Paradox Valley Area CLIMBING

Category: ColoradoElev: ~5,500 ftRock Type: Wingate Sandstone, Dakota Sandstone, Navajo Sandstone
Dates: November 2021(x3 days), March 2022(x4 days)Partner: Nate Arganbright
Trip Report #s: 508, 527

List of Climbs I've Done & 2 Trip Reports

Photo Trip Reports for

November 2021
March 2022

The "Wild Wild West" of Paradox Valley is a remote area of western Colorado near the town of Naturita. With no nearby population centers, climbing in this area is wide open. Most of the rock is Wingate or Dakota sandstone, with everything from short crags to pinnacles to long sandstone cracks. By a stroke of fortune that keeps the crowds away, the guidebook for this area ("Wild Wild West" by Charlie Fowler and Damon Johnston) is out of print and nearly impossible to find, and even if one does happen upon it, one has to really dig in to realize the potential for spectacular climbing in the area.

The first time I climbed in the Paradox Valley area was over Thanksgiving Weekend 2021. Nate had been to Paradox Valley multiple times over the years, and it sounded like a great place to climb in the sun on great rock and avoid the Thanksgiving crowds elsewhere. Nate and I returned about 4 months later during Spring Break 2022 for another awesome trip.

On this page, I keep a list of the climbs I've done in the Paradox Valley area. Below the list, I've included trip reports for my two trips to the area.

Table of Contents for this page

List of Climbs I've done in the Paradox Valley Area

Naturita Area

2 trip reportS

Trip reports for 1st and 2nd visits to Paradox Valley.

Color coded by area:
Atomic Energy Crag       Carpenter Ridge     Psycho Tower      16 Z Crags

Trip Report #1 for Paradox Valley: 1st trip to Paradox Valley: Thanksgiving 2021

Dates: November 25-27, 2021 (Thu-Sat)    Partner: Nate Arganbright      Climbed at: Atomic Energy Crag, Carpenter Ridge, Psycho Tower

Intro

It was Thanksgiving weekend, and both Nate and I had 4.5 days off (mid-Wed through Sunday). Time for a climbing trip! We desired steep splitter sandstone cracks in the sun, but without crowds. Paradox Valley sounded like a great option. With the 7 hour drive, we would be able to do 3 full days of climbing (Thu-Fri-Sat).

We booked a room at the Rimrock Hotel in the small town of Naturita. This was well worth the $80 a night for a warm place to stay during the long, cold nights of November in the desert. In the evenings, we ate simple dinners in our room, watched Yellowstone, and read books. And of course I spent some time downloading, organizing, and posting the photos from the days adventures, entertaining my incessant need to document the world around me. We enjoyed leisurely mornings sleeping in, drinking a couple of coffees, and doing computer stuff before heading out for a day of desert climbing. While daytime temperatures were probably in the 40s, the air was calm and the sun was out, so it felt quite pleasant on the red sandstone.

The trip ended up being a nice tour of the climbing options in the Paradox Valley area. On Thursday, we completed our drive (we had gotten as far as Grand Junction on Wednesday night) and cragged at Atomic Energy Crag: 9 pitches of 5.7-5.11 climbing, both sport and trad. On Friday, we hauled 6 sets of cams up to Paradise Wall at Carpenter Ridge, and enjoyed a day cragging on a few of the wall's steep and difficult thin splitters. On Saturday, we we tagged the summit of the classic 4-pitch Psycho Tower via a rather wild and exposed 5.9 (with 5.11 bonus pitch) route on the south face. 

Below are some photos from our Thanksgiving 2021 climbing trip to Paradox Valley. Enjoy!

Climbs / Photos

Day 1: Cragging at Atomic Energy Crag (5.7-5.11, 9 pitches)


Date: November 25, 2021 (Thu)    Climbed at: Atomic Energy Crag     Rock Type: Dakota sandstone       Area: Paradox Valley

"perhaps the best crag along EE22", "over 35 routes and extensive bouldering"

