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nutjob
Gym climber
Berkeley, CA
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Oct 22, 2012 - 07:37pm PT
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For me Castle Rocks used to be a top rope Mecca, with some almost-but-not-quite interest in leading related to bolt state. Examples:
the cool roof on Goat Rock Overhang... wouldn't want to take the swing on that rusty thing in the roof. Or the honeycombed roof on Aeronautical Engineer over on the main Castle Rock. That would be cool to climb if I was studlier or it was safer.
The bouldering is cool.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Oct 23, 2012 - 05:27pm PT
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Climbing can never be banned at Castle Rock simply because the Varian family via the Sierra Club gave the land for the Park to the State specifically for rock climbing and bouldering. That's what creates all the ambiguity up there. The local property owners don't like tons of climbers parking along Skyline Boulevard and the Friends of Castle Rock State Park want to limit visitation to reduce human impacts on the environment, which they classify as a "recovering wilderness". Both these groups feel that the growing popularity of the sports of bouldering and rock climbing are adversely affecting the Park's primitive wilderness character. Of course, CRSP has not been a "wilderness" in over a hundred years. It's easy to forget sometimes that there used to be a small agricultural city located at CRSP with a tram, houses and a school in the cave on the backside of the main rock. If you tramp around in the Partridge Farm area near Goat Rock you'll run into many, many cement foundations for the old buildings that used to stand there.
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jstan
climber
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Oct 23, 2012 - 05:33pm PT
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Interesting. The problem the municipality faces might be solved were it to return the parcel to the Sierra Club. It is a property whose management does not fit into the capabilities or purpose of that part of government.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Oct 23, 2012 - 05:52pm PT
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Only problem with returning the property to the Sierra Club, Jstan, is that only the original 500 acres of CRSP was part of the grant from the Varian Foundation. The 1000s of additional acres acquired by the Park since the original bequest in 1968 were, in the majority of cases, purchased and donated by the Sempervirens Fund, which supports the concept of a 'bio-corridor' (i.e. people-free zone) stretching from Skyline Boulevard down to the Pacific Ocean. Climbers are caught between the conflicting visions of a number of stake holders in the region and, of course, so is State Parks. That's why nothing ever really gets done or changes up there. Like herding cats!
You can see that State Parks would like to get more money from the State to run CRSP, but their budget is based on the number of visitors who are counted as using the Park because they have parked in the main CR Parking Lot and paid a user fee. However, those who park in the free parking zones along Skyline Boulevard owned by Cal-Trans in front of CR, Indian Rock and Summit Rock are not counted as Park users. So CRSP, despite its increased popularity with climbers and boulderers, is not generating any more revenue than it ever did when it was less popular. However, if a new expanded parking lot and campground are built on the recently acquired X-mas tree farm property, it is possible that State Parks may start to welcome climbers because they will be contributing to their cash flow. All depends on how the new X-mas tree farm property is developed. The Sempervirens Fund recently purchased the X-mas tree farm for several million dollars and do have some kind of plan for developing it along those lines.
All this stuff sounds like a bunch of attorneys haggling because that's exactly what it amounts to. All the stake holders in the region have different agendas they're trying to implement and their different visions all conflict.
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jstan
climber
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Oct 23, 2012 - 06:11pm PT
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Thanks much for the info Bruce. The park's lack of the personnel and expertise needed to manage climbing is clearly just one of many problems. It's a shame climbers aren't aware of all these real world undercurrents. If we were, we might be able to be of more help. We are just a small user group. But many users working cooperatively can have a big effect. Users might even help those investing in this great idea, to refine their visions.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Oct 23, 2012 - 07:38pm PT
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Yep, Jstan, climbers - who are already divided into warring factions - are being kicked around like a political football by different groups with conflicting visions about the future of CRSP. Hence, we are treated like a "problem", a "fly in the ointment", the list goes on and on. That's why I think that after the Access Fund and County Parks has worked out some compromise solution to the Summit Rock closure, it would be a good idea for them to next address bolt replacement and upgrades at Castle Rock State Park itself. First one problem, then another. I know it's slow business having been engaged with the Summit Rock peregrine issue for over 3 years, but I don't see any other way of doing it. Slow, measured, reasonable, but just keep at it and never let up the pressure. What is really needed is a Castle Rock Climbing Committee to negotiate with the State, but as I already said, climbers are so divided that they don't seem to be able to present a united front to the authorities.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Oct 25, 2012 - 02:42pm PT
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The new California Climber magazine contains an article by Jim Thornburg that not only contains a host of good pictures of the boulder problems at Castle, but also a few that illustrate the quality of the sport climbs there:
http://californiaclimbermagazine.com
The article promotes the new edition of Jim's book on Bay Area Rock that is full of even more high-quality photos of the Castle Rock area.
http://www.jimthornburg.com/bay-area-rock.html
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Feb 12, 2013 - 05:26pm PT
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Just ran across this information about the Ventana Sierra Club lawsuit about carrying capacity requirements at Castle Rock State Park:
http://ventana.sierraclub.org/conservation/castle_rock/index.shtml
It's a shame that environmentalists have come to regard climbers and climbing as adverse impacts on the biosphere in County, State, and National Parks. I guess it's because they can't get at the big polluters, so they apply a microscope to climbing activity, which is by and large benign, having almost no adverse impact on the local environment. Their attitude is extremely ironic when you stop to consider that climbers were the first environmentalist and largely started the movement.
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Guck
Trad climber
Santa Barbara, CA
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Feb 12, 2013 - 06:01pm PT
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I have always felt that the problems faced by climbers are brought on by the climbers themselves. The main issue is not climbing, but bolts. More moderation in the use of bolts (and chalk) might have alleviated the animosity of local residents. Unfortunately, climbers often think and behave as if they own the rocks. The climbing community is even quite divided on the issue of bolts and chalk. How can we expect the non climbing community to OK whatever we do if we consistently ignore their desire to protect their environment. For many, bolts (and chalk) are just as bad as graffiti.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Feb 13, 2013 - 12:44am PT
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Bolts and chalk are only red herrings. If it weren't bolts and chalk, it would be something else, some other pretext for keeping people out of Castle Rock and other areas along Skyline Boulevard (CA 35). The real issue is park visitation due to the proximity of major population concentrations in the Silicon Valley and the Bay Area. What the Ventana Chapter of the Sierra Club is trying to do is establish Carrying Capacity limitations based on the recommendations of some secret committee of environmental scientists of their own chosing. The problem with climbers and boulderers, as they see it, is that they visit the Park in the first place. Many of the sport climbing areas are actually in much better shape today in the aftermath of development than they were back in the good old days. The garbage has disappeared from the base of the Waterfall Cliff and bouldering areas like the Graveyard are no longer filled with broken bottles and trash. However, the Sempervirens Fund definitely wants to build a walk-in campground at Partridge Farm no matter what way out groups like the "Friends of Castle Rock" would like to see happen. Someday no doubt Castle Rock will emerge as a major international bouldering area like Fontainebleau. Climbers from all over the US and the world will stay at the walk-in campground to boulder for a couple of days or longer. So what? I'm sure the salamanders will still be doing just fine in Castle Rock Creek.
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