Tom and I had spent the night at our usual location off Moenkopi Rd, between the Red Rock CG and SR159. This was the first of three full days I had to devote to the fine sandstone scrambling found in Red Rock NRA west of Las Vegas, and I hoped to make a dent on the remaining 8 of 59 summits in this area described in Courtney's Rambles & Scrambles. The morning's agenda included two relatively modest outings with a good amount of fun class 3 scrambling. The afternoon's outing was a mellower affair, mostly a hike from the backside of the range that takes advantage of a good trail found there. The four peaks kept us busy for the entire day - what more could we ask?
Burlap Buttress / East Monument
Leaving my van at the Late Night TH, we drove Tom's Jeep out to the
Black Velvet TH.
It is a popular climbers' TH, used for the ever-popular Epinephrine
and other routes on Black Velvet and Whiskey Peak. Burlap Buttress is sandwiched
between Black Velvet to the south and The Monument to the north, lower than
either of its close neighbors. We plied the well-used climbers' trail for
perhaps half a mile before 
forking off to cross the Black Velvet Wash
and make our way up to the base of Burlap Buttress's SE Ridge. Courtney's
description of the route up "Burlap's prominent east gully near the mouth of
Black Velvet Canyon" is more than a little misleading. The correct gully isn't
at all prominent from the TH, hidden from view by Burlap's SE Ridge. And it
isn't near the mouth of Black Velvet Canyon, at least the main South Fork that
is prominent from the start. We spent some time at the base of the SE
Ridge looking at various chutes and gullies that showed no sign of easy access
and no signs of regular traffic. Changing course, we contoured on a good use
trail to the north around the SE Ridge, eventually finding our way to the east
gully. An alternate description might be to head up the 
north fork
of Black
Velvet Canyon, heading northwest towards Veterans Peak and The Monument. At the
next fork, head left - this is the 
east gully Courtney describes and is
in fact, east of Burlap's summit (though it feels like you're more
northeast). There are several ducked use trails, one on either side of the
creek that converge at this second fork, one of these the trail we contoured
along. The right fork is a highly enjoyable (and ducked) route to Veterans/The
Monument that Tom and I had used a year earlier. The left fork heads to Burlap.
Once we'd figured this out, things went fairly smoothly. We followed ducks up
the gully until we literally ran out of them after several hundred
yards' effort. Spidey senses tingling, we went back down a short distance to
where the (now) obvious ducks took a sharp turn to the left (south) up a steep
side gully which would eventually lead to 
the SE Ridge, very much as
described in our guidebook. There were no more miscues after this and
we enjoyed the rest of the scrambling, airy at times, all the way the summit.
Even with the detours, it took us only about two and a quarter hours to reach
the highpoint. The wind was howling and terribly cold in the exposed ridges
and on the summit (and I somehow forget to take any pictures on the SE Ridge or
the summit), forcing us to take shelter on the leeward side of the summit rocks
for our short stay there. The wind would dog us constantly for the next three
days with little letup. Our consolation was that it was better than rain. While
Tom snacked, I wandered northwest towards the saddle with Hidden Peak, wondering
if we'd have been able to climb the east gully to its end at this saddle. The
summit ridge looked to roll off easily at first, but soon devolved into some
problematic steps that stopped me. Finding the wind too distracting to explore
the options more fully, I returned to the summit where Tom was finishing up.
We started down the SE Ridge the way we'd come, but 2/3 of the way to the exit
gully I was distracted by a set of ducks dropping more steeply off the northeast
side of the ridge. I followed these down increasingly difficult terrain for
a few hundred feet before it became more like class 4 and harder. Having
descended partway himself, Tom watched as I tried several lines before giving
up the effort. We've greatly enjoyed finding unexpected routes in the past in
Red Rock, but this one looked like either a work in progress or something
beyond our abilities. Tom went back up to the SE Ridge while I traversed across
the upper flanks of the ridge, eventually joining forces back in the exit gully.
From there we followed the ascent route down the exit gully to the east gully
with only one minor variation when I found 
a tunneling option low
in the 
east gully, somewhat brushy, that appears to have been the
usual route at one time until a bypass was established sometime later.