1. Approaching Atomic Energy Crag.
2. Joy Stick (5.10, trad) climbs the obvious finger crack.
3. Nate leading Joy Stick (5.10, trad), our first route of the day.
4. Nate starting up an unknown bolted route, which felt about 5.10b. This route was recently bolted and not in the guidebook.
5. Nate leading Pocket Change (5.10, sport).
6. Looking up Silly Savages (5.7).
7. Looking up Dietary Supplement (5.10+).
8. Nate leading the exposed arete of On the Beach (5.11-, sport).
9. Nate leading the fun corner crack of Rancho Deluxe (5.10). 
10. Enjoying lunch in the sun at the base of Atomic Energy Crag.
11. Shadow fun.
12. Finger Fusion (5.10+), or last route of the day.
13. Mud cracks.
14. Camping in comfort in the Rim Rock Hotel in Naturita. Nights are long and temperatures get into the 20's by morning, so it is nice to have a warm place to stay.
15. Conglomerate. There is a band of this near the top of the wall.
16. My Thanksgiving dinner: shrimp salad in the salad bag. I also had some egg-based tortillas, and putting the salad inside them to make wraps was quite tasty.
17. Nate's Thanksgiving dinner: 2 hot pockets doused in Ranch dressing. (This was actually the dinner he had the following day, in a failed attempt to make up for the luke warm and chewy microwaved pad thai bowl he had on Thanksgiving.)
18. Nate resorting to chugging the Ranch dressing for sustenance.

Day 2: Cragging at Carpenter Ridge, Paradise Wall (5.10+-5.11, 4 routes)


Date: November 26, 2021 (Fri)    Climbed at: Carpenter Ridge     Rock Type: Wingate sandstone       Area: Paradox Valley

"350+ feet", "two long ropes and all your cams", "fantastic crack climbing"

19. This photo was taken when I was cataloguing all of my cams in preparation for the trip. We brought 6 sets of cams from #0.1 to #3, plus a couple of #4's, up to Paradise Wall, since we wanted to target a couple of thin splitter cracks. 
20. Cold mornings. But tshirts by mid-morning!
21. Taken at the start of the approach to Carpenter Ridge Paradise Wall. About 700 feet vertical elevation gain.
22. Steep Wingate sandstone of Carpenter Ridge.
23. Our actual rack for Paradise Wall: 6 sets of cams from #0.1 to #3, plus a couple of #4's.
24. Splitter corner of Barney Rubble (5.10+). Lots of #0.75 to #2 on this route.
25. Splitter corner of Barney Rubble (5.10+).
26. Splitter corner of Barney Rubble (5.10+).
27. Nate leading an unknown bolted route, which felt about 5.11. This route is not in the old guidebook.
28. Looking up the unknown 5.11 bolted route.
29. Splitter tips on another unknown route, just right of the bolted route. We toproped this after climbing the bolted route. This one felt about 5.11 as well.
30. Shadow fun.
31. Splitter thin hand crack of Cheeseburger in Paradox Pitch 1 (5.11). I love this kind of climbing. I got the rope up it and we toproped it a couple of times. I took all 6 of our #1's for this one, plus a few each of #0.75, #2, and #3.
32. Nate laybacking through the thin hands on Cheeseburger in Paradox Pitch 1 (5.11). I was able to get pretty decent hand jams in this section.
33. What a spectacular place to hang out!
34. Looking back at Paradise Wall glowing in the afternoon sun after an awesome day of cragging.

Day 3: Regular Route aka Psycho-Path (3p, 5.9) + Nameless Face start (1p, 5.11) on Psycho Tower 


Date: November 27, 2021 (Sat)    Climbed at: Psycho Tower     Rock Type: Wingate sandstone       Area: Big Gypsum Valley / Dolores River area

"a wild tower route with highly worthy variations", "200 feet", "on the cover to the Wild Wild West guidebook"

