Conditions:KC Canyon-20250204194519
Latest: |
2 Feb 2025 (13 days ago) |
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Reported by: | Austin3623 (15 reports) | |
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Quality: | Ok |
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Waterflow: | Dry |
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Wetsuit: | None |
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Water temperature: | ||
Difficulty: | Special challenges |
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Time: | ![]() |
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Team: 10 people with experience level Brand new to Advanced
Trip report URL:
Comments: Large competent group—first time running KC for all of us.
Key takeaways are: - The approach is horrendous, but made much easier if you avoid a few key missteps. Very similar to Monkeyface, it’s a class 3 scramble up a dry, loose hillside…but unfortunately more extended. Would not advise if temps are over 75F. - A bit tricky getting up above the creek bed initially. We cleaned out a steep path directly under the face of the hillside without having to wander up or downstream. - Once above the creek, stay on the grassy face of the hillside where you’ll find solid game trails zig zagging up the hill. Aim for a grove of Sycamore trees near the top. - For the love of all things holy, ignore the prominent trail at the bottom that leads you into the gully. It’s very loose. You’re going to have a bad time. - Once you get to the 2800ft range, start heading climber’s left toward the gully on the opposite side. We found a really solid trail here. - We cleaned up a bunch of the old webbing still in the canyon. Previous beta refers to deadman anchors. Confirming that none of them are buried—they’re all well-built cairn anchors. - Final rappel sequence has a massive 50ft tree turned upside down in the watercourse. Added an extended anchor around a solid bush DCR of the tree to avoid the worst of the gnarly branches (see photo)
Overall: Glad we did it. Won’t be going back for a while. Great practice for people wanting experience with marginal anchors. Dear god, so many ticks…
All condition reports
Date | Quality | Waterflow | Wetsuit | Difficulty | Time | Team | Reported by |
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2 Feb 2025
| Ok | Dry ![]() | None ![]() | Special challenges ![]() | ![]() ![]() | 10 people Brand new to Advanced | Austin3623 (15 reports) |
Comment: Large competent group—first time running KC for all of us.
Key takeaways are: - The approach is horrendous, but made much easier if you avoid a few key missteps. Very similar to Monkeyface, it’s a class 3 scramble up a dry, loose hillside…but unfortunately more extended. Would not advise if temps are over 75F. - A bit tricky getting up above the creek bed initially. We cleaned out a steep path directly under the face of the hillside without having to wander up or downstream. - Once above the creek, stay on the grassy face of the hillside where you’ll find solid game trails zig zagging up the hill. Aim for a grove of Sycamore trees near the top. - For the love of all things holy, ignore the prominent trail at the bottom that leads you into the gully. It’s very loose. You’re going to have a bad time. - Once you get to the 2800ft range, start heading climber’s left toward the gully on the opposite side. We found a really solid trail here. - We cleaned up a bunch of the old webbing still in the canyon. Previous beta refers to deadman anchors. Confirming that none of them are buried—they’re all well-built cairn anchors. - Final rappel sequence has a massive 50ft tree turned upside down in the watercourse. Added an extended anchor around a solid bush DCR of the tree to avoid the worst of the gnarly branches (see photo) Overall: Glad we did it. Won’t be going back for a while. Great practice for people wanting experience with marginal anchors. Dear god, so many ticks… | |||||||
Ok | Dry ![]() | Rain jacket ![]() | Normal ![]() | ![]() ![]() | 4 people | Mikeatran (64 reports),Eljefe62 (55 reports) | |
Comment: First time through KC. Approach was kind of wonky; we ended up finding a faint trail partway up the creek that led to some exposed class 3 scrambling with some crumbly rock. After gaining past that we were treated to some loose holey dirt and somewhat non-existent trails to get up to drop in elevation, at which point we found some decent animal trails to follow. Once in canyon, anchors were pretty good; we ended up replacing R2 or R3 due to it having a large cut. Only ended up using 3 or 4 cairn/deadman anchors, the rest had alternate anchor spots via a tree or shrub that were pretty bomber. Added a webbing anchor on the downed tree directly in the water path for R11 to facilitate pull through the messy twig grouping and to reduce rope length to work with 200’ rope systems.
The hike out followed the creek that had flowing water; we found a class 3 scramble that was also exposed but got us quick access to the road whereby we ended up having to walk alongside traffic to get back to the car.
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Great | Dry ![]() | None ![]() | Normal ![]() | ![]() ![]() | 4 people Beginner to Advanced | Cavewine (1 reports) | |
Comment: Green and lush. All anchor webbing replaced 2 weeks prior, although some already showing rodent damage. Owls present near drop #5...maybe due to ample rodents. Drop in point better located at 34.16225 -117.17577 - look for pink flagging atop 2 trees in the drainage area
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