|
| | | |
| |
| |
| | |
| Linked |
|
none
[ show ]
| no linked trail guides |
| Partners |
|
none
[ show ]
| no partners | | The Havens, near Inspiration Point along the upper Catalina Highway in the Santa Catalina Mountains, is a well known climbing area with lots of mid level routes. Park just south of the Catalina Hwy at MP 23 and hike for about 10 minutes for 1/4 mile down the drainage through the Sykes Knob Picnic Area. Look for the crags on your right. The power line runs right over the crag. I have to warn you, even though the climb out is only 250 feet, it's steep and hard at the end of a day of climbing.
Mountain Project lists The Havens as "Havens, The" among the Upper Highway crags, and is an excellent source of info. Also good (especially its topo and pics) is Squeezing the Lemmon III, which lists it as "Inspiration Point The Havens". The Havens is not affected by nesting closures that affect many other crags on the upper half of the mountain. It gets a lot of use on weekends but we usually have it to ourselves during the week (although we ran into a pretty well behaved Rocks and Ropes youth group yesterday. those kids are great climbers!).
The Havens elevation at over 7800 feet makes it a great cool option for summer climbing. The rock is very good and has three sections with 17 routes from 5.6 to 5.11. All are one pitch and seem (to me anyway) to be graded pretty accurately. You'll have afternoon sun, but the belayer positions are normally in the shade.
There are some good routes for the moderate leader; we all led the pretty easy Black Stain and Meagan's First FA, both 5.7s, then shifted the rope over to The Groveler 5.10, Roofer Madness 5.9-, and Summer Haven 5.10-. All of the routes are well bolted and have solid anchors. This is one of our favorite crags for summer climbing and it didn't disappoint yesterday. Great day our with my climbing buds Frank and Bob. |
| _____________________
| Check out my Instagram posts at "cartershift", and videos on my Rumble channel "rvcarter". |
| | |
|
|
|
Route Editor
Route Scout