Route overlay for Psycho Tower (click to enlarge).
35. Another cold morning.
36. A distinctive boulder about 50 feet off the road at the start of the trail up to Psycho Tower.
37. Approach to Psycho Tower. About 30 minutes uphill on a trail from the car.
38. Zoomed in a bit.
39. Psycho Tower.
40. Looking up the Nameless Face (5.11) start, which adds a pitch and boosts the difficulty of the route. The standard start to the Regular Route is to hike further uphill to the notch. The Nameless Face pitch finishes at the anchor at the start of the Regular Route.
41. Stick-clipping the first bolt on the Nameless Face (5.11) start.
42. Fun bolted climbing on the Nameless Face (5.11) start.
43. Nate starting up Pitch 1.
44. Nate starting off Pitch 2.
45. Pitch 2. Wild exposure!
46. The exposed bolted face traversing above the roof at the end of Pitch 2.
47. Pitch 3. To the top! I need to replace my camera after this trip - it has too much dust inside the lens. Good thing I can normally get a replacement (Canon PowerShot Elph-160) on Ebay for about $50.
48. Summit register on summit.
49. Summit photo.
50. Rappel 1 of 2 down NW side of the tower.
51. Rappel 1 of 2 down NW side of the tower.
52. Rappel 2 of 2 down NW side of the tower.
53. Sardines and crackers for a snack/lunch.
54. Yucca.
55. Cool plants.
56. Petroglyphs on a boulder on the approach to Psycho Tower.
57. One of the all-time greatest music groups. Steal your face sticker on back of another climbers' car. We passed them headed up to climb Psycho Tower as we were coming down. 
58. Comfortable temperatures once the sun is out a few hours.
59. Nate outdiid himself for his final dinner of the trip: bright yellow TV dinner mac and cheese topped with what looked like catfood and doused in Ranch dressing. Yum?

Trip Report #2 for Paradox Valley: 2nd trip to Paradox Valley: Spring Break 2022

Dates: March 19-22, 2022 (Sat-Tue)    Partner: Nate Arganbright      Climbed at: 16 Z Crags, Carpenter Ridge

Intro

For Spring Break, Nate and I went on a 1-week climbing roadtrip. We started off the trip with four days in the Paradox Valley area, climbing sunny sandstone splitters. We spent three days at the 16-Z area, where we camped on the rim right above the cliffs and descended down to climb on the sunny Wingate and Navajo sandstone. We enjoyed having this unique area to ourselves. The fourth day we packed up camp and drove 1.5 hours and spent the day at Carpenter Ridge climbing some steep desert splitters.

After four days, we continued our climbing road trip by heading to Shelf Road, and then back to Estes Park area to climb locally.

Below are some photos from our Spring Break climbing trip to Paradox Valley. Enjoy!

Climbs / Photos

Days 1-3: 23 routes (5.9-5.12)


Date: March 19-21, 2022 (Sat-Mon)    Climbed at: 16 Z Crags

"40-80 feet", "remote", "Wingate and highly featured Navajo sandstone", "variety of crack and face routes"

