Ascents in Scarface Buttress having Beta

I thought this was "Bolts Are Back", and was kind of concerned for a while there.

2nded Neil on the FA of P1, P2 and P4. Neil kindly donated P3 to me for the FA. How does this climb even go at a reasonable grade? Super-unlikely and intimidating. P1 start is a hard boulder then nice traversing. P2 has a super-technical, hella pumpy, UNIQUE roofy start, then a pleasant finish. P3 is desparately thin slabbing on tiny polished sloping crimps, to a nice trad finish. And P4 has another boulder start, to adventurous traverse and friction slab finish. EXCELLENT!

2nd shot. Onsight ended 30cm from the big horizontal ledge as I continued to move my right hand up the seam and the seam ran out! 2nd shot was smooth sailing. Hard to grade, as it climbs like a sustained V3 boulder problem for the first half, then quite easy second half. Funky moves up pockets, left hand slapping up a fused flake feature, while right works an incipient seam. Marred by dubious rock, and bolts (all of which are 1 move above the obvious clipping stance). Bring loooong draws!

Mostly seconding Neil on the FA of this unlikely (visionary?) trad line. Neil donated the FA of the awesome pitch 3 to me (thanks Neil!) which I climbed onsight. P1 - 2nd: exciting traversing with great rock after the first 5m, P2 - 2nd: outrageous trad roof climbing, tough crux move to great face climbing above, P3 - onsight FA: sustained face climbing on pockets and features, P4 - flash first repeat: rad cruxy technical crack finale.

Pretty cool route, very cool that bolts have been used sparingly making some sections feel very out of the ordinary, whilst placing gear.

Fun times. Move on the crux (p2) aren't too hard but actually placing gear in the flake is strenuous! Very cool climb to have near Sydney.

Only lead pitch two so that's what the insight applies to, this is the money pitch. What an awesome position! Quite overhanging, rad! Finished the whole route in the dark. Good Sunday arvo adventure!

Pitch 4 into pitch 5 linkup only. Seconding Neil on the first ascent. Intriguing "very trad" start to the ledge (pitch 4), then tricky roofing and hard topout finale (pitch 5). Good fun, and a great way to end the day.

Pitches 2, 3 & 4 with Neil and Bulti. 2nd pitch is awesome! 3rd is awful access rubbish. 4th is a great weird finale and harder than it looks.

Pitches 2, 3, 4. Super tired so a bit of dogging occurred! Wicked climbing up pitch 2 and pitch 4 is trickier and cooler than it looks. Thanks for the rope gunning Neil.

P2 (22) - Onsight (with some beta from Neil as to where the route goes), and P4 (20) via the original finish this time (partial onsight, as I'd done some of it before in the variant finish). P2 is a stunning pitch of unlikely trad on bomber rock, with great pro, in an exposed position, and with surprisingly pumpy and technical climbing. Stoked to get on this one! P4 is good in the "adventurous trad" style.

Seconded Neil on the FA on both pitches. P1 is amazing, but hard, bold, and bloody terrifying. So much core tension to hold a series of polished, sloper undercling pockets as you move across on bad feet with a scary run-out (I was almost certain I'd fall off). P2 is great technical traversing on good gear, with only the tricky down-climb start to tarnish it. Could become a rarely repeated classic...

Seconded Neil on the First Ascent. If you're doing Avian Abattoir, there's no excuse not to rap in and do this route as well. Varied climbing on cool pockets and features, with a tough finale that I felt was desparate (I got my leg stuck in a break!). Nice little sport number and a great addition.

Repeat. P2 (the money pitch) only. Just a leading lap on this great pitch to kill time while Stephen worked Gravity. Perhaps not as epic as I remember it, but still great trad-ish climbing on bomber rock, in an awesome location. Great protection and moves. Save a #3 if you want to skip the 1 bolt on this pitch for an all-trad ascent.

A full lap from the ground to exit the crack. Finally led P1 (Onsight) - I'd forgotten how terrifyingly scary the sandpit rock for the first 6m is... great corner crack and traverse after that. P2 - Clean 2nd (Repeat). P3 & P4 (Linked) - Clean (Repeat). P5 - Red Point (technically, since I'd seconded Neil on this over 2 years ago, can't claim an Onsight), but in the dark, without stripping down unnecessary gear, and without ticking or cleaning the chipped topout hold and slopers. Fun. Short.

Really great for a Sydney route and pitch 2 is legitimately a terrific bit of trad climbing. Great rock and great gear and I think it overhangs by at least a few meters. The pitch 1 hand traverse is also pretty fun. Definitely worth the effort to get out there.

Sick route! Although a little scary at times, there's really good gear so don't be put off.

Fun and adventurous

Forgot to Traverse right after the crux and spoilt the send by trying to go up Slopers next time!

Well, we climbed from the bottom to the top. Spoogy conditions made P1 pretty hard and scary. The bottom few metres is sandy choss. Mungo ripped off a ~5kg piece of rock just before the traverse. P2 was pretty good, but I was seconding so I missed out on the exhilaration of leading it I think. Mungo liked it a lot. P3 was fun and a bit challenging but quite short. P4 was a bit awkward and tricky. We didn't do P5 because the top was wet. Altogether it was certainly a challenging climb with lots of weird moves

So good trad climbing in gong exists! Will be back to tick off the best pitch, took a pretty fun fall after the crux breaking a handhold, was going the wrong way which is now even less of an option. My blue totem held, how good!

Finished it off!

Got absolutely spanked. P1 traverse destroyed my soul. The rest went ok. Rory pulled a hold off on p2 and went sailing. Different a lesson to climb more trad, just couldn't find good body positions. Looking 👀 forward to coming back for a clean send 😄

Fixed a 60m static to rap from the top anchors to P1 anchors, then used lead rope to rap ~10m to the ground. Had to rest on a cam about 1m above the P2 bolt, in sight of the anchors. Then broke a hold going slightly off route to fall on the same cam.

First ascent (thanks for the scouting/donation, Neil)! A nice little technical arete, which is substantially easier if you're taller. Great pro the whole way (don't forget the #4 and #5 BD Cam) and good rock. RIP beloved WRX rally-wing, you shall be missed.

Sandy junk. I didn't bring any trad gear and I'm bloody glad I didn't blow the top moves. A few easy moves lead to a sandpit and choss, then some hard moves lead to sand and vegetation. The crux movement up a flake feature was cool... but utterly ruined by the terrible rock quality.

Stellar thin crack. Overhangs by 2m, though you wouldn't realise it to look at it. My onsight ended at the super-tricky crux (the last hard move), though I blame warm-up flash pump and 1 million degree heat as contributing factors. Great locks on good rock, with a tricky crux sequence that MIGHT be a sandbag at 20, but went quite easily 2nd shot. Loved it.

Great pitch! Shame it's hidden away by itself down there.

Tricky in the middle. Fantastic climbing.

Burly crack on a fine example of Wollongong rock.

Repeat. Sure, the crux is burly for the grade (and probably intimidating for most trad climbers) but it's over quickly, gear is plentiful and easy to place, and the climb is quite stance-friendly. Enjoyable thin-crack pumping. Now if only it was 40m long!

So damn close. Great route, stiff for the grade. Tape up recommended.

Felt hard for the grade