Walking in to Black Velvet Canyon, before hitching a ride.
Black Velvet Canyon. Frogland climbs Whiskey Peak, the first buttress in the foreground, and Epinephrine climbs the main face.
Stewart at the 3rd belay on Frogland.
Stewart finishing the arete on the 4th pitch.
Josh rope-soloing on the 4th pitch.
Stewart, Brendan, and Josh on the summit of Whiskey Peak.
The descent from Frogland (which also happens to be the last 1/3 of the descent from Ephinephrine).
Looking up at the first third (5 pitches) of Epinephrine. The notorious chimneys are behind the large buttress in the middle of the top of the picture.
Stewart racking up on the floor of Black Velvet Canyon. Stewart led pitches 1-5 (including all the hard chimney pitches), and Brendan led 6-10, and we mostly simul-climbed the last 5 easy pitches.
On the first pitch, enjoying the few minutes of light we had on the route.
Looking up the chimneys from the top of pitch 2. We let the this party pass us on the first pitch, but we ended up moving faster, and so they let us pass around pitch 7.
Looking down from the optional belay in the chimneys (between 3 and 4 on the supertopo). Stewart was having so much fun he cruised right by the normal belay, getting to this one just as we were running out of rope.
Brendan heads up the "Elephant's Trunk" on pitch 7.
Pitch 7: short but sweet.
Stewart approaching the belay at the top of pitch 7, one of the best face-climbing pitches on the route.
Nothing like pulling perfect sandstone edges with a heady dose of exposure.
Stewart on the longer-than-expected pitch 9 (probably more like 185 feet, versus 160 on the supertopo).
Brendan on the 3rd class ramp on pitch 15. The pine tree marking the end of the route is directly above.
Heading for the summit.
Brendan and Stewart on the summit.
Scoping the descent in the evening light.
Cairns lead the way.
Back near the bottom of the canyon, Stewart makes a new friend.
"Hello there."
Red Rocks from the loop road.
Watching sport climbers on Sunday. This might be the "black corridor" area --- check out the red rocks sport climbing topo from drtopo.com.
