Climbing at the Shawangunks

Ask any climber who lives in the Northeast about the "Gunks" and most will speak fondly of it, they might even "wax poetic" about it. This area, since it's discovery in the 1930s by the German Fritz Wiessner and Austrian Hans Kraus, has thousands of developed routes. One might compare it to Yosemite in California, indeed its cliffs are not near as tall, but the complexity of the rock and exclusive traditional routes make it just as challenging.

Of course all this was on top of my mind when I knew I would be working in the Catskill mountains, immediately northwest of the gunks. I underestimated my commitment to work up here, so an opportunity to climb did not present itself until recently. I enlisted my colleague and friend, Dave, to come with me. He currently lives in Idaho and as I write this he is getting happily married in his home state of Tennessee, congratulations! We spent the labor day holiday at the gunks, with near perfect weather, albeit a bit on the humid side. It was a real bummer to pay to climb though, $15. Most of the climbing areas at the gunks exist on private land, I am of the opinion that one should never have to pay to recreate, I will gladly pay higher taxes if it means that money is allocated properly to conservation and management of public lands.

We did perhaps 4-5 different climbs, and from the first to the last I was impressed by the quality of the rock. Dave climbs at a lower ability than me, but that was ok because we were there for climbs rated 5.fun, not anything else. In a landscape as beautiful as the gunks, it was hard not to smile at the top of the climbs.


It was a real pleasure to climb with someone who was as happy to be there as me. I lead all the pitches and Dave followed, pulling gear and gaining valuable experience for his future climbing career.

Climbing is such a novel experience for beginners, I couldn't wipe the smile off Dave's face even if I tried.


Our nice day off ended with us having to return to the motel, to get ready another week spent in the forest doing stand exams. It was beautiful to be paid for our day climbing at the gunks, another perk of working for the feds!