Brian on a V7 photos Rylan Marshall
The Prow V10
The Prow V10

Homestar V11 from Jamie Emerson on Vimeo.

King of Town on the left, Homestar on the right.

Homestar was featured in Friction Addiction, where first ascentionist Chuck Fryberger jokes that they had bushwhacked for hours to find the problem. In reality it is a five minute flat walk from a parking lot and a camp store that sells ice cream, candy and soda.
We arrived late Thursday night and were psyched to give it some goes. I nearly sent it with a big jump move, swinging out slowly, but unable to control the swing and came away empty handed.
Rylan working Homestar V11
We debated the efficiency of climbing straight out of the car after a nearly 6 hour drive. The session finished around 12:15am.
I think the conclusion was that we had never climbed anything hard, no matter how psyched, right out of the car and that in the future we should probably turn in early and get a good nights rest. We camped for free near Mt. Rushmore

and there were perhaps two other cars in the parking lot. I slept outside underneath the looming dark trees and millions of perfect white stars.
In the morning I felt more sore than I would have liked. We made our way to Mt. Baldy. Brian put his excellent technical skills to work and climbed The Prow V10, a classic problem. Rylan and I had some good burns, but neither managed a send.
We rested for a bit, checked out some problems and made our way back to Sylvan Lake for another night session on Homestar. This time I discovered a key piece of beta, and desperately clung on for the send. Rylan and Brian threw themselves at it for a long time to no avail. It was well past dark, again, when we hiked out to the car.
Sat. we went back to Sylvan Lake, where Brian climbed several Gill problems that are, while not amazing, certainly worth doing.
Gill Arrow
Brian on the Yellow Wall V4, a John Gill FA

After repeating Homestar for the video, I got psyched to put some effort into Matt Tschol’s line King of Town. I was really psyched when I figured out the supposed crux move, a long reach off of a committing heel toe cam. Here are some pictures.
King of Town Rylan Marshall photo
King of Town Ryan Marshall photo
I look forward to coming back to try and climb this great problem when the weather cools off.
The Black Hills are not the next great thing, just another small and quiet area with quality problems, great scenery and a relaxing environment. A perfect place to get out of town for the weekend and enjoy the company of friends. Click here to read about a previous trip to South Dakota.

By the time Monday rolled around I think we were all very exhausted. The heat was there to stay and it seemed unlikely that I would climb anything hard. After a monster breakfast of sausage, eggs, bacon and pancakes in Hill City, we drove to Sylvan Lake and then up the road to check out the Thimble V4. I was very disappointed with the problem. I think the contrived nature of the line really wrecked it for me. The rock looks very solid, however it is extremely crystally. It is very tall and very cool that Gill had the vision so many years ago. It is almost like a piece from a museum now. It’s importance is not in what it is now, but what it was 40 years ago, if that makes sense. I’m not sure if I would go back and try it or not.

The Thimble

We went back to Sylvan Lake to climb some more reasonable Gill problems. The campground boulder has several classic moderates. We climbed all of them, and they were of very high quality.

Angie on a classic Gill V4

We went back to Homestar and King of Town but it was very hot. I tried King of Town briefly. A very good problem. It climbs two opposing seems to a very tricky move at the lip. I did all the moves up to the crux, which revolves around a heel hook maneuver. I would love to come back and put more effort into this great problem.

Brian on King of Town V12

The rest of the day we played on some more moderate things. Angie and Pinto had fun on a Gill Problem and we left around 4.

A Gill arrow points the way.

All in all, the Black Hills have enough good quality problems to keep anyone busy for a weekend, and I would certainly recommend a trip. The rock is not always the best, but on the best problems it is good. There is free camping, $2.50 all-you-can-eat breakfast, good scenery and rock climbing. I will headed back in the fall, probably after the Park season ends.

Very conveniently, the trail head for the main bouldering area (Old Baldy) is the parking lot of the camping. It was a pleasant 25 minute stroll through the woods.

Brian gave us a tour, and the first place we stopped to climb was The Prow V10. I was very impressed by this problem. It is quite nice. We “warmed” up on a couple problems to the right of the Prow, both of which were of very high quality. One was called 4 on 6 V4 and the other was called Sol Avec Deux V7. I say “warmed” up because it tooks us about two hours to do both of these problems. Conditions were very horrendous and the temperature must have been getting up near 80. The slipperyness of the rock reminded me of Little Cottonwood Canyon, outside of Salt Lake City. I finally sent both and started trying the Prow. It seemed impossible to squeeze the open handed holds while my hands were sliding on the grease. I tried fairly hard for a while but it just wasn’t going to happen.

Jason Pinto

Pinto on Sol Avec Deux

The Prow V10

Trying to escape the heat, we walked to an open ridge that had a nice breeze. It was still hot but there were some other problems to climb on. Here is me flashing a short but fun V8 called Black Roughy.

Black Roughy

Black Roughy

We walked around and looked at a few more problems before heading over to Virgin Martini V9. I had heard a lot about this problem and the obvious comparisons to Hueco. I was very not impressed. I figured out different beta and sent it in a few goes. As with a lot of the other problems we saw, it was short, sharp and not really very good. Fleshwound V8, its counterpart to the right was very short as well, but it was fun enough.

Camp low ballin on Fleshwound V8

The heat never really subsided all day and as evening rolled around we decided to head into town and get a nice meal. Our meal was very sub-par, and we all got large Blizzards from DQ. We had a little picnic outside and it reminded me of home.

We left at noon on Sat. It was a 6 hour drive across the rolling plains of Wyoming. As we crossed into South Dakota, the land began to rise and the forest thickened.

We had a tour lined up from Brian Camp and we met up with him at Sylvan Lake, which is in Custer State Park. We met up in the parking lot and my hopes were high. Brian assured us the approach was short. We hiked for about 5 minutes along the flat shore a very nice lake.

Sylvan Lake, Custer State Park

My first goal was to see a problem put up by Chuck Fryberger called Homestar V11. After walking around the lake you pass through a narrow corridor of rock and move to the left. The streak walls soared around.

The boulder faced the trail. I was fairly impressed. I saw a very nice 45 degree wall with two independent and obvious problems on the face. Homestar is the right line and the left line a V12 called King of Town that was put up a few years ago by Matt Tschol. The rock on this boulder was good quality grippy granite. It is very interesting rock. There are occasional crystals, but these don’t seem to detract from the overall quality of the problems. With fading light, I decided to put my effort into Homestar. It is a two move V8 to a very hard jump out right. It wasn’t long before I was trying the jump on link.

Ready to pounce.

Camper8000

I couldn’t quite do the move, but it was so much fun trying! It is a blind throw around the top bulge of the boulder and I seemed to have accuracy issues. It was getting dark and Brian took us up the hill to a V10 called Mood Swings. It was very low, but it seemed like my style. I am always up for a good flash so I gave it a try. The headlamps were out and conditions were very good. I was psyched to try hard.

Mood Swings flash

It was a good way to end the evening and we drove into Hill City to get some food. After dinner we went up to Wrinkle Rock, where there is free camping about 2 miles from Mt. Rushmore. I slept very well.