This obscure route is sort of like one of those choose your own adventure books that came out in the eighties.  Only instead of different endings, all choices in this novel lead to the heinous roof at the summit cap rock.  We both found the experience we had, to marginal at best and probably suited only for those true desert rats that chase down old Kor and Carter routes.

Although; future parties might have an altogether completely different experience due to our efforts.  We both felt this route should be called the Constant Gardener for the excessive amount of exfoliated crap we trundled off of it.  No one had been there in years.

There is no information for this route in any of Bjornstad books, but it has all the feel of an old Carter with its well-driven Star-drives and homemade hangars.  Someone has been up there in the last ten years or so and given new life to the anchors.  The important ones all sport at least one 1/2" bolt.

It should be noted that this climb sits in the perfect spot for summer ascents if you are quick you will be in the shade all day.

P1:

Choose your adventure, right or left side.  Looking up; your two choices are an ugly looking chimney or an intriguing looking hand crack that roofs out.  We choose WRONG and ended up battling the choss monsters.  Its probably only 5.10 or so but given the ++ for a severe garbage factor.  The right side is much cleaner now; although still ugly.  When we rapped down the left side, we found the chimney to look much better up close. It worms its way up moderately good stone and looks to be about 5.9.

P2:

Another choice, your two options here are to high step the belay and run up a string of bat hooks in marginal stone, or to down climb off the belay and free your way over to the start of the seam that takes you to the big ledge.  I found the level of acceptable risk too great for option 1.  (What?  Bat hooks out here?  To say the least  Bizarre) If one of them blows you are going to need a hospital no two ways about it.  We chose RIGHT.  I gingerly freed over to a chossy seam and proceeded to garden my way up this right angling crack finding a few C2 moves  maybe;  some C1, lots of trundling, a few free moves, and an exciting fear factor style 5.8 top out.  After gardening the calcite and sand out of the seam, a few pin scars revealed themselves.  Some low balls might be helpful.  It should be of note, that if you blow it down low on option two you could get hurt as well.  This pitch gets you to a big ledge and some artifacts from days gone by.

P3:

Chossy free to a ledge, and then the work begins.  Thrutch up some wide till it pinches out, finagle some crap till you can push that green #6 up in the the wide slot.   Work up more widness till it pinches down again.  Pull through into the good rest via some more thinish moves.  Work up the roof via old bolts till your are below the Maw.  Figure it out and make your moves to the good two bolt belay at the summit, via bust ass free climbing, bat hooking, or painfull aiding.

This route will go free at a moderate grade to someone with a sick sense of humor.

Pipe Organ Spire - South West face

Organ Pipe Spire

Pipe Organ Spire-Southeast

Organ Pipe Spire - Ender's Game

Organ Pipe Spire - Aces & Eights

Pipe Dream

Organ Pipe Spire - The Weird Fun

Organ Pipe Spire is located in Wedding Canyon and is part of the next peninsula of rock south of Sentinel Spire.  It sits next to Pipe Organ Spire, and is the shorter of the two, furthest from the rim.  The names are quite confusing!  A photo of the south faces of the spires is on p.269 of Bjornstad's Desert Rock III.  The best approach is to park at the Book Cliff Overlook and rappel in as you would for Sentinel Spire: Walk south to the rim (about 90 seconds from the car) and on the left (east) there is a small pine tree to rap from.  Rap about 100' and leave your rope fixed.  Don't forget to bring jumars for the way out.    Descend slabs and follow a faint trail that winds down and eventually to the right beneath the south face of Sentinel Spire where the classic route Medicine Man is located.  Hike south toward Organ Pipe Spire for about 20 minutes wrapping around the base of it to arrive beneath the south face.  It is very important to walk in the drainages following a circuitous path rather than trample the fragile soil taking a direct path toward the objective.  The direct path will only save a few minutes but could harm the soil for years!  It is also possible to park at the Pipe Organ Overlook, hike 5 minutes to the rim and rap from there, but I found it more difficult to deal with the much longer rappel (and jumar), as well as a pesky cliff band that is time-consuming to negotiate.  Pipe Dream begins in the middle of the south face at a small, left-facing dihedral about 25' left of a long, clean dihedral.

