Climbers Need to Rally to Save Routes in the Red River Gorge
By Michael Frank, Adventure Journal on February 17th, 2012
If you’ve ever climbed in Kentucky’s Red River Gorge you haven’t forgotten its fantastic array of sandstone challenges. But even if you’ve been there you may not realize that adjacent Muir Valley Nature Preserve isn’t part of the Red — it’s on private land. And its 300 bolted routes, which range from 5.2 to 5.14a, are in danger of closing — climbing is funded by owners but has to be offset by donations (they don’t charge admission). Muir Valley, named for naturalist John Muir, only dates to 2004 but saw 30,000 visitors last year. A buck a climber would go a long way toward saving the area.
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