We started off our trip to Smith Rock with the classic Zion! We got an early start, and started climbing at 7:00 AM and got to the top around 9:50 AM. The approach is super short and all on a really cushy trail! All anchors are bolted. We clipped our shoes to our harnesses and climbed without backpacks, which was really nice.
Gear
- #0.3-3 with doubles 0.5-2 was about perfect. I forgot nuts, could have used them on the low angle slab part of P2, but ended up being okay. If pushing grade I’d recommend doubles of 0.3 and 0.4 too.
- No walkie talkies, communication was okay
- 60m rope
- Crack gloves
- Shoes clipped to harness (no need for backpacks, it’s a quick climb)
Pitch 1 – 70′
Cruse diagonally up the giant buckets toward the corner and up to the bolted hanging anchor.
Pitch 2 – 5.10a/b, 100′
The crux pitch. The first crux is right off the anchor, surmounting a roof-ish move to the right. I took a hang here (only hang on the route). Then, the terrain turns lower angle for 15 feet (if you brought nuts, you can pop a few in, I forgot mine). And then it turns vertical with some leanback at the start for 10 feet and then some corner jamming, until you exit on the left onto a really nice bolted belay ledge.
Starting off 
Immediate crux moves at start 
Then easy low angle for 15 feet 
Then leanback corner crack 
Exiting to the anchor!
Pitch 3 – 130′
Really fun easy jamming for maybe 20 feet, and then spot the chalk that exits to the right. It traverses straight 90 degrees to the right for 10-15 feet until you start to reach a shallow crack that you go up on. This part is PG13 as you can’t place any gear for the traverse, and the features are definitely a little thin, but not too bad.
Pitch 4 – 5.9, ~100′
This pitch starts off with a cruxy exposed hand-over-hand traverse left on a thin (#0.2) hand ledge/crack for 5 feet before moving upwards. It’s probably best to just get through the first part quickly rather than trying to place gear, but it’s definitely a bit spooky. Then it gets easier as it goes up. You finally get on top of a ledge and then walk 7 feet to the left and take an unprotected but easy slab 15 feet to the top (where there’s a bolted anchor to belay your second from).
The start of P4 
After surmounting the ledge 
The final easy slab to the top
Top!
Descent
The walk off is super easy! It takes the gully immediately to the climbers right, well-worn trail, really good trail, chacos are fine! Near the bottom there’s one spot you can rappel (or maybe downclimb). We did the rappel after we climbed one of the sport routes at the crag there.
