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| The Flying Buttress ascends the shadow and light line close to center |
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| Solo on the "third class" approach pitches |
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| Pitch two ascended the spire and traversed across the 5.9 face to belay at two 1/4 star drive museum piece bolts |
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| Emily Jean... |
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| Rob D'Anastasio sends a V9 second try |
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| Dariusz about to top out |
| Chasms and Cumulus (Missing ME) | ||||||||||||||
| words/images ©Bennett Barthelemy |
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| Summit portrait on Thatchtop 12,668, RMNP -Longs Peak rises behind my shoulders. |
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| Looking north, finding the pika's viewpoint- from the summit of Thatchtop. |
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| Hallet above... |
| Type: | Trad, Alpine, 8 pitches, 1000 feet, Grade III |
| Consensus: | 5.9 [details] |
| FA: | Dale Johnson, Dallas Jackson, 7/4-5/57 |
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| Hallet with a view of the route that leaves from the center snowfield and wanders up the face to summit. |
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| 2 hours approach makes this one of the easiest and likely most crowded faces in RMNP. |
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| Gaining ground with dual leads to maximize time efficiency in the weather fickle Rockies... |
| By Lordsokol From: Boulder, CO Jun 26, 2007 rating: 5.9+  | Climbed with Phil Wortmann this Saturday. We started on "in between" aka Right Dihedral. After three pitches, we decided to traverse right and finish on Jackson Johnson. We climbed the last 4 pitches of that route. The only things to say are; route finding is a bit more tricky than most big walls in the area, the top 5.9 move feels much harder after a long day of climbing (the bolt is way too old and spooky to trust but there's a nice place for a #1 cam several feet above it). Also, we did not really look at the descent beta as closely as we should have, and ended up dropping down into Chaos Canyon. Though this was a bit tiring on us, it wasn't the end of the world, and a little bit of perseverance got us out safely and back to the car well before dark. Finally, the route was completely dry this time of year, even with the heavy winter snowfall this year. After having done it now once, we will definitely have an easier time route finding next time out! |
| By Michael Amato Jul 9, 2007 | Re crux: not sure if I climbed this properly... I went up the left corner, well left of the rusted 1/4" bolt with the spinning "gunsight" hanger. All I can say is getting back out of that corner and above it was a hell of a lot harder than 5.9, that is, without "grab(ing) one piece of pro". I would also add: DON'T get stuck up in that corner. It was most unpleasant. |
| By Ivan Rezucha From: Boulder, CO Aug 3, 2008 rating: 5.8+ | I had a great time on this route and thought it was really good. The crux pitch is wild, but not that difficult, with good gear. Fun stemming looking down between your legs 800' to the ground. Route finding was easy with info from here and from the Gillett guide--keep angling right until you have to angle back left. One hint that was useful was the "step down" in the original post. At the point where you can make a short step down and keep moving left, there is a corner directly above. The step down hint convinced me to move left to the next corner which leads to the crux corner. |
| By tooTALLtim From: Boulder, CO Aug 21, 2009 | The last several pitches are amazing, among the best on Hallett, but the first pitches are just ok. It'd be great if the direct start was better. |
| By Roger Harris From: Boulder, CO Mar 14, 2012 | Sad to see that Dale has passed. Obit -(www.dailycamera.com/obits/ci_20164711/dale-lloyd-johnson) Best regards to his friends and family. |
| By Brad Johnson Mar 27, 2012 | Dallas Jackson and Dale Johnson made the first ascent of the 2nd buttress of Hallett Peak on July 4th and 5th, 1957. On the 4th they had hiked up to a vantage point across the valley from Hallett Peak to have a look at the face. After some study, they picked out a possible line and decided to hike over to the face and climb a few pitches to see what the climbing was like. They had only brought along a lunch and a canteen of water each as they had not planned on doing any serious climbing that day. The first few pitches were not difficult and they ascended rapidly up an inside corner of a feature they called the Yellow Buttress. They continued up crack and and small holds with good belay ledges at the end of each pitch. They were enjoying themselves and the lack of any real difficulties led them to climb beyond where they should have turned back. It then became evident to them that they should turn back if they were not to be caught by nightfall. They discussed the matter and realized they did not have enough pitons for all the necessary rappels and decided to push on in hopes of reaching the top before dark. A few more leads brought them to the most difficult section of the face and still a couple of pitches from the top. Dale climbed up a steeply sloping ledge only a few inches wide. He ran out about 80ft. of rope before realizing the ledge was leading nowhere. With no cracks or handholds to continue and with his only protection being two pitons he had placed back at the beginning of the pitch, he realized that he was not going to be able to downclimb without a possible long fall. Dale was able to take his pack off and dug out a bolt kit he had inside and put his pack back on. He spent the next half hour drilling a single hole in the granite and eventually manage to insert an expansion bolt and clipped into it for an anchor. Because it was beginning to get dark, Dale tied one end of the rope to the anchor and rappelled down to where Dallas was belaying and they spent the night sitting on a ledge, with no warm clothes and out of food and water. After a long night huddled together for warmth, they waited for the sun to arrive and warm them up a bit. Dallas ascended the fixed rope using prussiks to reach the bolt anchor. Dale followed in suit and they set up a belay. Dallas took over the leading and managed to climb a smooth slab to reach a huge, thin flake above. After a few more moves off the flake, the climbing eased and Dallas climbed the full 150 feet of rope to a good belay spot. Dale followed and led the final 50 foot pitch on easy rock to the top. This information was taken from Dale Johnson's book titled; Calculated Risks, an autobiography of his adventures. |
| By PatrickV From: Albuquerque, New Mexico Mar 28, 2012 | That's
an incredible story Brad, it's cool to know where the old bolt came
from on the crux dihedral. I couldn't imagine climbing the Jackson
Johnson with a hemp rope and mountaineering boots. -Patrick |
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| A Portrait of Hiro Watanabe |
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| A Portrait of Alexandra Kahn |
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| Hiro and Alex at Work... |
