MOAB!
- emilyyork13
- Jun 4, 2023
- 10 min read
Emily (scroll down for Dan's perspective)
Wow - reflecting on our time in the Moab area, we did a LOT, and a lot of the trip’s highlights thus far happened here!
After leaving the Grand Canyon, we headed to Moab, Utah. On the way there, we made a quick stop at the Navajo Nation’s Monument Valley and got a chance to see the iconic Mitten Buttes.

I had assumed Moab would be a climbing and hiking town given it’s proximity to several national and state parks, but there’s also a massive off-roading scene where people rip up and around rock formations and bumpy roads in fancy dune buggies. While Dan and I would creep down Moab’s treacherous roads at a snail’s pace in the van, dune buggies and jeeps would fly past us with loud music blaring and bright light-up antennae whipping in the wind.
The majority of our time here we spent in the Creek, which is considered by many to be the home of the best crack climbing in the country. I was excited, but also a little nervous coming here. The climbing style was a bit different, and the grades (assigned level of difficulty of a given climbing route) were even more subjective than in other climbing areas. I have hands and fingers that are much smaller than average, which can make some routes way harder or easier than the assigned grade.

Despite this, I very quickly fell in love with the style and did my hardest trad leads to date! I think this, in part, might have been inspired by the community at the Creek.
While there are lots of women climbers, we are still pretty outnumbered by men, especially when it comes to trad climbing. I’d say there’s also still a prevailing assumption that your typical climber/ outdoor adventurer is a man. We have seen evidence of this firsthand throughout the trip observing many tourists ogling at the ant-sized climbers on the wall shouting things like “look at him go!” , “he’s moving!”…always assuming they’re looking up at a “he”.
On our very first day at the Creek, I was so excited to see that the majority of the climbers we encountered were women…women leading, women taking falls, women trying hard, and women having fun! It seems obvious that seeing other women do cool things would be inspiring, but I was still surprised at just how much it made me stoked to climb, try hard, and enjoy the process!

Another cool thing about the Creek is it’s one large paved parking lot that is pretty central to all of the climbing that seems to serve as a place to hangout, find climbing partners, or just to chat with people and make friends. There was a community feel here that was pretty unlike any other place I have climbed that made the Creek feel really special.
We also found an EPIC camping spot (probably my favourite wild camping spot so far). There were barely any other people around so it just felt very still and peaceful.

After a few days of climbing we were absolutely exhausted. We took a day off climbing and did a little hike in Canyonlands National Park. I saw some cool desert plants!


We also got our first real look at mature cryptobiotic crust, which is basically living soil that holds the entire desert landscape together. The crust holds water and nutrients for the plants that live there. Without it, nothing would grow, and you’d just find plain sand. While you hear about the importance of staying on trail in most places, they’re super serious about it here. If you step on crypto, it can take many years to regrow (up to 250 years!!!).

Next, we met up with Amy and Bill again!!! We spent the next few days exploring different climbing areas in the Creek together.

Then we headed back into Canyonlands to do a day hike to see this massive arch! The hike involved some fun scrambling and had super cool views the whole way.


We were pretty pooped by the end of the day, but rallied for a campfire where we tested out dan’s new s’more idea - two pieces of a Pop Tart with a strawberry flavoured marshmallow in the middle. Would not recommend (sorry Dan 😂).
Next stop - Arches National Park.
We planned to do a canyoneering route that would get us to the top of “Elephant Butte”and would provide the best views of the park. We would later learn that butte is not pronounced “butt” but “byoot”.

This route was super fun and adventurous! It was a bunch of scrambling, and a touch of climbing and rappelling to give us a sweet panoramic view of the park.

Afterwards, we did a short hike that brought us to the famous “Delicate Arch”, which was well-worth enduring the crowds to see !

The next day, Dan and Bill set out to climb a tower at Fisher Towers while Amy and I did a short hike.

We got back just in time to watch them top out, which was pretty entertaining from the ground.
We parted ways with Amy and Bill finished off our time in Moab with a few more days of climbing in the Creek. I led my hardest trad route thus far. It was called “Lightning Bolt Crack” - the top of the crack looks like a lightning bolt! It was a bit wide for my hand size so it was a little out of my comfort zone and a great challenge! I was pretty proud of myself for this one.
Next stop - Bishop, California!
Dan
Leaving the Grand Canyon our next stop was Moab, Utah to check out the climbing around Indian Creek. Utah is really a beautiful place with many national parks and national monuments to see, that we probably didn’t do it justice by whizzing past everything. But to get the most out of the climbing, we had to head straight to our destination.
Fortunately the drive to Moab was still quite pretty in and of itself and we managed to sneak in a quick visit to Monument Valley and the road from Forrest Gump where he’s running across America.

Indian Creek is probably the climbing destination Em and I have been most looking forward to checking out on this trip. Normally when I’m able to take time off during March break it’s still cold and snowy there so we really wanted to take advantage and enjoy it. The Creek is a world famous climbing destination that’s known for these incredible parallel and vertical cracks running through beautiful sandstone cliffs that are just begging to be climbed. At other crack/trad climbing destinations if there is a crack that resembles what the Creek offers it is an instant super classic and will always be one of the most popular climbs in the area. At the Creek there is what feels like an infinite number of these cracks.

