Southwest Face

My wife Marketa and I climb sport exclusively in Austin, so when we decided to try some trad routes in Colorado, we were mighty modest about what grade we could chew. Our friends Gary and Eliza were doing the Direct East Face, which we originally intended to follow. However, after a bit of reflection we decided to do the easiest route in the book. At 5.0, we figured we couldn't lose. We were right, of course. The route we took started at the point where the East face of the First Flatiron juts above the ground near the summit. I got on the big ramp and found ridiculously easy climbing that went to a nice place for a belay. A handle of rock the size of a large squash invited a bomber thread. From there, I managed to find cracks above to add nuts and micro cams. This being my second trad anchor ever, I spent forever testing it and equalizing the thing.

The next belay was at the huge eye bolt in the place the Falcon guidebook calls "a small bowl." It's more like a huge ledge. In any case, fears that the wall to the left would block talking with my belayer were unfounded. From the eye bolt, you may consider climbing up directly in front of you. If you are a wuss and want to stick with the easy stuff, you'll back track slightly to the East face and get back on it. From there, it's barely a stone's throw to the twin eye bolts on the summit proper.

One cool note: it only requires a single 60 meter rope to rappel off the back side, contrary to what we had been led to believe. Next trip in a year, we plan to do the Direct East Face and a bunch of other stuff. This place kicks ass! It is beautiful. Oh well, back to the limestone.

Small cams, nuts, and slings.