Cosmic Wall

Date Signed: Oct 01, 2003 01:32 AM Beautiful day, perfect temp, clear sky and fun climb. Alan Kanaskie and I had a great time on the Ogre. No one else on the rock, some day hikers over near Castle Dome. We cruised down I-5 from Willamette Valley on Saturday afternoon. Got some good beta from an employee at Mckenzie Outfitters in Medford on apprach, the rappel. Slept by the car on national forest Land. Good sites ~3 miles down the road that goes by entrance of Castle Crags State park. Early start,hit the trail by 6:15am Sunday morning. Regarding the approach -To avoid the manzanita thrash make sure you go north to a saddle between Hubris and a small granite knob that is west of castle dome. A trail to it shows on the topozone map. When you are way up on the 'flats' near castle dome there will be a fork right to castle dome. Take left fork and keep heading uphill (north). The path that becomes an eroded "wash"' and leads towards that knob. (Its3-5 feet deep in places with big pine roots, you'll know it). Skirt that knob on its left and you are at the saddle. A trail leads west up to Hubris..The topozone map shows the saddle. We left our packs at the 20 inch Dead Pine tree. Hiked the last bit to the start of climb and used small pack for shoes, wind breakers and water. A couple hours to the Dead pine, after a snack putting on shoes, walking last bit to rock we were starting to climb at 9 am. Topped out at summit at 2 pm. Regardly rope length, we used a 55M rope. We broke pitch 1 into two sections (there's a ledge right above the tree that is visible from the ground ~100 feet up). The bolts at end of P3 are easy to miss. I was rigging a small a 'rock bridge' when I saw the bolts around a bulge to left. One of those bolts looks old amd manky, the rock bridge is a nice back-up to the bolts. For P5 belay at upper portion of the "spacious ledge" nearest to the actual start of P5. That should ensure a 55M will allow rope to reach the notch. For P6 we did the summit ridge. Nice. P6 is way longer than 70 feet, more like 120+ to the bolts at top. Our 55M rope was perfect for the rappels. With a 50M rope you would have to go off the end of your rope and scramble down a few feet. With pack at Dead Pine you can avoid back tracking to start of route. A couple pitches get run out, 30 feet or more, though on moderate ground. Brings plenty of runners for flakes, "rock bridges", horns. We used cams and stoppers to good effect. We stopped at Indian Springs on way down, great water source, cold h20! Back at car at 5:30pm. Lastly, I don't believe the elevation listed on this site is correct. That's significant as the peak with that elevation (as shown on the topozone map) is not Hubris. Looks to me like Hubris is 5400' and much closer on map to Castle Dome. Check out the link to the topozone map. Bob J, Eugene OR