Now if you don’t want to read more about cracks you should probably stop now because im going to mention them probably a couple dozen more times.
When we first drove in we were both surprised by how green the Creek actually is. In all the climbing videos we’ve seen from the area the only image you really get are of these big beautiful red cliffs that look like they’re from Mars. But below the cliffs there is actually quite a bit of greenery and purple flowers growing everywhere that make you feel you’re not completely in the desert.

Now for the climbing itself, the Creek has a bit of a reputation of whooping peoples butts on their first visit here. People think they know how to crack climb and then they get here and realize they have a lot to learn. The cracks here are different than in other places because they are almost all vertical or overhanging instead of low angle and there are virtually no holds outside the cracks that you can use to help you get up. This makes it that the climbing is pretty much always strenuous and usually a little painful because you have to rely solely on jamming your hands and feet into the cracks. I was coming in somewhat confident and it wasn’t long before I realized how burly it can be here. Most places have climbs in a wide variety of difficulties and when you’re there for the first time you can get used to the rock and climbing styles of the area by climbing nice moderate difficulties before you try harder stuff. At the Creek I think there’s basically four 5.8s a few more 5.9s and then a boat load of 5.10s and 5.11s. When it comes to trad climbing I’ve done several 5.10s up to this point but it definitely isn’t an easy grade for me. Adding to that because the cracks in the Creek are so perfect they stay the same width throughout long stretches of the climb. It’s really cool climbing wise but protection wise it means you need lots and lots of cams of the same size (sometimes you up to 7!!!). We only own a double set of cams which usually is plenty good, but I quickly learned that in the Creek we’re going to need to make some friends.
The first 5.10 we got on on our first day crushed me. I did not have enough gear to protect the climb well without bumping the protection up as I climbed which is super tiring and kinda freaky. Our next day wasn’t much different with me just looking up at a bunch of climbs we wanted to do and just saying ‘nope!’ because we didn’t have enough gear. Eventually we were able to find some climbs that varied a bit and would protect okay but it was definitely putting a bit of a bummer on our time climbing there. Luckily the Creek has a good culture of people sharing gear and setting up top ropes for each other. In the parking lot there always seems to be a few people looking for partners everyday and we were starting to meet some people we might climb with. Even better than that though we got a message after a few days there that Amy and Bill we’re on their way along with their gear!!! Ahhh it was definitely great to have some good friends join us and know I might actually be able to get on climbs with a bit more confidence that I can protect them well.


With a quadruple rack now I was feeling really stoked. We went to an area called Supercrack Buttress that hosts a number of really classic climbs including the super duper classic ‘Supercrack’! Normally there’s a big line of people waiting to do it but we got lucky and we’re able to just hop on it. I didn’t manage to get the send…even with a quadruple rack I had to pull some shenanigans that got me tired…but the climb really was dare I say super! After that we spent the next day or two climbing a bunch with Amy and Bill. It was really cool seeing them try out climbing here. They are still a bit newer to crack climbing technique and it was really impressive how much better they were getting after only a couple of days.
With our hands and feet in pain we decided it would be a good idea to take some rest days. We managed to get some campsite and Canyonlands National Park with Amy and Bill. It was really pretty there like all of Utah really. After our first night there we got up and did 26km hike to the ‘Druid Arch’. I usually don’t love hiking I’d often rather be climbing but this hike was really fun! The hike involved some scrambling, there were amazing views the whole time, and there wasn’t a lot of elevation gain which made it quite pleasant.


Now if a 26km hike doesn’t sound like a ‘rest day’ activity to you, you’re right. We were even more pooped after that hike so we definitely needed some proper chill activities.
We went into town the next day and played some disc golf and got pizza. Rest complete! The next day we drove into Arches National Park and did a fun little scramble/hike that involves a few rappels to get up to the Elephants Butte! It only took us a couple of hours so it was also a good less strenuous day.

Now in the Moab area in terms of climbing besides the cracks I’ve mentioned so many times before there’s actually other famous climbing you can do there. The area is also known for having lots of desert towers which often requires a broader skill set of climbing. A lot of them are either quite hard or require some aid climbing but Bill had his eye on this climb called the Stolen Chimney which seemed really doable but he was a little unsure. The climb takes you up a dried mud covered sandstone cliff that looks like its from Lord of the Rings and tops it off with a very precariously looking sandstone tower that looks like it could topple over any day now.

With a moderate grade of 5.8 though I was all in to get my first desert tower ascent and I managed to convince Bill to come too! The climbing itself was overall pretty mediocre but the picture we ended up getting was pretty great. Worth it for the gram!



After exploring Moab a bit more Em and I were ready to head back to the Creek to climb some more. Bill was super generous and lent me his trad rack since they wouldn’t be using the gear until we met up again in Yosemite. Having that extra gear made the climbing so much better over the next few days. We managed to get on some more classic climbs like ‘3 am crack’ and ‘the incredible hand crack’ and we both could feel ourselves getting more comfortable with the terrain. Emily pushed herself and managed to send some nice climbs on trad lead. I think the highlight was went she sent ‘Twin cracks’ in great style not getting stressed and climbing well.

I was super proud and happy for her. I was really impressed also when she got on lightning bolt crack on lead. It was rated a stiff 5.9 and even though she didn’t get the send she got up it and had to do some hard moves that were probably much harder for her because of her smaller hands.
With a few more days of climbing in the Creek our hand and feet inevitable got sore again. We toyed with idea of staying a bit longer but being in the desert for the past month was kind of getting to us I think and the allure of bolt protected climbing routes send us on our way out and towards Bishop, California.
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