Ascents by Christoph Rauch having Distinct route

Alpine adventure climbing with two traverses and a good amount of choss. Crux of the first pitch is right at the second bolt, the rest is way easier. The second pitch is a bit more homogeneous. The traverse to the anchor, where the rock quality is noticeably better, is quite good. Said anchor, however, is a lower-off-only "sow's tail", which doesn't make any sense in such a route …

Thought I was going up LLL, but ran into the first pitch of this one. Not bad per se, but slightly scary slab moves.

Slightly left of the bolt in the overhang, easier than directly to the sling.

Climbing the start head-on without using the nice steps behind you would be a shame. Using the slab to gain the good holds above the first bolt make this one a really nice 6+ or 7- or so, instead of an inhomogeneous 7+. Two slightly harder moves at the second bolt and then interesting wall climbing.

Climbed only the upper part of this, after "Südverschneidung Einstiegsvariante". Selling this route as a "direct variant" of KHG is rather silly, it's a direct finish for the dihedral if anything. KHG goes relatively straight up from the start, it doesn't get any more direct. I don't know if the traverse from KHG to the left is the crux of the route, but the upper part is certainly not harder than 6+.

High first bolt, you can place small cams on the way, otherwise it's quite bold. From there it's well-protected and a nice face climb with interesting movements considering it was a former aid route. A green dragon fits into a pocket in the traverse, but I had only a red one with me, so only David could benefit from that knowledge.

If you desperately try to climb directly over the last bolt, it might be 7, but the jugs a bit on the left are too alluring (and too close), so it's rather 6+. But a nice one at that. Similar to its right neighbour.

Marvellous climb with lots of crimps (not even very polished, with small dimples on them) in the lower part, then a juggy middle section to a roof. Cool boulder moves out of the roof into the slab, which isn't easy as well.

Great climbing on jugs in the first part, then a crux section (two moves on small crimps into an undercling in a crack) followed by a relaxing slab to the anchor.

Nice warmup, felt easy for the grade, even though it's a crack (with a thin layer of ice on the last meter).

Crux is the bulge directly above the first bolt, laybacking a mediocre slit. The rest is far more easy, but it seems I did the top wrong and climbed out to the right of the cave.

Standardised pockets in the upper part, slightly too shallow to take your time, good enough to sort out the next moves. Crux is a long move away from the first bolt. #warmup

First route in Sicily, and a very nice one! Beautiful rock and cool moves. 6a+ in my guide book, but 6a is fine.

Awkward offwidth in the beginning, then narrow chimney, nice squeeze-through behind the chock stone. The chimney widens above, after a few meters of stemming to the bolt, you need to get out into the overhang, which is probably why it‘s graded 7-. Apparently, you can squeeze through another narrow tunnel in the back, which is certainly what the first ascensionists did in 1916. Looked quite stuffed with leaves and dirt, though, so no choice here at the moment.

Surprisingly good climbing at this little crag. Powerful bulge in the lower part, directly up the little needle after the ledge. Cool hold structures and great moves.

Great way to start off. Obvious arête to a nice slab, a long runout to the first bolt in the upper wall which turns out to be perfectly fine, then a nice crack in the end, a little overhanging. After the first maillon rapide, there's around 5 to 10 meters more to climb to the top bolt, but the rock is slightly brittle. I hesitated for some time on the big ledge before committing to the last moves.

Homogeneous wall climbing, quite long and in good rock. Felt more like 6+.

Either a very forced line directly over the arête, or not really 7-. If you bridge out to the crack on the left, it climbs nicely having the bolts directly in front of you. Nice moves, nevertheless.

Nice pocketed #warmup in black rock. The holds are there, just a bit hidden.

Beautifully situated south of the Bussaglia beach, this fully bolted route is a nice afternoon (or, if it's too hot to climb in the sun, morning) adventure. The most adventurous part, actually, is the abseil, since it's often diagonally to the left, with a few bolts because it's overhanging, too. I think the way down took us almost as long as the climb itself. Pitch 1 is nothing spectacular, you might want to skip it if you're short on time or there's seepage (also saves you one abseil). Pitch 2 is already starting to get interesting, going up a blank wall right next to a dihedral. Afterwards, you're getting into the orange, steeper part of the wall, always following the line of bolts, roughly heading left towards the arête above a dihedral that marks the crux pitch. The latter is a little more athletic than the rest of the route, but the difficulties are over after a few meters, ending with a massive jug which invites you to cut your feet and hang a hundred meters above the sea. From there, the route follows the arête, sometimes stepping out into quite awesome, exposed positions. Great route overall, evening light makes for a brilliant mood.

A single harder move to get onto the slab, then easier but still on smallish holds.

Starts off like "Direkte Talwand" and then drives towards the left through an unfortunately quite splintery little wall section, then up into an overhanging dihedral to the anchor. Worth it for the finish alone, which is of course brilliant. Too many bolts for my taste, though. I literally left out every second after the split from "Direkte Talwand".

Incredible red and grey rock, fantastically homogeneous on brilliant holds.

Tricky slab with a difficult section at the overlap in the upper part.

Bigger holds than in most of the other routes, quite nice.

Great name, great route!

Good moves on big holds, crux directly at the start. Long runout before the ledge, which is slightly uncomfortable due to the polish. Generally, the polish diminishes the route's attractiveness a bit, but it's still bearable.

Looks hard, and turns out it is. Maybe it's the grease, but it could just as well be the awkward movements in the overhanging dihedral in the middle. Must have been exceptional in a less polished state.

Nice moves in the beginning, but then the route suffers from the same problem as many routes here: a bit left and you're in "Little Big Hole", a bit right and you're in "Short Cut", both viable options. The way straight up is a bit forced, but not bad.

Relatively homogenous on edges and blocks.

Cool moves to the anchor, quite athletic.

Quite similar to Ram.

Nice dihedral, but it’s over too soon.

Really short on tufa structures, felt hard.

Much easier than its left neighbour, but also nice.

Powerful start and finish, easier and nice middle part.

Funny route with a small chimney section, a little more "adventurous" than the rest here. Long, and varied, one of the best lines of the crag in my opinion.

Absolute pleasure line with good movements from bottom to top. Nice start with hidden holds behind the bulge, interesting the whole way through.

Good wall climbing, but a bit vegetated in the beginning and in the middle.

While there is a crack in the end, it's still basically a slab. The crack just makes the final section super easy, there's just one move at the beginning which uses the crack to get over a tricky passage. Nice and long.