SHUT UP AND CLIMB©
climb smart, climb safe = climb forever
Michael Schneider
Danbury
There is more bouldering, not all of it included here, on the far edge of the gas easement north west of the storage center. Five lines on this, the black block with the serpentine quartz intrusion, range from 5.6 to 5.11+.
Another Connecticut climbing area zoned industrial.
West Side Bouldering
The fun in these rocks is in the discovery of the lines. The full potential of this hillside is stymied by its proximity to private property. Be considerate if you are disturbing /disrupting any of the neighbors, leave. If not keep climbing up the hill.
If you are very good at every thing it takes, it is easy to climb any one of the first pitch problems in old school style. (Blast the opening moves like a boulder problem, leave enough gear to keep yourself off the deck, don’t blow the moves, belay off a high point ) and move up the hill to the great boulders.
Terrywile Park
​
This is a very limited look at a few of the rocks at Tarrywile park in Danbury CT. Scattered around a knob shaped hillside that is bordered by the mansion and the public parking are some short gems that offer crisp high friction granitic blocks the highest is the farthest from the parking lot. A 5 minute walk to the prominent overlook and an easy walk around to the base of a black streaked corner that forms a 50 foot high prow that is just vertical, split into left and right sides there are a few good lines under 5.9.
Wooster State Park
At some point in time, starting around 2005 or there about, the visionaries behind the Ives trail network began to re route, close and actually remove some trails in their effort to bring the Ives Trail from a dream to the great resource that it is today. I took notice of these and the other changes that were to come.
When the route 7 highway expansion project was finished, the hilly two lane country road with numerous trail heads and parking pull outs on both sides of the road (paradise) was moved down twenty to fifty feet, widened to the east and straightened to the west, producing the six lane (as yet) undivided highway with guard rails and Jersey barriers that have all but closed access to the west side of route 7, that is Wooster State Park in Danbury.
Hungry Bear Boulder (SE Face 16ft just past vertical).
Many of the roadside picnic areas and historic campsites that were over one hundred years old were ditched, flooded, refilled and built over (paradise lost). All of these improvements resulted in the loss of access to climbs. The West Side, The Danbury North End, where climbing had been going on from at least '99-2004, as well as, all the parking and trailhead access to the state park on both sides of the road for miles. A stairway built of dirt and wood ties was placed at the Ives Trail, Route 7 intersection, at Starrs Plain Road. While not quite a link to no where, there is no parking any where near this point of interest
Trailhead/Parking can be found ACROSS THE ROAD from the shooting range, 800 yards north towards Danbury directly across from a blast fractured road cut block. It is an unmarked, unimproved dirt and gravel lot with a paved pull off just past a cable guard rail at the north end of a swamp/pond. (Not the gun range parking, crossing the road, rt7, is unsafe)
Trail Head: Once you have found your way to the Ives Trail, head north uphill, the east side becomes rocky and the hillside trail winds up and down. Yellow paint blazes and Ives plastic trail makers show the way. The trail has a steep jog up at aprox. 1 mile (yellow blazes) that ascends a short zig-zag step between sizable boulders. The Greetings From Surgar Hollow (GFSH) corners are up on the right. After this step, most of the climbing is a short rappel down. The trail continues to a intersection with the steep entrance to Ives Gulley. The old animal trails ,and natural fall line trails, are not always the best way to the base of the rock. Most of the climbing is down hill from the trail. The top outs are usually near, but some times as far as fifty yards away from the trail.
Drawing by : Malina Schneider
Sugar Hollow (Wooster State Park)
Raven's Crest
​
High above a loose, shifting talus slope that prevents access with steep, leg wrecking basketball sized rubble, sits the Sugar Hollow Ridge. By following the Ives Trail north, the escarpment appears on the left, down hill. Due to the loose rocky slope the best approach is to follow the yellow blazed Ives Trail along the top of the cliffs until you reach the Ives Gully, a natural, south west trending (down and away from the Ives Trail) break in the hillside between the main ridge and steep south facing walls of hard clean rock. (Right of Ives Notch)
Down the hill, along the cliff base, is a rift in the cliff wall. The Ives Notch, a stepped 5.0+ that summits the Ravens Crest formation.(Climbing on the outer edge of the large chimney.use a rope) . There are climbs from the top of Ives gully stretching all the way around the formation heading north including the west facing shorter cliffs,
the Far Left/North east side.
This approach is about ¾ longer than the treacherous direct scree field. Depending on any number of factors (ability to rock hop size of pack, condition of knees and ankles, etc.) IN DRY CONDITIONS ONLY a retreat down the scree to the swamp and then back south to a stream /culvert leads to the guardrail, Route 7, a ½ mile or so north of the parking.