Boulders That Touch (Updated again!)

Boulders That Touch

           An offwidth bouldering guide to Little Cottonwood Canyon

Secret Garden Offwidth

Description:

An 18 foot, less than vertical offwidth that starts flared and cuts to a right leaning grovel.

Location:

Park at the Little Cottonwood park and ride and start at the climbers trail in the north east corner of the parking lot (north of the bathrooms.) Follow the trail to the east, the boulder can easily be seen on the north side of the trail.

Details:

A number 6 cam will fit in the top if you would like to put up a top rope. It can be climbed right or left side in.

More:

After becoming comfortable on this boulder, it would be a good idea to try Firestarter 5.9+, Burner 5.10 and Certain Death 5.8+

'Round the Sun

Description:

A ten foot flared, leaning roof crack formed by a quarried boulder that fell onto another boulder.

Location:

Park on the south side of the road across from the LDS vault entrance (0.7 miles from the Wasatch Range sign.) Locate a trail just to the east of the vault road. Follow the trail north for 200ft. It is the first set of boulders you come to.

Details:

Start deep under the crack. You can choose to climb it vertically or inverted.

More:

This would be a great boulder to practice for inverts like, Trench Warfare, On the Waterfront, and it's variation Jaws of Flesh.

                    

 Big Mouth

Description:

Large split boulder starting at fists and widens into a squeeze chimney.

Location:

Park roughly a mile from the Wasatch Range sign, look for the green 5 mile sign. The boulder is on the north side of the canyon and can be seen from the road. If your familiar with LCC bouldering, this is the split boulder at .5 mile.

Details:

This boulder offers everything, knee locks, fist Stacks, chicken wings, and even that mysterious sidewinding technique, if you so dare.

More:

Enjoy the Chimney? Try squeezing through the roof on Cloister crack, or the chimney to the east of On the Waterfront.

 A Little Razz-Ma-Tazz and All That Jazz

Description:

A large boulder that starts out in a flared chimney with deep fists that cuts out a roof. Turn the lip and for 20ft of easy less than vertical climbing. FA: Merrill Bitter. Graded at 5.11d.

Location:

Approach as for Plumbline Gully, just prior to entering the gully follow a drainage south, down the canyon. This large boulder will be on the west side. The crack is on the south face.

Details:

This problem starts in an overhanging flare, and continues out a short four inch wide roof crack, after pulling the lip continue up the low angle easy climbing to the top. TR chains are available on this climb.

More:

This problem is great for working on big steep fists, and tricky lip encounters.

 Jonathans Crack (A.K.A Twister)

Description:

This problem is literally the space between two boulders that rest against each other.

Location:

J.C. Is located in the Hidden Forest bouldering area, Park at the green roofed hydroelectric plant, cross the river and locate the access trail on the south side of the canyon, continue east on the trail (crossing a small bridge), a large fallen tree has been cut to clear the trail, the problems are immediately south of the fallen tree.

Details:

Start this problem in the back, using a fist and a chickenwing, Invert and pivot your way around the flared lip.

More:

This problem has a very Vedauwoo like flare to it, it would be a great problem to practice prior to any inverted offwidths.

Cliff Soup

Description:

This is a slightly overhanging crack thats about nine feet tall.

Location:

This problem is up in the Allen's ridge area, just above Trench Warfare.

Latitude  40°34’4.44"N    Longitude 111°46’5.17"W

Details:

Cliff Soup can be climbed vertically or inverted, bring a pad, and be prepared to down climb the problem to get back down.

More:

This problem is great for practicing steep movement, hand/fist stacks, elbow locks and inverting.

We hope you enjoy this short guide, offwidth bouldering is often the best way to hone your wide skills prior to thrashing it out on the walls. 

I Chew Chew Chews You

Description:
This is a 5inch slightly overhung crack with a wicked bite to it.
Location:
Park at the gate parking and take the north east trail head from the parking area, locate the cluster of boulders known as the round room and head directly north. the problem is less than 30 meters from the boulders and should be easily visable.

Details: 
I Chew Chew Chews You is a great invert problem, it can be climbed both right and left foot leading, and offers a great practice grounds for "inverted walking" and pivots.
More:
A huge thanks to Ryan Thavaradhara for cleaning and preparing a great landing area on this.

Acracknaphobia

Description
This is why we named this short guide boulders that touch, this problem is a long flake that rests against a large boulder up near Snowbird resort. Acracknaphobia varies from tips crack to squeeze chimney.

Location 
I've heard this location called north white pine, the easiest way to explain how to get there is to simply drive up Little Cottonwood Canyon to Snowbird, turn around and head back down canyon for about a quarter mile or less. look for a boulder on the north side of the road with an access trail just east of it. Parking is nice on the south side of the road, just under the curved road sign.
Hike east up the access trail to a very large boulder, from there continue on the trail west, this should take you straight to Acracknaphobia. (3 min approach)

Details 
Several options are available for this problem, it can we climbed north to south or reverse south to north, feet are available near the ground if you are looking for an easier option (maybe V4?) or avoid the feet at climb the crack only (maybe V6?).

More
We spent many hours digging out this problem and moving large boulders, this problem and 'Round the sun go to show what potential may still lie just a few feet under the ground. ;)

Looking for more?

Joe’s Valley has a decent selection of offwidths, that aren’t too far away.

Needles District in Canyonlands has a handful of incredible roofs, mostly in the 5.12 range.

Vedauwoo has a ton of offwidth boulders, you can find anything from V0 to V9. 

Notes

This guide was put together by Daniel Parker and Ashley Cracoft.

If you have any information that you think we should add, or have any questions feel free to send us an email.

danielsharker@gmail.com

Century Crack

It's hard to set a goal and not meet it.
Six months ago my girlfriend Ashley and I made an audacious goal, to climb the worlds hardest offwidth, the Century Crack. We spent several days a week, training on our wooden version of the climb, making huge improvements over time and becoming almost machine like climbers, and yet when it came down to it, we didn't send.
I've been asking myself the same question for the last couple of days, simply, "why?"
In the final days of our training, we were both climbing the equivalent of back to back Century Cracks without a rest, our feet never got pumped out, our fist stacks were strong, and our sit ups came with ease, had we not set ourselves up perfectly?
The answer, no.
Several factors lead to our demise, we were both still very tired from a big climb we had done four days earlier, we were both still fighting off a nagging head cold, but the final conclusion I've come to, makes the most sense. Climbing an eight foot wooden crack, is not the same as real rock, real rock has character, it flares and constricts, offsets, and breaks apart, real rock will get in the way of your butt, cut your shins open, and rain sand into your eyes.
I had developed tunnel vision, I focused so much on how the brits (Tom Randall and Pete Whittaker) had trained prior their ascent of Century Crack, I had forgotten about the two months prior to their ascent they spent climbing a massive list of some of the hardest offwidths in the United States, not only were they in perfect conditioning to climb the Century Crack, but they were also ready for any unknown factors the route could've thrown at them.
But now we know what we're up against, and instead of a big failure, I'm seeing our Century attempt as more of a learning curve. We need to prepare ourselves to climb not just a five inch crack, inverted for one hundred feet, but everything in-between.
Maybe I'll set our wooden crack between four to seven inches, invite some friends over and have them kick me, and throw sand in my eyes, while I practice inverted shuffling, or maybe I'll get out and climb all of those other routes leading up to Century Crack, and learn how to handle every possible variable I may face whether it be on Century, or maybe even the next big line.

                  (Photo: Ashley Cracroft stares up at the monstrous end section of Century Crack)