Honeymoon Chimney

If you are as fortunate as I was, this route begins at

Lumpy Ridge

near Estes Park, Colorado. Here, you can bury a nice granite sample in the rope at the bottom of your partner's pack, which can be hauled up to the base of

The Priest

the following weekend.

P1

: This is the most serious and rewarding pitch on the route. Squirm your way up the fatter-than-fat dihedral. The amount of squeezing you can do is inversely proportional to your size. The crux has a 1/4" bolt nearby, which in even Wingate sandstone, should inspire confidence—right?

Find your own way through the crux, after which you can get a rest on a small ledge and clip drilled angle that will be in the back of your mind for the next thirty or forty feet of 5.9. After this, you will occasionally get pro by slinging chock stones in the crack and/or placing stoppers between them.

As you near the end of this pitch, you will be able to chimney inside the crack. Belay just behind a large boulder wedged in the chimney. You can build an anchor by threading a large stopper in between the boulder and the chimney and sticking a #3 Camalot near your feet.

Don't belay at the rap anchors 20' behind you or you will have hell to pay for rope drag. After grunting up this pitch, I was rewarded with the following high-pitched whines from my second that made it all worthwhile: "I hate this! This sucks! I can't get in the crack! Take!!!" If I could have recorded all this... Maybe add a camcorder to the gear list. 5.9, really...

P2

: This is the most fun pitch on the route. You'll see. I think it went around 5.7.

You basically chimney the whole thing. There is a fixed pin on this pitch. Towards the top, you can get a couple of cams. It ends on a nice ledge with two of those nice and fat Metolius rap anchors.

P3

: This pitch is either about 5.7 A0 or 5.11-.

Head up and right from the belay. There are some fixed pro and cam placements as you do the first part of this pitch. You get a nice body stem to access the arete/face that takes you upward toward the summit.

The face/arete (11- or A0) is basically a bolt ladder where some bolts are relics and others are decent-looking. This accesses a ledge, which you traverse to the left before gaining the belay. You are totally uncool to your second if you don't put a #2 Camalot in the crack at the back of this ledge after doing the bolt ladder.

P4

: This is a relatively short dihedral crack system that goes at 5.8. This nice little pitch puts you on the summit.

Summit - while on the summit, read the summit register notebook COVER to COVER and be sure to view the creative artwork within its bindings. You will thank me.

To reach

Honeymoon Chimney

, take the approach to

Castleton Tower

and head left when you reach the short cliff band near its top. You will next head upwards toward

The Rectory

, and continue left slightly below its base, thereby traversing its length.

The Priest

is the lone tower, just at the north end of

The Rectory

.

Honeymoon Chimney is located on the west side of The Priest

on a sizable ledge. It starts in the fat crack that you can't help but admire.

Just as in my description of the

Kor-Ingalls Route

you can bring an arsenal of 2x4s and Big Bros, but why bother? This stuff will just get in your way, piss you off, and lower your adrenaline levels.

Bring a #5 Camalot/#6 Friend. Use this as the belay anchor for the first pitch as the climb starts on a large ledge, and leave it there.

All you really need is several long runners, cams from around a #2 TCU to a #3 Camalot, and some stoppers.