Eldorado nightmare (huge crowds today)

I thought I'd climb solo today in Eldo. What an idiotic idea.

Arrived at 11am and the park was full so everyone was getting turned back at the entrance station. Eldorado Springs was full of illegally parked cars and the tow trucks were reportedly en route. The ranger told me to park on the asphalt east of town, so I did and then did the 1/2 mile walk back to the entrance station. 9 mins...not too bad.

Most people were just giving up and going elsewhere. I had no idea, but it was GET IN FOR FREE day today, which was a big part of the problem.

Went to warm up on The Bomb. There was a top-rope on it and a family of 6 taking turns. So I figured I'd go do Wind Ridge, but a party of three was just starting and they said they'd be slow. So I figured I would just do Breezy.

But I'm working on a major lawsuit right now (I'm a professor at CU who works as an expert witness) and a lawyer called, "We need you to look at this document in the next 60 minutes!"

So I ran down the trail, out of the park and out to the car, then drove to Hwy 93 where cell reception was good enough that I could download 2 PDFs to read. Finished that, back to the parking place, hiked back to Eldo, back up to Wind Ridge and... the same party of three was barely off the ground. A party behind them had cut over to Breezy, so that was taken too. It was 3pm now and Wind Tower was going into the shade. The Bastille had been empty all day, but it's the routes there are too hard for me to solo. I hiked over to Whale's Tail to look at the two easy climbs there... both taken.

Reluctantly I just packed up and hiked out, getting absolutely zero climbing in for the day.

And the surprise was???

You are part the crowd that other people were complaining about as well.

Cool story bro.

Sounds awful. I recommend never ever going back.

jason.cre wrote:Sounds awful. I recommend never ever going back.

Lol, I love how people on the Internet think it's important to comment on something they think isn't worth commenting on.

God I love you people.

John RB wrote:Lol, I love how people on the Internet think it's important to comment on something they think isn't worth commenting on. God I love you people.

You're surprised by this?

The Denver area is an urban metropolis that just happens to have mountains in the background. Crowds are to be expected.

Reminds me of posts where people ask if Yosemite will be crowded on spring break. "Will it be hard to find a campsite?" Uh, yes.

Dear god I'm soo glad you weren't in the middle of a climb when the lawyer called! You would have had to activate the bat signal and Batman would have had to do the PDF review... That would have been something I cared to read about

Indeed, Andy - crushing major binary bits is the MP life blood. :-)

John, interesting...post. Sounds like we're in a similar demographic (longtime clomber, earlyish 50s, legal profession--at least at times for you), but not sure why that's relevant. Anyways, I had considered dragging the kids at to Josh this weekend since they're booked the next few weekends, but then I did the math: Josh, holiday weekend, etc., etc. It would have been parking and top rope hell. I know this without having to drive 2.5 hrs. to witness it for myself and getting all pissed about it. And you've been doing this long enough to know this too. So I'm doing myself and everyone else a favor and staying home. Trust us, we know your pain.

Pretty much the same story everywhere thats not too cold to climb, I'd wager. I took my chances and met some friends in Joshua Tree. Definitely crowded - more folks on the walls than I've ever seen in Indian Cove. We managed to find a less obscure crag that as much less busy all of a 10 minute scramble from the parking.

For our last route of the day, we wandered over to Short Wall, which was starting to free up as people wrapped up for the day. People were quite pleasant and friendly. Lots of folks from out of state, or who get out relatively infrequently (the trip being the one or two times a year they climb). Being away from the main park meant fewer non-climbing tourists

I could be stuck in mall parking lot traffic, or some big box checkout line with irritated fellow shoppers and frazzled store clerks. All in all, it was a spectacular day climbing fun routes with good friends. Wishing the original poster just as great a day sometime in the future.

The Dog House in Clear Creek was very civilized. I guess all the dogs went to eldo along with all the climbing snobs that don't like chipped/glue holds
youtube.com/watch?v=Qkuu0Lw…

Chad Miller wrote:You're surprised by this? The Denver area is an urban metropolis that just happens to have mountains in the background. Crowds are to be expected.

relatively few crowds on Redgarden for such a perfect day, but then again I am not a professor...super terrible OP

Like most places it seems like 90% of the people exclusively climb about 5% of the available routes. Eldo has many great routes in the 2 star range that are rarely travelled but well worth having a go at. Branch out, explore, have fun!

Eldo climbers are also spoiled. A 2 star route at Eldo would be 3-4 stars most other places.