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Hallett Peak, Jackin’ the Johnson (5.11c, 8p)

Hallett Peak

Route:

Jackin' the Johnson

5.11c, 8p

A stellar alpine route with an engaging crux pitch and otherwise high quality and fun climbing.

Region: Colorado

Elev: Hallett summit: 12,713 ft (note: the top of the route is not the summit)

Rock type: Gneiss & Biotite Schist

Type:

Date(s): August 18, 2022 (Thu)

Partner(s): Nate Beckwith

Related trip reports:

Hallett Peak, Better Than Love (5.9, 7p)

Hallett Peak, Culp-Bossier (5.8, 8p)

Hallett Peak, Direct Second Buttress (5.9, 8p)

Hallett Peak, Englishman's Route (5.8, 6p)

Hallett Peak, Jackson-Johnson (5.9, 9p)

Hallett Peak, Northcutt-Carter (5.10b, 7p)

Hallett Peak, Snow-covered Flattop Mountain trail (winter)

Otis-Hallett-Flattop Loop (winter)

Route Overlays

CLICK TO ENLARGE

Intro

Jackin' the Johnson is a relatively new route on Hallett, being put up in 2006 by Eli Helmuth and Shane Wilder. The route combines a few older pitches with some new ones to create a striking line up the Second Buttress. The crux pitch of the route is a 5.11c face climb (5 bolts). The other seven pitches of the route are in the 5.7-5.10a range, making this route a good one to do if you are comfortable with a bolted 5.11c crux section and otherwise more moderate (but not without challenges) climbing.

I climbed this route with Nate Beckwith. Nate and I really enjoyed this route. We found the crux section to be engaging face climbing on good rock, with great movement and holds just where you need them; however, without chalk guiding the way and steep moves with sporty spacing between bolts, it proved to be a difficult onsight for both leader and follower—Nate hung a few times to make sure he had figured out the sequence to the next bolt, and I had to hang once at the final bolt when I missed a key foothold. Nate and I were pleasantly surprised to find that the climbing on all of the other pitches was high quality and engaging. This route is not a one-pitch wonder, and the entire thing is definitely worth climbing.

The following page gives route overlays and pitch-by-pitch photos for the climb.

Time Stats

Bear Lake Trailhead to base of route: 1 hour 12 minutes
Climb route: 7 hours 8 minutes
Top of route to Bear Lake Trailhead: 1 hours 41 minutes
Total car-to-car (includes breaks): 10 hours 55 minutes

Pitch-by-Pitch Photos

Approach

2nd

From Bear Lake Trailhead, follow the trail to Emerald Lake. Go left around the lake, scrambling through talus and then on a climbers' trail under the base of the wall. Begin in the second small dihedral to the right of Culp-Bossier, beneath a striking prow with striped rock.

Pitch 1

5.9, 65'

Climb the steep dihedral, followed by a short offwidth corner to the first grassy ledge. Traverse right to a 10-foot crack and belay.

Pitch 2

5.11c, 115'

Work straight up from the belay, past some loose rock, and into a wide section under a roof. Bypass the roof via a quartz hand crack on the right. Climb the tapering crack to its end, then go 10 feet left past a fixed pin (we found this pin to be disconcertingly loose). Work up and right onto the face and climb past five bolts (crux). Make a slabby finish (gear) to a bolted belay.

Pitch 3

5.7, 165'

Climb straight up on the left side of the arete to join Jackson-Johnson for a short ways, but then continue up into a wide groove where Jackson-Johnson goes right. End below steep cracks above.

Pitch 4

5.9, 130'

Climb steep cracks lead to a big ledge on the white band.

Pitch 5

5.10a, 115'

Traverse left to a right-facing corner. Climb the corner, then go right and straight up a crack system that takes you to the bottom of a long, right-leaning ramp.

Pitch 6

5.9 or 5.7, 205'

Follow the long right-leaning ramp up and right. This pitch will involve a bit of simulclimbing if you have a 60m rope.

Pitch 7

5.7, 115'

Climb up a steep quartz crack off the ramp, then go left and climb the right-facing corner of Jackson-Johnson. Belay above the corner on a ledge. This is below the crux pitch of Jackson-Johnson.

Note: For this pitch, the Rossiter guide describes climbing all the way through the crux pitch of Jackson-Johnson, and then making the last pitch a 50 foot pitch to the top. I think it is better to instead belay at the ledge above the corner and then climb the crux pitch of Jackson-Johnson all the way to the top. Reasons: (a) the leader doesn't have a bunch of rope drag when climbing the 5.9+ crux section, (b) the belayer can see the leader, and (c) it just makes more sense to climb to the top from the ledge above the corner rather than link the crux of Jackson-Johnson into a mega pitch and then do a 50 foot pitch to the top.

Pitch 8

5.9+, 200'

Climb the crux pitch of Jackson-Johnson (click link to see my July 2021 trip report for this climb). Climb a right-facing dihedral for 50 feet, then work up and right past two old bolts (crux) where the corner leans right. Continue as the corner goes straight up and belay at the left. A 50 foot steep and juggy section leads to the top of the wall (this final 50 foot section can be broken into a separate pitch as per the Rossiter description or linked with the previous pitch, which makes sense if starting from the ledge above the corner).

Top

The route tops out on the ridge well below the actual summit of Hallett. It would be easy to scramble to the summit from here, but we felt no great need to do so so we headed down.

Descent

2 Rappels + Scramble

From the top of the route, hike downwards along the ridge, following cairns. At the end of the last big buttress before a big descent to the next one, look for the chains that mark the first rappel. Make two raps (single 60). Then scramble down a gully eastward, and then jog back westward and scramble down a gully to the base of the Second Buttress. You end up a few hundred feet below the start of the route (5 minutes back to base). Note: The descent does NOT go down the huge gully to the east. This is apparently quite loose and harder than it looks.