I drove I-10 East to Eagle Mountain Road. Then north to a side dirt road to a T-intersection, then turned left on Hayfield Road. These were the smoothest dirt roads I've ever driven. I was doing 30-35 mph without a problem, so any car could make the drive. I parked in between the two canyons. About half a mile from my parking spot, I reached the entrance to Difficult Canyon. Pretty quickly, I ran into the crux section with giant boulders. The boulders were solid. There were multiple class 3 obstacles and catclaw eager to rip my flesh. Did quite a bit of backtracking as I hit dead ends. I made a couple of scary moves, not always on the cleanest route. As I got deeper into the canyon, I was motivated to get through, not wanting to come back this way. After scrambling and crawling through several tunnels, the canyon opened up for a quarter mile, then came the second scramble section, with new problems. Past that, the canyon got easier. I walked up on a beautiful king snake basking in the sun. He had no interest in me and let me get quite close. I wound around the canyon to the ascent gully on the south face of Anschutz.
Entrance to Difficult Canyon
I didn't take any photos while scrambling, but I did shoot some shaky GoPro video.
The ascent gully was class 2 with crummy, loose rock, gaining 1500' in the final mile. I slid around and slowly picked my way up. I could not see the saddle at the top, but GPS gave me some encouragement. For a fleeting second, I considered abandoning the summit and just completing the canyon loop, but I was too close, and vowed to continue the fight. From the saddle, it was a short walk over two small bumps to the summit. register placed in 1981. The last visitors to sign in before me were Bob Burd, Patrick O'Neill and Karl Fieberling seven years ago. Definitely a seldom visited summit. I took a longer than usual break on top to rest, finish my Flame Broiler bowl, and enjoy the view. The return trip down the loose gully was a slow and painful knee buster. I tried to stay on what little solid rock was available. With great relief, I reached the bottom of the gully and started down the mellow Dragon Wash. I had a second snake encounter there, a huge red racer, 5-6' long and larger than the king snake. Unlike the king snake, she was skittish and disappeared in the rocks before I could snap a photo. Anschutz was serious fun and scratched my scrambling itch. For an easier day, you can go up and down Dragon Wash or take other canyons approches that appear more moderate.
Ascent gully
Dragon Wash exit
Joshua Tree boundary marker
Back at truck, super smooth road
Souvenir
7 miles, 2443' gain
