest or scariest line in the area, the Conn Diagonal stands as a bastion of exposure above the Black Hills’ dark-green, Ponderosa canopy.  The Line, Lover's Leap, California
Aside from the first 15 feet of spicy face climbing (5.9), the route eats gear (up to 2.5 inches) for its entire three pitches, though these pitches are long and the rests are few. Stem, jam, and layback with an occasional dynamic move to jugs (protruding pizza-box sills) leading to the first belay stance.  Spooky (5.9) The Needles, California
The Needles of California dish out inspiration in spades. It’s a feeling that intensifies during the hour-long approach atop a remote, wooded ridge. The warm summer breeze quickly gives way to cold drafts that hint at deep canyons ahead, at a benevolent land changing into something darker, wilder. |
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