Elephant Butte TR

[Iceaxe]

Sunday Rock Gremlin and I climbed Elephant Butte. It was perfect weather for the route with only a slight breeze and a high of about 50 degrees. We were the first names in the summit register for 2006...... Happy New Years!

This was my second time on the summit and Gremlins first. We signed below uutah.com regular Scott Patterson who had signed in on Christmas Day. Looking through the register there were a lot of names from uutah members. There are two registers on the summit, the first from 1978 to 2005. Its pretty fun to read through the names. Hank Moon and I were the last entries in the old register from when I had climb EB a year earlier.

Here is a route description for anyone wanting to do Elephant Butte
http://climb-utah.com/Moab/elephant.htm
Sometime in the next week I will update the route description to clarify a couple of confusing items.

Only thing I found strange was the the first rappel has grown into a very large bolt garden. What was three bolts with hangers nicely positioned to rappel the crack has grown into 6 bolts spread crazily across the top of the platform. The new bolts are really poor and the rope pull from the new bolts really scares the rock and is a crappy pull. I'm guessing they were a piss-poor attempt at eliminating the easy down climb at the bottom of the rappel. Anyhoo.... we cut all the webbing from the new bolts and rigged a nice anchor in the corner that provides a safe rappel and easy rope pull. It would be nice to see the trashy, rock scaring, extra bolts removed.

I didn't take many pictures on this relaxing climb. I had used up all my energy the day before playing with Fire. But a couple of pictures from the route are below. I did get a couple of cool silhouettes of Gremlin.

[Sombeech]

We signed below uutah.com regular Scott Patterson who had signed in on Christmas Day. Looking through the register there were a lot of names from uutah members.

That's pretty cool!

Just curious, did they put their full name, and then their uutah username? That would be cool also.

It would be a good place to do some promo work for uutah.com in those registers.

I say cool a lot, because I think it's cool.

[Iceaxe]

Thats pretty cool....

No one signed with their username. Everyone uses their real name in a summit register. But as you probably know, hang around here a while and pretty soon you can match the real names to the usernames.

cool

[Sombeech]

cool

cool

[Iceaxe]

For those still playing along at home the Elephant Butte route description has now been updated.

http://climb-utah.com/Moab/elephant.htm

Cool

[PaladinTodd]

How's Elephant Butte rank for a 6 & 7 year old? They thought Cameltoe was great. Have done plenty of rock-climbing. Harnesses and gear all set.

Really a 60' rappel? I have to lug the 60 meter climbing rope rather than the 30 meter static?

[Iceaxe]

If the kids did Cameltoe they can do Elephant Butte. A little more exposure on EB you have to be careful of with kids.

[PaladinTodd]

Wheee, that was an adventure. We made it. Kids of course had a blast, but if it had been me alone, we would have had to turn back, probably at Sandy Bowl. I'm a weak climber and there were a couple moves on this one I would not have attempted without the spotter. Fortunately had wifie along for this one. I'd call Elephant Butte several degrees more difficult than Cameltoe but certainly doable with hardy kids and a pair of adults.

[Iceaxe]

I'd call Elephant Butte several degrees more difficult than Cameltoe but certainly doable with hardy kids and a pair of adults.

You asked how the kids would do.... not how the old man would do.