Ascents in Zig Zag

First lead trad route.

Really bloody nice. Sick start crux, sit down rest, mega pocketed sequence to stellar deadpoint and cruisy climbing to top. Kneebar rest before top lip lets some juice drain. A few attempts and went 😃. Short but sweet.

Short but interesting moves. Got scared going for 4 th bolt on the onsight and though the sequence was good and I did have the clipping hold it felt very unsafe. Much better second go with a longish draw in situ. Cool move at last bolt.

LED with Ant 1980

Intimidating! Monstrously steep. Clean to the crux move (turning the lip) and then I got scared! A few rests to figure out the crux move, then clean to the top. The lower section is scary rock and gear, but as the climb improves so does the gear. Delicate technical climbing under the roof and arete to the waco, then exposed strenuous crux. The vegetation isn't as bad as it looks. You can thank me for the chalk on the hard-to-spot crucual hold to gain the crux. I WILL be back for the send!

Alright, so maybe it was a bit ambitious to try and tick this in the afternoon after ticking Grasshopper. With 3 hours daylight left I launched up this. Fell off at the main crux (and chucked a spaz after a particularly painful, gear-ripping fall which damaged my glasses). Found my sequence and went to the top. The roof of this is WAY more vegetated than when I tried this last 4 years ago (and I pulled out mountains of shrubbery back then too!), and I managed to rip out a tonne of vegetation on lead (got pretty pumped too!) mid-roof. This is a great, intimidating route with a hard and committing crux, but the first 6m of death shale is bloody horrible.

Yeeeew! 1st shot today placing all gear on lead, 3rd shot total over 3.5 years. As I've said before, this is classic EXCEPT for the poxy shale-start. Once you get in the crack proper, it's great trad climbing that just gets harder and more committing all the way. The crux for this is absolutely crazy (and really hard for me, I'm cranking solid 24 through that crux sequence... might be easier if you're short, or have beefy fingers?) and intimidating now that the fixed wire is a long-forgotten memory... Hanging upside down on the lip of a roof-arete via a heel-toe-cam to place a cam in the crack below is ridiculously cool. Very acrobatic and strenuous.

BETA SPOILERS AHEAD -> You've seen the photos, you've heard the stories: this line looks amazing. The moment you see that corner leading into an exposed roof traversing into the abyss you are left with mixed feelings of intimidation and excitement. The next moment, when you are tied in at the bottom staring at the first 3m of choss, that has no doubt changed forms since the first ascent, it leaves you with second thoughts, and third thoughts. Once I built up the courage (read: stupidity) to swim through to the first solid hold, the corner and roof are pleasant, besides the jungle feel of reaching around ferns to place gear and to dig out holds. It just adds to the climb's uniqueness, I suppose. I reach the end of the roof (gr 21-22 till here, minus the choss start), place two bomber pieces, and reach round for what I was always hoping to be a jug. To my surprise it was huge. But, a jug to no where. Without the crucial pieces to protect the next section (#0.5 BD) and the prospect of my rope running over the arete and slicing in two (https://tinyurl.com/ycues8g3), I embraced defeat...I lowered down, to then jumar back up and aid past the crux to free (read: flail) to the top in approach shoes with entries catching on the shale ledges. I suppose if you worked out the crux, heightened your risk tolerance to welcome choss piles of death and don't mind jungle fever, then give it a go!

Had been saving this one for far too long , and Vinnie was psyched for it so I joined in, somebody had to clean it after all ...

Enjoyable climbing up to the roof that lulls you into a false sense of difficulty before suddenly turning up a notch at the lip ... bit of flash/cleaning pump and bad hand placement caught me out on the first shot but then climbed through ...

Great route, will be back for the full tick soon ..

adding to my list

Only really worked the first 5 bolts - all the moves went there and the final roof is easy too. Crux looked hard, didn't really try it. A windy, shivering day, but not as cold as when it was bolted!

70m rope lowers from 2nd-last bolt, but there's still a 5 meter exit ramp after that.

Wander up to first BR then start slab climbing for 5m

led

Scarey face grating slab

with cate

Hard move off the big cairn to rock scars! then plod up to top.

cairn central! intresting first holds...

Enjoyable, varied climbing.

About 16. A little runnout at the top. Ok

With Niall.

With Big John.

With Dr Carl and Stu. Exciting start, the rest is cruisey.

Had no cams for the first lap.

Seconded this but didn't feel like more gear was needed than just the bolts. Cruxy start and a reachy arete midway but the rest is very straightforward

Sport route with optional cams. Some delicate arete moves. Start is more pleasant than it looks. Probably still soggy at 18. Nose-butting sharp edges not recommended, chunky gusher.

Blocky climbing with poor pro after 1st belay

Do 1st pitch only to new lower offs. look for giant bolt at chimney then step left. Probably 16 at least.

Kinda destroyed me, but maybe I was having a bad day? Pulled up on one move after falling on it several times. Just not my style of climbing but a good experience overall.