I've spent the last five days at Maple Canyon in central Utah. Maple is simply one of the most magical climbing areas in the United States.
The compact canyon, composed of three forks--Left, Middle, and Right, offers hundreds of routes of all grades from easy 5.4 to 5.14 on a strange conglomerate rock composed of unsorted cobbles and boulders of all sizes from finger-sized cobbles to ones the size of a small car. Imagine climbing a vertical stream bed filled with stones cemented together--that's the Maple Canyon experience.
Maple Canyon, hiding on the east side of the San Pitch Mountains above the Sanpete Valley and the small towns of Moroni and Fountain Green, is a popular climbing destination not only for Salt Lake City, Ogden, and Provo climbers but rock jocks from across the country. I talked to climbers there from Arkansas, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Oregon, California, and Colorado.
Everyone was excited to crank the juggy bolted sport climbs up both slabby and overhanging walls. I saw a Boy Scout troop from West Jordan, Utah, climbing and having fun...although their midnight yelling at the canyon campround was more than annoying!
Lots of pairs and groups of climbers moved from crag to crag following the shade. And my friends Eric and Lisa Hörst and their two boys, Cam and Jonathon, climbed at all the classic cliffs like Pipeline, Oxygen, Zen Garden, The Minimum, and the big cave at Pipe Dream. The boys, like miniature climbing machines, on-sighted a bunch of 5.12 routes and worked others. Ten-year-old Cam was able to climb the short bouldery Captain Bullet on his last morning to notch another 5.13 on his bunk bed post.
Photographs above: (Top) Box Canyon, a side canyon off Maple Canyon, is a scenic defile filled with sport climbs. (Bottom) Cam Hörst climbing Rucksack Wanderer at The Pipe Dream cave. Photographs © Stewart M. Green
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