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Nov 07, 2021 — Kofa Queen is visible to the left of Signal Peak from AZ-95, but somehow its terrifying-looking summit tower blends into the jagged landscape, rarely climbed. We spontaneously decided it would be the objective for the day, and went into our excursion knowing there was a massive chance we'd be let down. Although gorgeous from afar, this is an extremely dangerous peak and I honestly don't recommend it to anyone. We decided to name it Kofa Queen due to its proximity to the Kofa Queen Mine, and because such an intense-looking pinnacle should have a name, but it's listed elsewhere as Peak 4170.
We drove Kofa Queen Canyon Road, suitable for anything better than a sedan. The road continues into the canyon where it gets more rocky, but still quite good. We parked in a pull-out near Skull Rock, which is located a bit before the standard Signal Peak trailhead. From the pull-out, we decided the most efficient way to get to Kofa Queen would be to wrap around a minor ridge rather than go up and over. On our return we decided to come back through the hills, but I didn't even include this in my attached map because it was incredibly slow-moving. We started east through a wash that narrowed into a colorful canyon. The canyon has a small dam at Cereus Tank, and past this the drainage increased in steepness as it ascended to a minor saddle above. We got poked a few times by various catclaw and cacti, but it wasn't to bad. From the saddle, we dropped east into a major wash known as Tunnel Mine Canyon. We followed it northwest as it drained out of the Kofas, but left the wash when Kofa Queen was directly north of us. More wash walking and light cross-country over a few arroyos and light brush brought us to a steep and rocky gully at the base of Kofa Queen.
We started up the Class 2 gully, headed north. The terrain steepened the farther we got, Kofa Queen hovering above us. We left the gully and continued ascending the steep south slopes of Kofa Queen, making our way to a minor notch on the east ridge of our peak. Toward the top of this now very steep Class 2/3 gully, a Class 3/4 move brought us into the notch and to higher ground riddled with cholla. We wrapped around the small cholla forest to reach the ridge crest, and Kofa Queen came into view to the west, just ahead of us.
Mike decided to follow the loose, Class 4 knife edge ridge to get to just below Kofa Queen's summit pinnacle. Chris would have gone with him, but in my somewhat recently-found excitement for safety, I kept to the north side of the ridge to locate an easier route up and Chris followed. At the northern base of the cliffy ridge, we side-hilled on overall pleasant desert terrain for a few hundred feet up to a minor notch on the northeast side of Kofa Queen. From here a couple of interesting Class 3/4 chutes on mostly solid rock brought us to the peak's northern base, where Mike had already inspected our route options and seemed a little defeated. I looked at the headwall and already checked out, confident we'd be turning around.
After a few minutes of inspecting the various route options and rehydrating, Chris stepped up to the headwall and said "alright, let's try this". I was sure he was kidding. He wasn't. First he attempted a darker-colored and most likely possibility on the left side of the headwall, but the rock was loose in spots when it clearly looked solid. The single sentence of beta we found online mentioned this was a 5.4 with loose rock, and it very well may have been, but it seemed extremely dangerous and had basically no gear placement. After pulling out a couple of big blocks and and foot breaking, Chris backed off and inspected just to the right in a minor depression in the rock face.
The route Chris decided to climb was about 60 feet long with plenty of difficult moves and poor-quality rock. Ultimately he called the route 5.9X due to poor gear placement and generally loose and untrustworthy holds.
He started up on a Class 3/4 section of about 15 feet, plenty of loose rock to choose from for holds. In order to escape the minor despression, he pulled a single burly move to wrap to the right onto an extremely exposed slab. He had only placed one piece of gear at this point and was on an easier section of the climb, but there weren't any trustworthy gear placements. He kept ascending, I assume now feeling pretty committed. Even as just his belayer, my palms were sweaty. As he watched, Mike silently admitted his were too. The slab portion on lighter-colored rock went quickly, and Chris now found himself at a junction in the route. Heading right would bring him to a diagonal crack and ultimately a small break in the rim above. He chose this way, since the left option looked less plausible. After a few delicate moves, the crack became a decent rest spot with at least a couple of gear options. It made an ascending traverse to a mantle move through the lighter-colored break in the rim. From here he set up an anchor on a massive set of boulders and belayed us up. I cursed Chris out sufficiently after I made it up the climb, saying something like "*** you, you're a *** *** crazy *** person and I *** hate you... but thanks for getting us up this stupid peak". That was far too dangerous for someone I care about to attempt. For reference, after finishing the climb Chris said "in order to get from an impossible cam placement to a terrible cam placement, I had to scrape all the shit out". To be fair, I actually thought the climbing was really cool. There were some fun movements on delicate holds and the variety in the climb, if it were solid rock, would have made the route worthy of recommendation.
A somewhat exposed Class 3/4 section led to the summit block from the top of the technical climb, where we took in the incredible views of the Kofa before setting up a rappel and getting off this lump of gorgeous choss. Insanely, the previous climbers left no gear for an anchor and apparently down-climbed. I will never understand some people. We had intended to get more Kofa peaks today, but after Kofa Queen's intensity we were content to return to the car and call it.
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Hire/refer me as a web developer or send me a few bucks if you find my site useful. I'm not sponsored, so all fees are out-of-pocket and my time preparing trip reports is unpaid. I really appreciate it!