Though climbers think of the Calico area mainly for sport crags and bouldering, there's also lots of scrambling and hiking in dramatic situations and with interesting moves.

Indeed there's so much interesting scrambling in half-day range of some trailhead, lots of people head up and out with no specific objective or route description and just start exploring -- making up their own adventure.

. . (but keep in mind that the Calico terrain is complicated and serious, and sometimes it's much more difficult to get back down a steep section than it is to climb up it).

Visitors with limited time might appreciate some clues about which routes have interesting climbing of which kinds and what difficulty, and the descriptions linked from this page should be helpful for that. Anyway there's no danger of public descriptions "taming" the Calicos, since there are hundreds of possible 3rd and 4th and low-5th class scrambling variations.

info sources:

* book: Rambles & Scrambles, by Courtney Purcell (2nd edition 2015).

* book: Hiking Las Vegas, by Branch Whitney (Huntington Press, 2015).

* [[www.BirdAndHike.com]]http://www.birdandhike.com/Hike/Red_Rocks/_RR_Over/_RR_over.htm

* [[www.SummitPost.org]]http://www.summitpost.org/calico-hills/151464

note: Many loose rocks and weak breakable hand- and foot-holds on these routes - (even when they're plenty dry). Two major implications:

(a) Maintain extra energy and time and attention to keep testing lots of holds - (and keep the difficulty of the climbing sequences you attempt well within your capabilities so you can always have a hand you're not currently depending on available for testing);

(b) Parties with multiple persons need to either climb very close together so there's not much vertical distance for a loose or breaking rock to accelerate before hitting one of the following climbers (who presumably is wearing a helmet), or climb potential-loose-rock sequences one a time, with following members staying far off to the side (and sheltered) away from below the current climber -- because loose rocks often bounce in unexpected directions off sideways and far outward from where they start.

note: The warning about wet sandstone rock being fragile applies also to scrambling routes around here -- so scrambling on ridges and peaks in the Calico area is not a "safer alternative" to technical sport or trad rock climbing a day or two after substantial rain. Just because you're not on 5th class terrain doesn't mean you won't die or get seriously injured if a hold breaks.