Lily Mountain
36 routes · granite (Silver Plume Granite) · 8,877 ft
What's here
5.5 to 5.10, with no single grade dominating.
Counted from the 36 climbs here that carry a grade. Shown only where there are at least 5 of them — below that the shape is noise.
How well located
Position on wall known 36
No route here has its own point yet. The map pin is the crag. At the wall? Survey it: 30 seconds per route.
The order of the climbs along this wall is known from the open catalogue, so a few surveys go a long way: standing at Anchor Management, My Grain Headache, Follow the Hare (3 climbs, about 90 seconds on Slamdance Buttress) would place up to 12 more climbs between them. Survey the wall →
“Up to” because the estimate between two surveyed routes is only used when they turn out to be close enough together on the ground.
Rock, from the geologic map
Biotite schist — metamorphic. Paleoproterozoic, about 2,500 to 1,600 million years old.
Conspicuously banded rock marked by alternating layers of contrasting composition; dark-gray to black, medium- to coarse-grained layers are rich in biotite, sillimanite, and magnetite; light- to medium-gray or bluish-gray, fine-grained layers contain more quartz and feldspar than biotite; white, coarse-grained layers consist of quartz and feldspar and minor biotite. Weathers to mottled reddish or yellowish brown. Layering is typically folded into moderate warps and tight flexures and isoclines. Protolith consisted of alternating beds of shale, siltstone, and sandstone. Regional metamorphism at about 1,700 Ma (Peterman and others, 1968, p. 2284) produced characteristic mineral assemblages that vary across the region depending on maximum local temperature and pressure. Northeast of the North Fork Big Thompson River, maximum temperature of metamorphism was as low as 525 degrees C (J.W. Drexler, oral commun., 1986), partial melting was not initiated (migmatite is absent), and the typical prograde assemblage consists of quartz, plagioclase, lepidoblastic muscovite, biotite, staurolite, andalusite, and iron oxides. Throughout most of map area, peak temperatures probably exceeded 700 degrees C (Nesse, 1977, 1984), anatectic melting was widespread (migmatite is ubiquitous), and typical mineral assemblage contains quartz, plagioclase, microcline, sillimanite, biotite, +/- garnet, +/- cordierite, hercynite, and iron oxides. Presence of garnet (rare) and (or) cordierite depends on local bulk composition; prograde cordierite appears to have formed by reactions of the type: biotite + sillimanite = cordierite + anatectic melt. Mineral changes between the lower and higher temperature regions are shown by the red dashed-line boundaries: sillimanite is present west of the S boundary, whereas staurolite and andalusite disappear near this boundary; microcline appears and lepidoblastic muscovite disappears at the K boundary; migmatite appears south and west of the M boundary; cordierite is present south and east of an unmapped, broad zone that extends from Eagle Rock (north of Estes Park) through Beaver Meadows, Mount Wuh, Ptarmigan Mountain, and southwestward to the east end of Granby Reservoir. GRI Source Map ID 141 (I-1973). ** Areas where numerous sills, dikes, or irregular bodies of Silver Plume Granite (Ysp) intrude biotite schist (Xs) [indicated by stippled regions on source paper map]. Areas that contain numerous conformable layers of pegmatite (YXp) [indicated by crossed regions on source paper map].
This is the map unit under this crag's map point, read from the 1:100,000 sheet (National Park Service Geologic Resources Evaluation program, 2006, National Park Service). The point can be a few hundred metres from the rock, a cliff often stands on the line between two units, and at that scale a line on the map is about 100 m wide on the ground, so the wall itself may be the neighbouring unit. The rock named at the top of this page comes from the public geology of this area; this card is the map's answer. Every crag on this unit: Biotite schist. Geology data: Macrostrat (CC BY 4.0), serving USGS and Colorado Geological Survey maps.
On the map since 1915
The USGS has mapped this ground since 1915. 31 historical sheets cover this crag's map point; the oldest is below.
USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection · Public domain · the record · placed by its coordinates
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Hidden as soon as you tell us, everywhere it appears, before anyone reviews it.
Public domain, U.S. Geological Survey. The sheet shows the ground as the survey found it then, which is why a trail or road you know may be missing. Every sheet over this point, 1915 to 1984: USGS topoView.
