ancient art - 5450' - Stolen chimney Class 5.8 A0
november 2014
The original plan for this day before Thanksgiving was for Jamie and I to climb Kingfisher, however since I have never aid climbed before, and we had some issues on the bolt ladder on the first pitch, we decided to bail and settle for Ancient Art since I had never been up it before. I met Jamie at the trailhead and we started hiking up the trail into the Fisher Towers. Turns out Jamie is a Green Bay fan, and since I am a Seahawks fan, we talked football the entire approach. Jamie, you know what to do when we climb Shiprock! Unfortunately, despite us being the first ones to hike up that day, when we got back down to the first pitch of Ancient Art there was a line of people! So we ended up waiting at least an hour and a half. Eventually we were able to go and Jamie led up the first pitch. The bolts however were apparently replaced and moved slightly, making one of them out of reach for Jamie compared to the last time he was here. After a nice dyno move he was able to clip the bolt and reach the ledge. I quickly followed and we waited around a half hour on the first belay ledge.
I led up the second pitch which was actually quite fun. A nice chimney that took gear fairly well, I just had to watch out for the sand and keep it out of my eyes. The final 25 feet of the chimney wasn't really protectable and was a tight squeeze for me but I managed to reach the ledge and to my dismay there was already 6 people standing around there! Jamie followed and we sat on this ledge for over an hour while we waited for everyone ahead of us to summit the tower one by one. Once it was clear, I led up the very short third pitch and reached the narrow sidewalk in the sky. Mantling onto the diving board was tricky but the hardest move I thought was actually the last little overhang to reach the very top. There was only one hold in the rock and no way to get my legs up easily. After thinking about it for 10 minutes I finally just put a sling in the bolt and made my own foothold since I was running out of time and it was getting dark.
I finally reached the top but I had to quickly get lowered, and there wasn't enough time for Jamie to finish. We rappelled down the route and reached the ground just as complete darkness came. I was actually on the summit just as the sun set and Jamie was able to get an amazing photo of me. We hiked back to the cars in the dark and proceeded to find a place to camp. This climb was memorable for me because I remember seeing the Capitol One commercials when I was younger and wondering about that tower! Finally, I got to climb it.
I led up the second pitch which was actually quite fun. A nice chimney that took gear fairly well, I just had to watch out for the sand and keep it out of my eyes. The final 25 feet of the chimney wasn't really protectable and was a tight squeeze for me but I managed to reach the ledge and to my dismay there was already 6 people standing around there! Jamie followed and we sat on this ledge for over an hour while we waited for everyone ahead of us to summit the tower one by one. Once it was clear, I led up the very short third pitch and reached the narrow sidewalk in the sky. Mantling onto the diving board was tricky but the hardest move I thought was actually the last little overhang to reach the very top. There was only one hold in the rock and no way to get my legs up easily. After thinking about it for 10 minutes I finally just put a sling in the bolt and made my own foothold since I was running out of time and it was getting dark.
I finally reached the top but I had to quickly get lowered, and there wasn't enough time for Jamie to finish. We rappelled down the route and reached the ground just as complete darkness came. I was actually on the summit just as the sun set and Jamie was able to get an amazing photo of me. We hiked back to the cars in the dark and proceeded to find a place to camp. This climb was memorable for me because I remember seeing the Capitol One commercials when I was younger and wondering about that tower! Finally, I got to climb it.
Hiking at the base of Kingfisher
Overview of the route. The chimney (Pitch 2) is visible
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Remnant snow on the Fishers from the trailhead
Looking up the chimney
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Echo and Cottontail towers from the ledge atop pitch 2
Me on the summit of Ancient Art
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