AZ: Mogollon Rim Red Mountain near Flagstaff

We stayed home due to forecast for precipitation in Utah for Memorial Day weekend. So we got a chance to do a canyon(?) Nick had found on a previous trip to Red Mountain. The canyon turned out to be a good little canyon. Worth a stop to or from the Grand Canyon if you have couple hours to explore something completely different. We parked at the well marked Red Canyon trailhead that is 30 miles N of Flagstaff on 180.

It took us 40 minutes to get to the top of the canyon. This is the saddle on the right side of the mountain. The climb up the ridge was not too bad and not as loose as going along the side of the hill. It is hiking mostly in cinders once you start up the mountain.



As we headed down, there was lots of fox scat then a dead fox. Tempting to call this canyon Dead Red after the fox.

Shortly we came to the first rappel and we rigged sling to get past a rock and Fiddlestick'd down the 40' drop. We worked our way down the canyon.



There were a variety of down climbs in the strange rock. Very, very sharp so we were careful not to slide. We built a sling around a chockstone that we dug out then fiddlestick'd off a horn/hodoo.




None of these were very long. 40-50'; max.

A meat belay for Wes and I that Nick down climbed followed by lots of down climbs with partner assists led to the last obstacle.


I slung an overhead boulder and went down a wet flute while Nick and Wes crawled through an arch and down-climbed to the bottom. Just as we got to the bottom it started to rain. Perfect timing.


A challenging little canyon with 2 mandatory short rappels of not more than 50'. Nick only rappelled twice, Wes 4 times and myself 5.

Although we were probably the first in this canyon, we still did not find any garnets :-( It is very strange rock with lots of embedded crumbly obsidian.



Chris Grove