CircleX

Circle X Ranch - October 2009
In spite of our busy fall schedule, and a recent death in the family, Carlo and I were able to get outside with some friends and do some climbing this last weekend. The boy and I have been booked with work, school and soccer and my wife’s grandfather passed away late last week. Things have been quite hectic and we know things are only gona get busier with the holidays and flu season coming up. A day at the crag was definitely in order.
Carlo has this pal from school named Mitchell whose been itching to go climbing with us. So we made plans early in the week to go up to Wheelers Gorge on weekend. As it turns out, Mitchell’s dad Randy showed some interest in coming along as well. After we made our initial plans it occurred to me that not only did we have a game on the weekend but, Carlo had and obligation to work at a fund raiser for his school. I almost pulled the plug on the whole trip and then Carlo told me that he would rather go climb than go to the festival.
After waffling for a couple of days on a destination, I settled for one of my favorite places in the Santa Monicas; The Grotto at Circle X Ranch. Circle X used to be a Boy Scout camp back in the day and also had a beautiful campground called The Happy Hollow as well as a nice little group camp. During the 90’s there was a fire in the campground that burned the place out. After the fire, the parkies closed the camp, tore out all the fire pits and picnic tables and bulldozed the road and basically left the place fallow. (A similar deconstruction occurred at Lions Camp after the Arroyo Toad was listed as endangered). The closure of Happy Hallow was coupled with new, region wide restrictions on camping the Santa Monica backcountry. Today, the only camping available in the Santa Monicas (not counting the beaches) is in Malibu Canyon and the group camp at Circle X.
The Grotto is part of a gorge like formation in the southern end of the ranch, just below the old Happy Hallow campground on the Arroyo Sequit Creek. The rock there is the same sandstone conglomerate found elsewhere is the Santa Monica’s. The Grotto itself lies in a narrowing of the canyon where the creek sometimes runs underground below the boulders. In these narrows, the creek boulders form caves and alcoves and the rock walls on either side stretch to the sky a couple hundred feet. The approach is a short and easy hike from the parking area that takes about 20 minutes. In the twenty plus years I’ve been going to this place, I have never seen another climber or evidence of climbing activity (bolts, chalk, ect) and considering the rock quality (which is OK) and the setting (which is excellent) I am blown away by this fact.
We met up with Randy at the trailhead at around 11 o’clock and were down at The Grotto by 1130. After giving Randy and Mitchell a chance to explore the caves and alcoves of The Grotto proper, Carlo and I led them down over some class four terrain to a tall, walk behind waterfall. This would be our lunch spot. To one side of the waterfall is a 30ft free standing boulder shaped like a tear drop called The Tear Drop Boulder. There are four or five boulder problems on the Tear Drop, all in the easy moderate range. Now, I’ve soloed all of these routes, many times before but because the landings on this boulder are kind of sketchy (it sits in a pool of water) I figured it best to build an anchor and put the boys on TR for now. I tied off a big Sycamore above the boulder with an old climbing rope, extended a BD Airlock over the edge with 24 inch sling, set the rope, had the boys bounce on it, and then rapped off for good measure. Simple and bomber.
Mitchell had never been on a rope before, so I gave a simple primer to technical climbing where we talked a little bit about the equipment, climbing technique, climbing forces (physics) and communication. After that I had Carlo tie himself in and have a go at the route so Mitchell could see what top-rope climbing is all about. Carlo sent the route quickly and in fine fashion so after lowering him off we tied Mitchell in and sent him up the rock. Mitchell struggled a little his first go but after a while he started to trust the anchor and the belayer (me), and just climbed. After Mitchell, I sent up his dad Randy, and than gave him a chance to belay the boys up the rock. Carlo, as is par for him, started to explore the other routes on the Tear Drop and Mitchell quickly followed suit. After a while we got bored with it and headed back up to The Grotto proper and got busy with some bouldering there.
There are a couple of boulder problems in the Grotto cave that when clear of logs and debris can be quite fun and there is potential for a monster roof problem there as well. Above the cave, there are some heavily featured boulders also sporting easy to moderate problems. The western wall of the gorge is also made of heavily pocketed sandstone conglomerate and stretches skyward through the trees about 200 feet. Much potential exists here for multiple sport routes and maybe even a trad line up an inside corner on the walls left side. (I have a sense that something is up with the Park Service in the Santa Monica’s that has prevented the development of this crag. Something for me to sleuth out).
Anyways, after a couple of hours of bouldering, we rolled up our gear and started back up the hill to the trailhead. Along the way, we were given fantastic views of the of the red sandstone towers that make up the Backbone Ridge and its high point Mt Allen. It only took us about 20 minutes to get back to the trailhead and from there we decided to meet up at Neptune’s Net on PCH for dinner. After a good meal and some warm fellowship, we consigned to do it all again and headed home.