A few hundred feet below the second fork, we started to 
traverse east
out of the drainage and around the broad SE Ridge of The Monument, looking
for a shortcut to East Monument, our second summit for the morning. This bit
of trailless, unducked terrain worked out quite nicely in getting us to the
prominent chute on the south side described by Courtney and rising to the
saddle between Monument and East Monument. We found ducks and a trail almost
immediately upon 
gaining the chute and began following them up. Coming
rather soon to what seemed the impasse described in the guidebook, I noted ducks
below us to the east that climbed out of the chute. Tom didn't think these
were the correct one to follow as they didn't seem to match the description
we'd read earlier (but didn't have with us). Nevertheless, I got him to drop
back down and follow me and the ducks up and around the south side of East
Monument. It soon became clear that this was way off the route, but I
continued up, wondering if this was yet another undocumented way to the summit
that we'd stumbled upon. Unfortunately, the ducks and the route stopped rather
abruptly where we found ourselves staring at massive cliffs on the SE side that
offered no apparent way up. Perhaps another route in progress? Back we went to
the prominent gully.
What we had thought was an impasse turned out to be a simple class 3 scramble
with a second look, allowing us much progress 
up the gully. We could
see a very large chockstone near the head of the gully that would make for the
more obvious impasse. Tom spotted bypass ducks almost immediately on the right
and began to follow them. I wanted to explore the chockstone at the headwall
more closely and continued up through some mild brush and across a fallen log,
eventually finding what I think was the class 3-4 
exit ledge
that Courtney
described (Tom followed what appears to be an easier class 3 set of ledges below
the one I used). I explored the chockstone further a bit later on our descent
and discovered that there appears to be a long, but possibly workable tunnel
behind the chockstone that would make for an interesting exploration. It was
too wet from the recent rains to be comfortable when I looked into it, so I
left it as an exercise for future explorers.
Above the ledges we reconvened and followed more ducks over easier terrain the
remaining few hundred feet to the summit. It was not long after 12:30p when we
reached 
the top, finding one of the usual 
ammo boxes with far
too many entries
to bother recording. I cleaned out the business cards and other detritus in
the box while we took another short break here - the wind had not relented in
the least from its ferocity earlier on Burlap Buttress. It would take us another
hour and a quarter to retrace our steps back down the main gully on
the south side and then back across Black Velvet Wash. The ducked trail
ran out well before reaching the wash, resulting in some meandering to get
across with a minimum of brushiness, eventually finding the well-trodden
main trail on the south side that led back to 
the TH.
Hollow Rock Peak / South Peak
These are the southernmost sandstone summits in the Red Rock area. Given that it was almost 2p, we decided to tackle them via the easier approach from the west rather than another involved class 3-4 scramble from the east. It took us something over half an hour to cover the 7.5mi back out to SR160 and then west to Mountain Springs and the TH. With the Jeep we managed to drive the last third of a mile on a steep dirt road to the top of a small
telecom hill
described in the guidebook. From here, a very 
good trail
follows an undulating ridgeline to the crest of the range in 2/3mi. Turning
right, we then followed a lesser trail marked by regular ducks southeast
along the limestone crest to the backside of 
Hollow Rock
and South Peaks. There is some scrambling to be had once one crosses onto
the sandstone layers, ducks
amply providing direction in case one has any doubts on what we thought was a
fairly obvious route. We spent just over an hour to reach the impressive summit
block of 
Hollow Rock, with the only reasonable
scrambling route found on its
northwest side. The downside of this backside route, we came to find out, at
least for today, was again the wind that blew harder yet across the limestone
crest during the approach. Getting from Hollow Rock to South Peak is pretty
straightforward, even without a single duck to guide you. The strongest winds
we encountered all day were blowing through the saddle between the two summits
where I found I could lean at something like 10-15 degrees into the wind without
falling. 
South Peak was easily the least interesting of the four peaks
we visited, having taken but half an hour to get there from
Hollow Rock. It did sport some nice views of 
Potosi Mtn
to the south across SR160, however. The last hour would be spent retracing our
route back along the crest and down the ridgeline to 
the TH, finishing
up at 5p.
Continued...