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Day 2: Window Route on Echo Pinnacle

Shirley rapping off of Echo Pinnacle.

Want something that is not too long of an outing. Having seen a photo of a hippy van parked directly under the formation in the original Bjornstad guidebook, we figure that Echo Pinnacle is it. After a couple coffees in town, we make the short drive north on 191 and turn off onto some dirt roads. Couple miles in, we get our first glance of the tower from a few miles away…few but painful miles as it turns out. The recent flood of the century had turned the dirt roads into washes. The routine goes like this: I get out of the truck to scout out the next 100 feet, “Let’s give it a shot”, punch the car through bottoming out repeatedly and repeat. Finally, we find ourselves driving down a sandstone staircase with 18 inch steps into a deep wash. The opposite bank proves too steep for the Tundra as the engine revs but the car just stands still. Hiking time. An hour approach brings us to the twin formations of Echo Pinnacle and Aeolian Tower. “I can’t believe this is rated 5.8!!” we agree looking up at the Cutler sandstone foundation that makes up the lower 1/3rd of both towers. Indeed – we’re looking at the incorrect side of the tower!! I’m a tool. Opposite side has a more reasonable looking line. I start up the line and find myself sweating at the quality of the rock (I don’t know if technically this is Cutler but it’s like the stuff in the Fishers w/o a cleaning job) – if there’s an opportunity to place a piece, I place three! Upper 2 pitches are infinitely better. Pitch 2 starts up a short overhanging hand crack (blue Camalots – Shirley later swore on this section) that quickly turns into a vertical hand crack in dihedral (nice!) and then “deteriorates” into tight hands (red Camalot – Shirley’s choice section) on the upper third. Hanging here sees me through to the belay. Now comes the classic pitch of the route: a bolt ladder with missing pegs that follows a weird chimney formed by edges of two pinnacles (of the same tower) separated by inches. Some chimneying and some bolt ladder terrain (including lassoing an out of reach pin with an aider) put us on the spacious summit. Scramble to highest point, photos, kisses, a double 70 meter rap and soon enough we’re driving back via the washed out road this time with the added benefit of darkness. Next.

Photos

Aeolian Tower (left) and Echo Pinnacle (right; ~230 feet tall) as seen from the approach road (east faces visible). Can you see the window on Echo? Window Route climbs past this feature on the opposite face (Nov. 19, 2006).

Leading 5.8 mud on pitch 1 of Window Route on Echo Pinnacle (Nov. 19, 2006).

Leading pitch 1 of Window Route on Echo’s west face. Line continues up the obvious dihedral above (Nov. 19, 2006).

Namesake window on top of P1 of Window Route. FA party came up on the opposite (east) side of tower on P1 and hiked thru. this here window. See this here window from afar. (Nov. 19, 2006).

Leading P2 of Window Route – lower half of this dihedral though steep has good hands…..upper half sucks if you have big mitts (Nov. 19, 2006).

Leading pitch 2 belayed by Shirley (Nov. 2006).

Shirley nearing the top of P2 of Window Route (Nov. 19, 2006).

Funky chimney at the start of pitch 3 of Window Route (Nov. 19, 2006).

Looking back at Shirley from the lead of P3 (Nov. 19, 2006).

Leading P3 of Window Route – a bit of free to a bit of bolt ladder to a bit of free to …..FUN and unique pitch (Nov. 19, 2006).

Looking down from midway up P3 (Nov. 19, 2006).

Shirley topping out on Echo Pinnacle via Window Route. The sub-tower forming the memorable chimney of P3 is visible (Nov. 19, 2006).

Aeolian Tower (shorter but with much, MUCH harder summit line(s)) from the summit of Echo Pinnacle (Nov. 19, 2006).

Shirley on the summit terraces of Echo Pinnacle after our climb of Window Route (Nov. 19, 2006).

Shirley on the 65 meter rap off the summit of Echo Pinnacle (Nov. 19, 2006).

Wider angle view of Shirley rapping off of Echo with Aeolian Tower on the right…time for beer and Mex food (Nov. 2006).

Shirley and a hellish beast at the base of Echo Pinnacle after our climb of Window Route (Nov. 19, 2006).

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