The Five Best Climber

Claire Buhrfeind prepares to climb 'Liposuction' (5.12) at Reimers Ranch in Austin. Photo: Long Nguyen / Red Bull Content Pool

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It’s hard to question the argument that some cities are better for climbers than others. Whether it’s easy access to high-quality rock, a thriving indoor training scene, or a larger, more diverse climbing ecosystem all around, certain U.S. cities simply make it easier to improve as a rock climber.

In this article, I’ve spoken with local climbers from some of America’s best climbing towns to get the inside scoop on what makes each of these spots so stellar—the best crags, routes, gyms, and more.

In an attempt to preemptively neutralize some folks crying foul in the comments, this is not the end-all-be-all list of the supreme cities for climbers. There’s a case to be made for San Diego, Albuquerque, Boston, Tucson, Reno, Portland, Asheville, Boise, Lexington, and several others not on this list, not to mention Boulder…

But after careful consideration, the five cities below topped the rankings, each for a different climbing discipline.

In the Deep South, there’s no better town for climbers than Chattanooga. Asheville has value for trad purists, but it’s small and growing prohibitively expensive, and there are spots in Kentucky that could warrant inclusion solely for their proximity to the Red. But Chattanooga tops the list for the sheer variety of rock around town, combined with a central location between the best of Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, and Kentucky on all sides.

“Chattanooga is the mecca for sandstone,” says David Whalen, who emigrated from Florida to Chattanooga six years ago for the bouldering but soon became a sport addict as well. “If you want amazing single-pitch sport, the best place in the South—besides maybe the Red and the New—is the Chattanooga area.”

“There’s so much that people don’t know about,” he says. “We have the big three nearby: Foster Falls, Denny Cove, and Castle Rock, and the SEC just purchased Woodcock Cove last year, too.”

Chattanooga has no “supreme crag,” Whalen says, because climbing year-round is more than possible, and one’s style changes with the seasons. “All summer long, we have Deep Creek. Steep, slopey tears out the wazoo, 5.12- is gonna be feeling like 13-, but it’s such a good time,” he says. “Leakage is a really popular 12- that can be someone’s project all summer just because of how pumpy it is.”

In the shoulder seasons, Whalen recommends Denny Cove. “That spot was a huge buy. It has the Buffet Wall, with all-you-can-eat 5.12- to 5.14- climbing. That place is the Rifle of the South.”

In the winter, hit up the T-Wall or Castle Rock for vertical terrain. “These spots are full tech, full brain stylized movements. Sheer vertical walls that foster some really cool movement.” For trad, Sunset Park on Lookout Mountain is the go-to, with lines dating from the mid-1960s.

There are essentially two gyms in Chattanooga, the more weekend warrior-focused High Point—which has two locations—and Synergy, a boulder dungeon and Ninja gym with a more hardcore, training-heavy bent. “Synergy is the climbing gym for climbers, but it can be a bit more intimidating for newer climbers,” says Whalen. “People are there to train and climb hard so they can climb outside. If you like lead climbing, want auto belays, or are newer to climbing, I’d go to High Point. But each gym’s community is great, and there are strong climbers at both.”

The Crash Pad is a longstanding hostel that is often a climber hub. Right next to Synergy gym, Whalen recommends a bar called Pax Breu Ruim, where many climbers congregate. The Woodshop is another bar with good live music, particularly bluegrass.

I call Sin City home, so I can’t help but rep it. Vegas has one of the lowest costs of living on the West Coast (if you stay away from the Strip) and sits just outside perhaps the largest concentration of high-quality sandstone in the United States: Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area. Red Rock boasts nearly 3,000 roped routes—some bolted, but most classics gear-protected—along with almost 1,000 boulders.

Dropping numbers like that is one thing, but the sheer quality of the routes here, coupled with the ease of access, really shines. Routes like the 13-pitch Epinephrine (5.9) are all but required coursework for anyone who plugs gear. Other easy, long classics include Dark Shadows and Frogland (5.8), Physical Graffiti (5.6), and Birdland (5.7+).

A stone’s throw from the car, Calico Basin boulders is home to hundreds of problems within a square mile, from nervy but chill highballs like Perfect Poser (V1) up to high-tension hard gunners like Lethal Design (V12) and A Clockwork Orange (V12). Nearby Black Velvet Canyon is home to a slew of quality problems, among them the only proposed V17 in the United States.

In the summer, when temperatures are near-apocalyptic and Red Rock a fool’s errand, head thirty minutes outside of town up to the alpine limestone at Mt. Charleston for stellar sport climbing (~500 routes). On a 110-degree day in the city, the temps in Charleston’s canyons (7,000-8,000 feet) often hover in the 70s or 80s, and there’s also some opportunity for ice here in the winter.

Boulder and training-focused, The Refuge is probably the best gym in town, but there are other solid options: the Red Rock Climbing Center, The Pad, and the Nevada Climbing Center. For the best food, head to Chinatown. There are dozens of world-class Asian restaurants along Spring Mountain Road. Hwaro, an all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ joint, is my personal favorite.

Seattle is one of those destinations that will probably always make the list of “best climbing towns.” It’s the home of one of the first climbing gyms in America—Vertical World, est. 1987—and has a staggering array of crags in the vicinity.

It’s probably just as good of an “all-rounder” as Salt Lake, but I’m giving it “best for alpine” because there’s no better big mountain training ground in the contiguous U.S. than the Cascades. It’s not just Rainier, of course. Washington is home to the largest concentration of glaciated peaks in any lower 48 state, and a few hours to the north, you have British Columbia (Squamish, anyone?) in all its glory. Seattle is probably the best city in the country to keep your rock skills sharp but also have the ability to train for bigger alpine objectives in Alaska or abroad.