Pitch 1: Climb 15' up the dihedral, then hand traverse left on flat, sandy holds into a right-facing dihedral.  Layback and jam up to a roof, turn it on the right, and jam wide hands about 10' above the roof to establish a belay on gear (#.5, #1, #3.5 for belay).  5.11, 80'.  Bring all cams #3 and smaller with just one #2.  The first 30' of the pitch are very sandy, but the quality of the route improves above that point.

Pitch 2: Fire up the wide hands splitter, layback up and left around an exposed arete, and tiptoe up large flakes to a small stance with two belay bolts.  5.10+, 50'.  Gear: (2)#.5, (1)#.75, (1)#1, (2)#2, (3)#3, (2)#3.5, (1)#4.

Pitch 3: The crux.  Climb straight above the belay, then launch into the clean, overhanging, and strenuous offwidth that finishes above the lip of small roof at a 3-bolt hanging belay. After some fist jams at the start, the offwidth dictates strenuous laybacking rather than full-on groveling because of its position in a corner.  5.11+, 60'.  Gear: (1)#.5 plus everything #3 and larger.

Pitch 4:  Squirm up a short offwidth above the belay, then follow the sandy crack that veers right after about 15'.  Pass a fixed anchor and where the crack ends, face traverse left for 8' on flat edges until below a second anchor.  Mantel up to this anchor and belay.  It is also possible to continue 20' to the false summit and belay from #3.5 and #4 cams.  5.10-, 80' or 100'.  Gear: 2 each all sizes.

Pitch 5: Once on the false summit, climb a very short overhanging wall on the left side of the summit block via fun yet nervewracking jugs.  These moves can protect with a #4.5 cam in a hole and/or a thread.  Walk to the summit.  5.6, 30'.

Descent: Downclimb to the anchor atop pitch 4 placing gear for the second.  Rap 80' to the 3-bolt anchor atop pitch 3.  Rap 190' to the ground - free hanging the entire way!

Note: For great crack climbing of all sizes without much choss, climb the first 3 pitches then rap.  The last 100' includes some bad rock just like any tower in the Monument, but the summit is worth the effort if you're so inclined.  Pipe Dream is possibly the second route to the summit of Organ Pipe Spire, and it may be the only free route.

First off I soloed this route, so I was not dealing with rope drag.  You may need to break up what I did in one pitch into 2.

P1. Start out climbing loose rock to a good crack and 2 great stopper placements. Pass 2 old pins the first of which held my body weight, the second I didn't touch. Pass a huge block and climb up into a chimney. At this point, place a large cam and go on the outside of the flared chimney/ow. There is no gear for the next 20-ish feet, but the climbing is not that difficult (large gear might protect it. I didn't have any and can't remember.).  It appeared as if one could first climb up inside of the chimney and clip a knifeblade then downclimb and get on the outside so that the 20-ish feet were protected, but who knows how good the knifeblade is?  Either way after running it out, you get to a good #3.5-4 Camalot crack.  Scamper up to a ledge.  Climb around big blocks and over loose rock to a chimney/tunnel in the rock.  Enter. Chimney until you can squeeze through a hole onto the southside of the tower and then climb 5' more to the anchor and a ledge/stance, 190' 5.8+, C1.

P2. 20' of easy climbing leads to the summit. There is no anchor on top. Downclimb. (5.4)

Descent: rappel from the top of pitch one to the ground. The anchor consists of 3 pins one of which is drilled. I backed this up with a piece of rope someone had left slung around a large horn/pinnacle.

Pitch 1: Climb slab to a crack, follow the crack up past two 1/4' bolts and a bulge to a ledge and an anchor. (5.10)

Pitch 2: Free past the bolts that are up and right of the anchor, until they stop.  Continue on mixed free and aid, 1-2 aid moves, to another ledge and anchor. (5.10, C1)

Pitch 3: This is a really loose pitch.  Climb up, staying to the right.  Climb through a notch in the summit cap rock, to an anchor. (5.8+R)

Note: Desert Rock III says that this route goes free at 5.10.  But pitch 2 seemed like it would be much harder than that to free.  On pitch 2, the rock is loose, the crack, the holds and the gear all sort of runs out at once.

