Rifle



Rifle Trip Info
Food: Anything from the Vitamin Cottage
Drink: Sleepytime tea, sometimes wit a splash of some good 'ole bourbon
Hobby: Swimmin in creek, hot poolin, learnin moon phases

Rifle. The start of my road trip. Land of kneebars, power, sidepulls and balance. Nothing could get you in shape for this style of climbing besides actually being here and learning for yourself. And I learned, oh boy did I learn!

Contemplating how to tackle the sea of sidepulls on Feline
This was my first time on limestone, first time sport climbing out West, and first real road trip. Needless to say,  I got my ass kicked for the first 2 weeks! Coming from the steep, southeast sandstone, I was not prepared to have to move my feet 3 times for each single hand movement. I also was not prepared to have to warm up on something that was pumpier than any route I'd ever climbed! 

Sean onsighting Ricochet, a battle for sure!
Rifle is unique in the summer. Typically, you wake up around 0900, eat breakfast, and go down canyon approx. 5 mins to warm up. You can chase the shade and climb on one side of the canyon in the morning and the other side in the afternoon. Usually, you'd warm up and put a burn on your morning project and hopefully get a morning tick. Then, you could head back to camp to make lunch, sit in the creek (which we did almost daily), have a beer or a nap, then head back out around 1400 to warm up again and put a burn on the afternoon project. You bring your lawn chair to the crag and you keep your harness on pretty much the entire day. You can drive to each persons personal project because everything is only 10 mins from each other! It's a pretty awesome deal!

Sean having afternoon lunch with his harness... and his Gri-Gri
I spent 5 weeks in Rifle. Slowly but surely I learned the style, awkwardness, how to knee bar and how to manage the pump. I ended up falling in love with the place. There is something special about that canyon. The routes feel impossible to onsite or even redpoint for that matter the first time you approach them. Somedays, you're just psyched you sent the warm up! The crux's are super beta intensive and technical but powerful at the same time. When you redpoint a route there and clip the anchors, it's almost a "thank god" moment. It's like all the puzzle pieces finally came together. And because everything feels so hard at first, it feels REALLY rewarding to redpoint! 

Pretty Hate Machine, pump fest!
All the locals are willing to help with beta and are super friendly. There is no service in the canyon so you are forced to leave "real life" behind and just focus on climbing. I had a sweet camping spot that I kept the entire time I was there, and it really did feel like home! I had a nice creek right next to where I slept which was super calming. I also had a sweet tarp set up in case it rained (which it rarely did). 

Home Sweet Home

I'm already getting psyched about another summer in this beautiful canyon with the best friends and climbing partners I could ask for. See ya next summer Rifle!

Forrest and Mou Mou



Location: Rifle, CO, USA

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