1. Looking down into 16-Z crags. Looking eastward.
2. Looking down into 16-Z crags. Looking westward.
3. Poorer Than Dead (5.10 left, 5.9 right). Our first climb of the trip.
4. Tipsy Taxi (5.12). This one was hard.
5. The Splitter (5.10). Gotta climb this!
 6. Resurrection (5.11). We ended up climbing this route when Nate's helmet rolled over the edge and we had to rap down to the next tier to retrieve it, so we rapped over this route so we could toprope it.
7. Woman On The Verge of A New Hairdoo (5.10).
8. Use It Or Lose It (5.9).
9. I called these "rock pimples". I wonder how these formed?
10. Another rock pimple.
11. Some more rock pimples. 
12. Colorful rope.
13. Cracks in the mud.
14. Perhaps a fault?
15. Descending the fixed rope into the 16-Z area.
16. Descending the fixed rope into the 16-Z area.
17. Valley of Flowers area. This is where we climbed on Day 2.
18. This area was called "Four Classic Cracks". We climbed the three cracks pictured in the photo: Off the Hook (5.9), Them Changes (5.11+), and Techno Love Parade (5.10).
19. Off the Hook (5.9). Our warm-up.
20. Nate starting up Techno Love Parade (5.10). A fun route.
21. Nate at the changing corners crux of Them Changes (5.11+). A 3-star route.
22. Red Bull (5.11). A 3-star sport climb up a tower.
23. Nate startin up Red Bull (5.11).
24. Homeland Insecurity (5.9). We passed by this on our hike to another area and couldn't help but stop and climb it.
25. Pitch 1 of Max's Horse (2p, 5.9/5.10+).
26. Nate staring up Pitch 1 of Max's Horse (2p, 5.9/5.10+).
27. Nate starting up Pitch 2 of Max's Horse (2p, 5.9/5.10+).
28. Sleeping Beauty (5.9+/10). A 3-star crack climb.
29. Checking out some cool chasms.
30. Another cool chasm.
31. Hidden Valley area.
32. A cool corridor in the Hidden Valley area.
33. A cool corridor in the Hidden Valley area.
34. Neat rock features. My go-to geology consult Doug McKeever says these are tafoni. Furthermore, he notes: "They are formed by water. Note how they are in rows parallel to the stratification. In this case the water was probably slowly infiltrating internally in the porous sandstone and encountered strata of lower permeability, allowing the water to pause in its downward movement, which facilitated weathering of sand grains on the previously exposed rock face."
35. Yucca.
36. Hiking back to camp after another good day of climbing.
37. My office.
38. Nate's dinner: bison, egg, and cheese stack. I called it "The Protein Tower".
39. On the third day, we woke up to a dusting of snow.
40. Breadloaves with a dusting of snow.
41. We spent the morning in the tent drinking coffee, making breakfast, reading, and doing logic puzzles.
42. My breakfast. Egg and velveeta.
43. I worked on a nonogram.
44. And a slitherlink.
45. As we waited for the rock to fully dry and warm up, we explored some more cool chasms in the Hidden Valley area. Photo by Nate.
46. As we waited for the rock to fully dry and warm up, we explored some more cool chasms in the Hidden Valley area.
47. Yucca. Photo by Nate.
48. Cryptobiotic soil.
49. There must be a natural gas aquifer in this area.
50. In the afternoon, for a change of pace from the fixed rope descent, we rappelled into the 16-Z area. Photo by Nate.
51. Crags.
52. East End Politics (5.9). Our first route on Day 3. Hard to believe we had woken up to snow.
53. West End Politics (5.9). A fun offwidth.
54. Forever Youngstrom (5.11-).
55. Forever Youngstrom (5.11-).
56. Lunch break.
57. Lunch: chicken and more velveeta. Velveeta is allowed when you are climbing.
58. Erotic Poetry (5.10+). Tricky face climbing.
59. Steph climbing Mixed Media (5.11-). Photo by Nate. 
60. Steph at the powerful crux of Mixed Media (5.11-). Photo by Nate. This was one of my favorite routes we climbed at 16-Z—a little of everything: beautiful steep face, powerful bouldery move, delicate face, and sweeping layback crack in corner.
61. Sweeping corner of Mixed Media (5.11-).
62. To get back to the rim, we climbed this crack, called Tailpipe (5.10). This is more fun than hiking back up the fixed ropes.
63. Eight cheeses for my 8-cheese egg folds I decided to make for dinner.
64. Cooking my dinner (8-cheese egg folds) on the Little Buddy.
65. The Little Buddy cooks well!
66. Nate cooking his dinner on the Little Buddy.
67. Our camp above the 16-Z crags.
68. A canvas tent is a nice place to hang out in the cold and windy nights and mornings.
69. Solar panel setup.
70. Gas is expensive these days.
71. Gas is expensive these days.
72. Chairs I spotted in Naturita.

Day 4: 7 routes (5.10- to 5.11-)


Date: March 22, 2022 (Tue)    Climbed at: Carpenter Ridge: Mad Bull Area and Colt 45 Area

"350+ feet", "two long ropes and all your cams", "fantastic crack climbing"

73. Driving towards Carpenter Ridge.
74. Approach to Carpenter Ridge.
75. The steep sandstone walls of Carpenter Ridge.
76. Outlaws and Angels (5.10-).
77. Mad Bull (5.10). A 3-star hand-crack in the corner.
78. Colt 45 (5.11-). 
79. Tecate (5.10). 
80. Pacifico (5.10+).
81. Sandstone swirls. Amazing photo by Nate.
82. Nodule formations on the sandstone. My geology consult Doug McKeever says these are probably "Pisolites."
83. Interesting staining on the rock. Another artistic photo by Nate.
84. The La Sal Mountains to the west.
85. A view back at Carpenter Ridge.
86. Nate needed to get some work done and I was happy to work on my trip report, so we did a night at the Rim Rock Hotel in Naturita before continuing the Spring Break climbing adventures by driving to Shelf Road the next day.
87. Nate's dinner, bought at the restaurant at the Rim Rock Hotel. I made an 8-cheese-egg-stack in the microwave.

previous and next adventures

(November 2021 trip)
(March 2022 trip)