Ender's Game is on the Northwest face of the Organ Pipe. While not on par with

Medicine Man

or

Tom Stubbs Memorial Route - Terra Tower

, I wouldn't hesitate to put it up there with

Fast Draw

,

The Kor Route...

on the Kissing Couple, or

The Revolution...

on Egypt Rock. It also has the added benefit of adding another tower available to the mere mortals and those who appetite for obscure desert offerings is limited. It is pretty clean for getting off the beaten track, has some really fun climbing, and will only get better with traffic.  This is an excellent summertime route and is in the shade till mid afternoon at soltice.

P1. Ascend the steep corner via thin hands, passing a wide slot (crux) and karate chop to the top of the pillar where an intermediate belay can be made at a good ledge. Or, continue up left for another 50' through an easier but less stellar chimney to a solid anchor on a great ledge, 5.10, 130'+/-.

P2. Climb down and over to the crack system plug a bunch of solid cams under the roof, and bust hard moves over this difficult feature. Continue up the finger and thin hand crack as it gradually eases angle and tops out on a great ledge just below the summit, 5.10, 70+/-.

P3. Climb up and over, tagging the top and belaying in small alcove on the other side of the tower, 5.5, 30'.

Aces & Eight's was an old mixed free/aid line put up in the early 2000's by James Stover and Elizabeth Fortushniak. Over the years, some work has been put into it to clean it up and get it totally free ready. It still needs some work. All pitches have been free climbed. Not all pitches have been led clean. This is mostly due to the fact that P2 is pretty scary and requires some big lobs if you blow it in the wrong places. P3 is just fun 5.9 climbing, and P4 is an easy 5th class scramble.

It's a good aesthetic climb with everything set for a strong free attempt, I am putting it out there for the next generation to see if it inspires anyone.

P1. Twenty feet right of Chris Widner's

Pipe Dream

is a long, clean corner. It starts out wide and over the course of 100' blinks down to nothing. This is OK because as the cracks thins out the feet and face holds start becoming more plentiful on the right wall. Eventually things disappear entirely, and you are forced to make some mandatory gymnastic/dynamic moves past a fixed anchor to clear the blank corner (the crux 5-7' was originally aided on blades - it might be doable now on aid with some micro wires and a hammer), this gets you back into some wide hands. Move left to a decent belay ledge and some solid anchors, 5.12 or 5.10 C1/2, 130'+/-.

P2. Ascend the chimney. Once you get up in it proper (scary), there's a crack deep inside to keep gravity at bay. Eventually you are forced out to the clean, highly featured corner above and some fun & exciting 5.11 climbing. Don't plug your cams in your finger locks, 5.11R or 5.9R C1 100'+/-.

-- With a few bolts through the outer lip of the chimney, this pitch would be really fun. Right now it's a dark scary voyage into a belly full of choss and gigantic spiders!

P3. Avoid the huge gash by heading up and left into a sweet corner on bullet hard stone on mostly fist-size cams. Climb to a great belay just below the summit cap. 5.9 50'+/-

P4. Scramble up to the summit then over to a gear belay at the top of the Original Carter Route.

This was a new addition to Organ Pipe Spire, done in the fall of 2009.  Eyeball it up from the Rim above Sentinel Spire.  Scramble up to the gap separating The Pipe Organ and The Organ Pipe (this is also the start of two other routes on these two formations) routes.  There are three crack systems on this face.  Move over to the third one on the climbers left and salivate at the base of an ugly chinmey.

P1: Grovel, thrutch, and dust your way up the vertical garbage chute above.  Work you way up the initial thirty feet (5.10) to where the climbing eases a bit and then on to either a squeeze through the hole (immpossible for fatties like me)or up through the overhang - which is much easier that it looks.  Climb up the ramp (5.4) and belay at the ledge from hard to get natural anchors.

P2: Climb up the super chossy pedestal and into the Sweet Chimney.  Climb for 60' without gear (5.8 PG-13) double up your pieces in the lone crack and then fire up the remaining 20' and onto the sketchy slab for another 30' (5.5 R/X)) to a great ledge and another natural anchor.

P3: Take turns climbing the remaing 10' to the summit on over and down to the original anchors from the Carter Route. (5.9 PG-13)

Description

Location

Protection

Routes in Organ Pipe Spire and Pipe Organ Spire