Basic Rock Climb - Kangaroo Temple/North Face

Trip Report

 

6:45am- Trail start

9:45am- Reached base of rock climb

10:15am- Started climbing

12:00- Everyone on summit

1:00pm- Started to rappel down

2:15pm- Back to packs

2:30pm- Started hiking down

5:15pm- Arrived back at cars

Approach:

We followed a distinct climbers trail up the valley from the hairpin turn parking area to Kangaroo Pass.  Got  a little turned around where the trail temporarily disappears at several boulder patches, but we discovered that it can be found on the other side of the boulder fields by projecting the trail grade on the same contour across to the other side.  From the pass we dropped about 20-30 feet below the pass and picked up a distinct trail along the toe of the slabs to a scrabbly gully full of loose rock, and up the gully to at the base of Kangaroo Temple.

 

Climb Summary:

We found the climb description on the Mountaineers site fairly accurate, but we ended up combining pitches so that we only had two pitches.  We all used a two bolt rap anchor at one full rope length as the first belay, and Justin and I  used a smallish tree described in the Mountaineers beta as the second belay.  With careful gear placement and long slings, the rope drag wasn’t too bad either. Mitch added a gear anchor at the official third belay station at the airy corner as his second belay station.

Mitch and I un-roped just below summit and scrambled to the top. Justin and Amy chose to add a bonus pitch up a 12 foot fist/hand crack to the top.

Decent: 

After an hour long banquet party at the top, we rapped down with three single rope raps to the base.  Having three ropes sped this process up considerably.

 

The hike out was fun and uneventful, and we celebrated in style at the Train Wreck.

Map