UCC event- Towerland in Hanksville

I spent the weekend in Hanksville Utah. It is in central Utah by Goblin Valley. The area I was in is also called Towerland because there are sandstone towers everywhere.

Our goal, the Utah Climbing Club, was to learn to climb up to the top of these towers.

The trick with this kind of rock climbing is that sandstone crumbles. Quite often you put your fingers on a hold or your foot on a ledge but then ... it just crumbles away when you try to stand on it.

This is me on the "Dirty Devil" a 5.9 trade crack climb--- an 80 foot tower. It was amazing standing on top of it. I am about 1/3 of the way up the tower with a red shirt on.
We camped one night in the sandy desert. The sun was hot - thankfully only in the high 70's, low 80's. We had to haul our gear all over.
This is me on top of "The Castle" a 5.10 80 foot tower. I didn't lead any of these towers, meaning I didn't go up first. I am far from that good. But I did climb up nice and steady once the rope was secure on the top!
I got to climb to the top of three towers on Friday.

On Saturday Ang my friend showed up and she and I attempted and succeeded in climbing "The Strummer." We had a "coach" helping us learn what to do to climb this very tall tower. How tall it is, I don't know. But it is rated an A3. What that means is A0 means if the person climbing falls the belayer and the climber will be fine. A6 means if the climber falls the climber will probably be dead of very badly hurt. We climbed an A3. Right in the middle. Thankfully we didn't have to lead it, we just hung safely from a rope a GOOD climber had put up several days before.

Ang is on the big rock and I am sitting holding the rope by the smaller group of rocks.
Slightly out of order, but the desert was amazing at sunset.
You can see our coach teaching Ang how to place gear correctly so she wont fall. We were learning to place lots of interesting things into the rocks. Pitons (metal you hammer into the rock), cams (funning looking jaws that you squeeze together into the rock) and nuts (little small metals pieces to jam into the rock)

And all these things are supposed to hold you into the wall. But we were also learning about aid climbing. We didn't' actually "rock climbing" up this we "aided" up the wall. We used ladders and things called aiders to get up the rock. You can see a ladder Ang is standing in.

This is me with our coach. He was my guardian angel. He stayed with me for the full 3 hours I climbed. I was a bit ... chicken!
You can see some gear in the wall... so interesting to think a little tiny piece of gear can hold me! Well I hope they can, if I place them correctly!

We got off the wall after 6 hours of climbing. Headed into Blondies and inhaled a burger and a milk shake. Then settled in for a long drive home.

It was a great weekend. Definitely an adventure!