Tahquitz (Lily) Rock- The Trough

Tahquitz (Lily) Rock 8040′ via The Trough

Southern California

Rock Climbing 

Total Time: 6:15

Distance: 2.5 miles

Elevation Gain: 1900′

Crux: 5.4

Pitches: 3 (often done in 4)

Companion: Holly

Trailhead: Humber Park/ Ernie Maxwell Trail, pit toilets, trash, no other services

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Tahquitz Rock (Lily Rock by the USGS) is the epicenter of multipitch climbing in Southern California. With technical routes established as early as 1936, it was the training grounds for many legendary climbers including Royal Robbins and Bob Kamps of Yosemite fame. In fact, the Yosemite Decimal System (YDS), the rating system for climbing difficulty we use uniformly across the United States, was actually invented at Tahquitz in the 1950s and had spread across the US by the early 1960s. I had been to Idyllwild only once before as a hiker but never as a climber, and was intrigued by some of the fairly long multipitch routes that were well suited for beginner leaders. It was difficult to choose from the dozens of multipitch routes rated 5.6 and under, and ultimately decided the most sensible place to start would be with Tahquitz Rock’s first route- The Trough, first climbed in 1936. Although originally rated 5.0 (it was the original definition of a 5.0 climb) it is now accepted more in the range of 5.3-5.4 over 4 pitches of climbing, and would make a great introduction to California granite. We spent the night in Indio having not left Phoenix until late after work, and got up early to finish the drive into Idyllwild. It was about 8 AM when we arrived at the Humber Park Trailhead, a few other cars already in the lot. Despite the sign going over the climbing history of the region at the trailhead, the trail which actually accesses Tahquitz Rock, the Ernie Maxwell Trail, was located one switchback back down the road, and we moved our car to the right spot and headed out.

We found the signed Climber’s Trail about a quarter mile from the trailhead and started up the steep use trail heading directly towards the rock face. I had heard that the approach was a bit of a slog, and although the use trail was steep, it was well defined and easy to follow. The very fact that we weren’t dancing around cacti in 90 degree heat was all I really needed to feel spoiled anyways.

After about 20 minutes we reached Lunch Rock, a 60ish’ rock just below the main west face of Tahquitz Rock that is often used as a staging area for most of the routes, with various use trails leading to this spot to pick up left behind gear on the return. We took a short break, then followed the main use trail to the left of the rock, quickly reaching the granite slabs at the base of the rock face. I was a little concerned about finding the start of the route, and followed the trail up the first set of slabs to an upper tier. There, I found a pine tree with a chimney and chokestone that matched the approach description. Some easy stemming past this obstacle put us on a narrow ledge and the start of the first pitch.

I was quite excited to get started as I finished racking up, and wanted to try and do the route in 3 pitches, with some alternate belay options in a topo on my phone. The first pitch follows a low angled slab and crack, with one or two pieces of fixed gear and an old piton for good measure. The climbing was quite easy but varied, with stemming, slab and crack climbing techniques all employed.

I was absolutely loving the pitch, and after stepping left of a large block at the base of The Trough proper, I blew past the first standard belay at a tree to the left, thinking I spotted the alternate belay tree not far up to the right. The climbing became a bit more challenging in the main Trough but still easy fifth class, and was mostly third class scrambling with a fifth class move every 5-10′. The pine tree was maybe only another 50′ above me when I suddenly heard ‘THATS ME’ from 200′ below. The tree I was aiming for was actually Pine Tree Ledge, and in my climbing bliss I had blown past the alternative belay and had effectively almost linked up the first three pitches of the route before running out of rope. I was in a pretty crappy spot to belay where I was, but there was a nice small ledge about 10′ below. So with some careful downclimbing,  I reach the ledge and built an anchor out of trad gear two and a half pitches up.

Holly similarly had an easy time with the route, but was annoyed by the bulky follower pack she was carrying, with our approach shoes for the descent, extra water, and snacks. I was enjoying the climb so much and didn’t want it ruined for her, so I took the pack the rest of the climb, Holly now with my smaller leader pack. Although nearly to Pine Tree Ledge and start of the final pitch, the last 50′ of our short second pitch held some of the most difficult moves of the route. The first was an awkward and deep crack, deep enough to fit completely inside requiring some ungraceful moves to work out and upwards. The last somewhat tricky spot, at least mentally, was an exposed moved out of the Trough onto the pine tree ledge, with great hands in a crack, but one of the more exposed spots of the day.

I built a quick anchor off the giant pine tree and quickly brought up Holly. She remarked that that section was her favorite part of the climb, and I had to agree. The final pitch, although nearly as long as the others, was very easy fifth and fourth class. Although I did place pro along the way, it was more for practice and the entire pitch could be easily soloed, especially after the first few ledges. I found the last tree at the upper belay and again brought up Holly to the sub dome about 2/3 of the way up to the summit.

Rather than try and find the notoriously difficult to locate class 4 Friction Descent, I thought we could scramble the remaining distance to the summit and take the hikers/ peakbaggers route down instead. It was a bit deceptive how far the summit was, and it was another 30 minutes of scrambling and working around huge boulders to reach the exposed and rocky summit. I thought we might find some hikers at the high point, but we had the summit to ourselves, and found some relief from the wind behind various boulders.

The climb went faster than expected and we didn’t rush, organizing gear and rehydrating before the slog of the descent. Since we didn’t leave anything at Lunch Rock, I thought we could save time by sticking to the peakbaggers route, expecting to find a nice well traveled route down the major gully between Tahquitz Rock and Tahquitz Peak. But after scrambling down the short bit class 3 to the saddle, we found little that resembled a trail. While there were a collection of cairns along our descent, they were seemingly placed at random, with little in the way of an actual trail until we were about halfway through our 2000′ descent.

The use trail was very loose even as it became more well defined, with any decent storm wiping it out after a rain. From the time we left the summit, it was nearly an hour of loose class 2 to reach the safety of the Ernie Maxwell Trail, hitting it about a half mile from the climber’s trail turn off. Thankfully, this stretch of trail was almost completely flat, and we motored along in the shade of the pines and back to the car.

We finished our day just in time for Happy Hour, and headed into Idyllwild for some wine (Lily Rock Merlot no less) before heading into Big Bear for the rest of the long weekend.