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Mar 28, 2019 — This turned out to be a great loop in Red Rocks, with some interesting scrambling, incredible views into First Creek Canyon, and a variety of peaks to bag. I started along the First Creek Trail looking for cairns to mark a social trail leading south from the official trail with no luck, so I headed into the desert until I stumbled upon multiple cairned routes. One of these routes led up a steep slope that dropped me into a talus-fulled gully that I followed to a flat section with great views to the south. Alternatively, you could just head up this talus slope from its base, but I was happy with avoiding a bit of it. once on the flat section, I followed cairns that sort of seemed to be leading me nowhere, as the elevation gain was minimal at first and I was wrapping around the south side of Indecision Peak. Eventually, the cairned route led through a rabbit hole and along a ledge before spitting me at the base of a wide gully, where cairned continued to lead me to high ground while avoiding significant brush. The route basically led to the summit of Indecision Peak, and from here some Class 2 led to No Decision Peak, Decided Peak, and then onward to First Creek Overlook along the ridgeline. I love when peak names follow a theme, but this was ridiculous. The views along the limestone crest down into First Creek Canyon were pretty incredible.
First Creek Overlook was protected by cliffs to the east, so I worked around the north side, heading down a steep slope that appeared to have received some human foot erosion. In order to avoid descending too far, I made my own route, traversing through some brush and working my way back to the east ridge, below the cliffs protecting the summit. The route led down to the social trail that many people take to the summit of Mt. Wilson via First Creek. This trail continues into First Creek Canyon and leads back to the trailhead, but I decided to take a quick detour to go bag First Creek Peak. This required leaving the canyon temporarily to follow a faint social trail to the south, where the route traverses a steep slope and gains the peak's west ridge. This, like many peaks in Red Rocks, is barely a peak and more of an overlook with a rock outcropping, but it's a pleasant detour nonetheless. Once at the summit block's base, head around the left side and summit via the east face, where an unexposed Class 4 move avoids the unpleasant overhanging options you'd get from the west side. Like other summit blocks that I've done in the area requiring a single Class 4 move, I couldn't justify calling my whole route Class 4 because of this small obstacle. Once I summited, I worked my way back into First Creek Canyon and used the standard route to get back.
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