Views from the Top of Castleton Tower, Moab, UT
After graduating from community college the Spring of 2014 a friend and I went on a road trip to climb iconic routes within bordering states. The North Chimney crack up Castleton Tower was one such crack. The approach is long and steep as you might guess from the photo. 
Source
I'd strongly recommend making an Alpine Start for the tower as the Moab Desert Sun doesn't relent. The climb consists of 4 pitches:
- A type-1 fun and "gear-eating" 5.10 hand crack to get you up in the air.
- A sketchy 5.9 offwidth featuring a rickety old bolt that you should never in a million years trust your life with. We managed to push past the offwidth by protecting with a BD #4 cam, though it's recommended that you use at least a #5 and preferably the "big-daddy" #6.
- A pitch tucked away within a chimney an you pull on boulder sized rocks lodged within the chimney themselves.
- A confusing traverse to start as you climb onto an adjacent face out of the chimney, followed by good exposure and the top of the tower!
Views from the top
We signed the notebook in the gear box up top to leave our mark and prove to others our having climbed the route as well. Upon signing it we saw that Alex Honnold, yes The Alex Honnold who's just free solo'd Free Rider, had climbed Castleton Tower just one day before us! (He did a much harder route than us, of course, but Honnold had just been up there! Crazy!).
Thanks for reading :)
