Jeff Climbs Ancient Art

Last week my friend Jeff was climbing the Fisher Towers near Moab. The highlight was summiting Ancient Art, a distorted corkscrew pinnacle that hardly looks real. He said it was a "life changing experience". I liked the photos so much I thought I'd share them. Next year I'm going to climb it.

Climbing the Stolen Chimney approach route.


Jeff makes his way out the catwalk and is about to beach-whale himself onto the diving board.


Crawling along the diving board.


Climbing the face.


Moving around to the other face to continue up.


Pulling over a bulge.


Almost to the top.


Success! The summit cap is about the size of a large pizza and it wiggles.


A wider shot of the summit.


You may wonder why Jeff seemed so cautious (crawling in places he could have walked). It's because as you go out the catwalk you have a 500 foot shear drop to your left (see photo below - that white dot atop the pinnacle is a climber) and a merely 300 foot drop to your right. That's vertigo inducing exposure!


Here's the "Karate Kid" on another tower. Before he left I told him to do that pose on Ancient Art, but with the big exposure and tiny, loose summit he couldn't make his body do it. After seeing the photos, I can understand.


I've been working on another post about a climb I did in 2004 (with Jeff), but it's taken longer than I expected. I should have it up next week.

P.S. In biking news, I got out for a night ride up in the Orem foothills tonight. I continued to explore the new trail I rode last week (Blackbird, I believe). I also went for a road ride Wednesday at lunch. It's been nice to ride, thanks to this mild November weather.

Tomorrow Jolene and I are leaving early in the morning and driving to Moab for a quick ride on Slickrock and Sovereign. We just couldn't resist any longer.