![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
canyonwalkerSedona Travelog #17
Cathedral Rock - Tue, 31 May 2022, 9am
At the end of my previous blog about hiking Cathedral Rock in Sedona, AZ I warned that the trail would get tougher. There are three stretches of the trail where you've got to scramble with hands and feet up narrow chutes over bare rock. Here's one of them:
After a few of these it was smoother sailing to the top. Not easy sailing, as it was still up, and there was still climbing over rock ledges; just easier than climbing the chutes.
The trail tops out at a saddle point between two of the large spires of Cathedral Rock. The saddle is 10-15' across and runs about 200' between the peaks. The mountain drops steeply down on either side.
As we caught our breath up here we marveled at how fast we'd completed the climb. By the numbers it's similar to our epic ascent of the Koko Head Tramline Trail in Hawaii: about 800' of ascent in under 1 mile. But unlike that hike we're not feeling wrecked. The cross-tie walking is what really did us in on that trek.
Anyway, back to this trek.
On the north peak there's a small ledge you can walk out onto. People were taking turns posing out there for photographs. Hawk didn't want to go (it was too close to the edge for her) so I handed her my camera.
Most people who make it up here to the saddle stay for a while, take pictures, and head back down. What they're missing is that there's a side trail that climbs even higher. Stay tuned for more!
UPDATE: To the top and back down!
Cathedral Rock - Tue, 31 May 2022, 9am
At the end of my previous blog about hiking Cathedral Rock in Sedona, AZ I warned that the trail would get tougher. There are three stretches of the trail where you've got to scramble with hands and feet up narrow chutes over bare rock. Here's one of them:
After a few of these it was smoother sailing to the top. Not easy sailing, as it was still up, and there was still climbing over rock ledges; just easier than climbing the chutes.
The trail tops out at a saddle point between two of the large spires of Cathedral Rock. The saddle is 10-15' across and runs about 200' between the peaks. The mountain drops steeply down on either side.
As we caught our breath up here we marveled at how fast we'd completed the climb. By the numbers it's similar to our epic ascent of the Koko Head Tramline Trail in Hawaii: about 800' of ascent in under 1 mile. But unlike that hike we're not feeling wrecked. The cross-tie walking is what really did us in on that trek.
Anyway, back to this trek.
On the north peak there's a small ledge you can walk out onto. People were taking turns posing out there for photographs. Hawk didn't want to go (it was too close to the edge for her) so I handed her my camera.
Most people who make it up here to the saddle stay for a while, take pictures, and head back down. What they're missing is that there's a side trail that climbs even higher. Stay tuned for more!
UPDATE: To the top and back down!