In print since 1877
1877 Geologic Map of Colorado (Hayden), high-resolution scan · F. V. Hayden; scan by the Colorado Geological Survey · 1877
Geological and geographical atlas of Colorado and portions of adjacent territory · F. V. Hayden, U.S. Geological and Geographical Survey of the Territories · 1877
Mountaineering in Colorado: the peaks about Estes Park · Frederick H. Chapin · 1889
The story of Estes Park · Enos A. Mills · 1914
Trail and Timberline, volume 2 (1918) · Colorado Mountain Club · 1918
Mountaineering in the Rocky Mountain National Park · Roger W. Toll, U.S. National Park Service · 1919
Free to read: public domain or government work. About Estes Park Valley as a whole, not this wall. More in the reading room.
Routes
Crag of Fear
- 1 Tibble 5.10
- 2 Unemployment Line 5.8
- 3 Tiptoe Through The Two Lips 5.9-
- 4 Guano a Guano 5.6
- 5 Who's Nailin' Palin 5.7
- 6 The Buckets Stop Here 5.10a
- 7 Burnin' Rubber 5.10b
- 8 Birthday Boy 5.10
- 9 Smokin' Joints 5.10
- 10 Mocha 5.9+
Quickie Cliff
- 1 Casual Six 5.5
- 2 Pickup Line 5.8
- 3 Ascent of a Woman 5.6
- 4 One Night Stand 5.10-
- 5 Nooner or Later 5.7
- 6 Luck of the Draw 5.8
- 7 Streak of Bad Luck 5.8
- 8 Trophy Wife 5.10b
- 9 Chokin' the Chickenhead 5.10
- 10 Atrophied Husband 5.10a
- 11 Manly Bulge 5.6
Slamdance Buttress
- 1 Anchor Management 5.8
- 2 Slam Dunk 5.9
- 3 Coors Flake 5.9+
- 4 Standing Ovation 5.8+
- 5 Sitting Duck 5.10
- 6 Tap Dance 5.8-
- 7 Lap Dance 5.8-
- 8 Blood Feud 5.9+
- 9 Western Swing 5.9
- 10 A Coarse Line 5.9
- 11 Show Me The Monkey 5.10
- 12 Rush Limbo 5.8
- 13 My Grain Headache 5.8
- 14 Squiggles 5.5
- 15 Follow the Hare 5.5
Also within 3 km
- Jurassic Park - Lily Lake1,349 m · 50 routes and 1 boulder problem · 9,547 ft
- The Crags2,210 m · 125 routes · 10,015 ft
- East Block2,235 m · 7 routes · 8,120 ft · Mary's Lake
- North Block2,262 m · 1 route · 8,081 ft · Mary's Lake
Straight line between the two crags' map points, each of which can be some way from its rock. For when this wall is full, or the sun has found it.
Photos from climbers
No photos here yet. If you're at the crag, yours would be the first.
Taken at the crag by climbers and published as they sent them. Each one's own location had to be within 0.5 km of this crag before we accepted it. See something that shouldn't be here? Use Report this photo under it and it's hidden at once. Anything else, write to us.
Conditions reported
Nothing reported recently.
Report what you see
Reports are dated and fade on their own: wet rock after 3 days, a bad bolt after a year. No names, no text.
Access & safety
The map point for this crag is on land managed by Roosevelt National Forest (federal). It lies inside national forest.
Land manager from USGS PAD-US (public domain), read 2026-09-29. It is the manager of the crag's map point, which can be a long way from the wall. What you may do on the rock is the manager's to say, not ours.
Rules for all Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests land
- Fees
- No entrance fee for the forest. Some locations require a reservation, pass, permit or day-use fee.
- Overnight
- Camping more than 14 days in a 30-day period, or more than 30 days in a 365-day period, is prohibited across the forests and the Pawnee National Grassland. Dispersed camping is within 300 feet of most Forest Service roads, on National Forest land; the MVUM shows which.
Read on Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests's own pages, checked 2026-09-29 by John Crawford. What they require, in full, or their own climbing page. These apply to the manager's whole holding; anything specific to this crag is above.
Nearby, from OpenStreetMap
- Toilets
- 1,946 m away (map)
- Mapped parking
- 222 m away, 2 spaces (map)
- Campsite
- Mary's Lake, 2,688 m away (map)
Distances are a straight line from this crag's map point, which can itself be hundreds of metres off; a road may be much longer. Mapped by OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL), so a toilet missing here may simply be unmapped. Parking here is what OSM has drawn nearby, not a guidebook's directions.
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