Exit 32 & Exit 38 are the closest crags to downtown Seattle. Write-Off Rock and Gritscone are excellent mellow spots for beginners. Headlight Point, Eastern Block, Blackstone, and Peannacle Point offer moderates, and the World Wall takes stronger climbers up to the 5.14 grade. For trad, you can head to the Far Side, or further north to the mecca of Index.

It’s not hard to connect to the scene in Seattle. The city has a whole slew of well-regarded gyms, including Edgeworks and Momentum branches, Vertical World, Half Moon Bouldering, Uplift, and the Seattle Bouldering Project.

For a bit of everything, you can’t beat Salt Lake City, says alpinist, guide, and filmmaker Damian Benegas. Salt Lake is one of the only major U.S. cities that truly has it all, from granite, limestone, volcanic, and quartzite single-pitch rock climbing to tremendous alpine routes in the surrounding Wasatch Range, all half an hour outside of a major metropolitan city with an international airport. That’s not to mention the trail running, mountain biking, paddling… “Man, I don’t know any other city in the United States where you can bike, ski, ice climb, and rock climb all in the same day, then jump on an international flight in the afternoon,” says Benegas.

Little Cottonwood Canyon is the hub for SLC rock climbing, with a couple thousand routes—mostly granite (technically quartz monazite) and some limestone—decently distributed between trad, sport, and bouldering. Among them are famous testpieces like Johnny Woodward’s ‘95 roof crack Trench Warfare (5.12+).

“At the base of [Little Cottonwood], you have incredible, slabby granite with many very historic routes,” says Benegas, “then you have tremendous ice climbing across the canyon in the winter, then you go up deeper into the canyon and you have all this moderate-to-easy, endurance peak bagging.” There are a number of prominent, high-quality mountain objectives accessible from the area, “like the southeast ridge of Superior, Castle Peak, the Pfeifferhorn… you get bored with that, then you can go over to Big Cottonwood [Canyon] and get moderate quartzite there,” adds Benegas. “There’s just so much good moderate climbing, all extremely close together.”

Other nearby spots include Bell’s Canyon, home to longer, more alpine-style trad routes; Mt. Olympus, a 9,000-foot peak looming over the city with a few dozen routes up its faces and a top roping crag, Pete’s, at its base; and Lone Peak.

The latter is one of the highest peaks in the Wasatch, an 11,000er popular for trail runs and hikes, also home to “a ton of really classic Fred Beckey climbs,” says Benegas. “In general, the history of climbing here is rich and very impressive,” says Benegas. “There is a little bit of everything, all doable within a day, and this isn’t a small, remote town. It’s a major city with an international airport.”

To dive into the local scene, Benegas recommends the Momentum climbing gym, both as a good spot to train and connect with other climbers. “I wouldn’t say it’s my favorite gym ever,” he joked—noting that he has too many fond memories of early California gyms back in the 90s to say that—“But hey, it’s what we have here. It’s a good gym.”

But with some of the best rock, ice, and alpine routes in the world at your fingertips, it’s hard to justify spending too much time inside. The real rock is where it’s at in SLC.

Everyone and their mother is moving to Austin these days, and it’s likely not the best city if you want to expand into trad, big routes, or train at elevation. However, as a beginner climber learning the ropes of sport climbing, it offers nearly unparalleled ease of access, says writer and climber Ryan Gossen, who has been climbing in Austin since the mid-1990s. “You can get really good at sport here,” he says. “The climbing is so close and convenient, and there are a lot of people who climb at a high level.”

The climbing in town is grouped together on the Barton Creek Greenbelt, a stretch of public land in South Central Austin. “It’s very doable to get to a crag after work, and climbs tend to be in canyons, so you can be comfortable when it’s too hot to walk around,” Gossen says. “There are three main limestone crag areas—New Wall, Gus Fruh, and Seismic Wall—all about a mile apart on the trail, with approaches less than a mile. The Central Texas Climbers Coalition does a great job maintaining the trails and routes here.”

Gossen notes that most of the rock is quite polished, but “people here are friendly and it’s very feasible to show up at a popular wall with shoes and a harness, chat people up, hop on some routes, and make plans with strangers for the next week.”

With a bit of time on your hands, you can get to several other crags in one to two hours. Forty-five minutes out of town, “Monster Rock is a smaller limestone crag with lots of moderate routes in a crevasse that stays cooler than anywhere else,” says Gossen. “Reimers Ranch, an hour away, offers a large quantity of varied, single-pitch sport limestone on the shores of the Pedernales River.” For folks looking for a bit of trad, head to Enchanted Rock (two hours drive), “a granite batholith of extremely high-quality rock. Lots of slab, a little trad, mostly single pitch.”

With a bit of spunk and a full tank of gas, you can head south of the border down to the sprawling limestone ramparts of El Potrero Chico (seven hours) for a weekend of some of the best multi-pitch sport in the world.

For grub post-climb, Gossen recommends Tacodeli near New Wall. Leaving Gus Fruh you can snag traditional Mexican street tacos at Papalote Taco House or hit up Phoenician Bakery for lamb shawarma with a cold mint yogurt soda, “the best hot weather beverage.”

***

Las Vegas, Chattanooga, SLC, Seattle, and Austin are all great cities for climbers. But the truth is, the most climber-friendly city for you might be the one you already live in (unless you live in South Florida). You don’t have to move across the country to become a good climber.

Nearly every major city in America has a climbing gym these days, and even if there isn’t a crag within an hour’s drive, there’s probably one close enough for weekend trips if you’re dedicated.

A final note: Support your local advocacy and access group. Show up for trail days and crag cleanups. Be a good steward of the climbing around you, however small. Try to introduce yourself to someone new every time you hit the crag or rock gym. Grass is greener where you water it. The same goes for rock.