Headdress Canyon and explorations in the Superstition Wilderness, AZ

[MrAdam]

Headdress Canyon is a short canyon in the Superstion Wilderness near Tortilla Flat. One of the guys I went with found this canyon and has been exploring and posting beta on the canyons in the Superstitions. It was a fun little canyon with 3 rappels, a couple downclimbs and a couple swims.
















After Headdress we decided to go explore another drainage in the area. The drainage turned out to only have one rappel and TONS of catclaw and other sharp vegetation which shredded my legs, thats what I get for wearing shorts! The rappel was 90' from a featureless lip with a pothole behind it. We found a 60lb boulder, wrapped it and dropped it in the pothole for our anchor. 3 of us rappelled down with a meat backup, but the last man decided to add his pack with some rocks in it, set up retrievable in line with the rappel strand, for some added backup. The anchor held, but when we pulled the pack retrieval line, it wouldnt budge. Two of the party used rope grabs to gain advantage while I was behind a boulder keeping the rappel line taught so the pack could zip down. Two guys using all thier weight and mechanical ascenders and the pull line finally started to move, but it was quite a bit of work. The pack finally came over the edge after a few more pulls with the ascenders....... and was follwed by some green webbing and..... ROCK!!!! The boulder that we used as an anchor fell 90' and exploded on impact. Luckily no one was hurt, although the rock landed on my brand new rope and severed it!

Afterwards we figured out that the tension being applied to the rappel strand was not allowing the biner attached to the pack to move and was keeping it pressed against the lip of the rappel. When they were pulling the rope, we assumed the friction from the lip and pack was causing the pull issue, but due to the biner being pinned down, they were actually pulling the boulder up and out of the pothole!

The evil, sharp vegetation


Some cool dissolotion holes


The anchor before being set in the pothole


The rappel


The aftermath of the boulder falling


My poor rope!

[ratagonia]

Hmmm. I think that qualifies for the "bad luck discount" on the rope... let me know if you'd like to replace it.

So, the question is, what would you do differently next time?

Tom

[MrAdam]

Hmmm. I think that qualifies for the "bad luck discount" on the rope... let me know if you'd like to replace it.

So, the question is, what would you do differently next time?

Tom

Thanks Tom! I definitley want to replace the rope, that is very generous!

If we were do do it over again, we would have shook out the rappel stand/guideline for the pack to relieve any surface friction created during the rappel and not applied tension to the guideline until after the pack was over the edge.

[ratagonia]

Thanks Tom! I definitley want to replace the rope, that is very generous!

If we were do do it over again, we would have shook out the rappel stand/guideline for the pack to relieve any surface friction created during the rappel and not applied tension to the guideline until after the pack was over the edge.

Obviously, when you guys tested it, it did not give the last guy the warm fuzzies, so it needed backing up. I think I might have tied off another rock (assuming there were more around) and added that into the anchor, rather than trying to retrieve a pack full of rocks (which sounds like it could have gone wrong even if it had gone right). But, good on ya for figuring something halfway reasonable out. I was not so smart, recently.

Tom

[Slot Machine]

MrAdam,

I've seen some bad ass retrievable anchors, but that one takes the cake!

Way to leave no trace!

Nice TR!

Bob

[accadacca]

Great write up and excellent photos. I give it a 10!

[Dan-wild]

That is awesome! Quite the dynamic adventure! I especially enjoyed the picture of the severed rope. I hate to laugh at your misfortune, but due to the lack of injuries:

[Don]

Wow, lucky there was enough room to pull the rope while not standing under it...

[deathtointernet]

Excellent adventure!