Ascents as trad by Sam Lancaster having Distinct route

2nd pitch is where the quality is. Raf lead the first pitch, I lead 2nd, lots of good gear. Would be nice as one long pitch, another time!

Done from the lake off Donovans boat with Thomas Herman. Certainly an exciting way to warm up to kawakawa climbing getting off the boat with a full trad rack, constructing an anchor and climbing up over some very dirty ground! What an experience. I would recommend rapping in and cleaning as all these climbs are pretty dirty, I doubt they get many repeats but they should, good fun!

Some great moves down low, then eases right off till the top. Half ropes would be useful.

Bit of a scary traverse, commiting move over. Wonder if there's a better way..

Easy climbing with some good fist jams upto bit trickier slab, nice to have a .2 or .1 cam to protect before the run out top moves.

Fun moves onto the hanging face near the top.

Great climbing, nice finger crack up top. Harder than Fingerprints.

Brillant climb, stoked to finally do it. Doubles of finger sized cams useful. Great pro and some nice feelings of a little bit of exposure.

Great climb, pumpy on the legs!

Really cool, engaging route. Easier to the first bolt than expected, this route has two cruxes. Decently exposed feeling. Good variety of moves and gear. Small cams and nuts are very useful as are alpine draws. Rapped off to make cleaning a cam that walked easier, plenty of rope left with a 60m from the boulder we rapped from.

Nice climbing with fantastic views- highly recommended!

What an experience! I finally got on this at around high tide when the combo of waves crashn and strong wind were threatening to drench my belayer (thanks Donovan) and added some motivation for me to get off the ground quickly! Not sure on the grade.. I'm not that good at jamming (as I suspect the majority who try lead this, why doesn't NZ have more cracks!) but getting better so tricky to know, not that it really matters. The sandbag of 16 feels kinda appropriate. Could have easily lost the flash as my arms got a bit pumped around mid height but I managed to keep it together, stoked on that.

Quality

Quite nice with some good bridging and good gear. Grubby but not too bad. Nice to finally get back to lead it.

Wayne climbed the first pitch, quite fun alpiney climbing. I went the wrong way on the top pitch and traversed out right to the top.. pitty should have read the description properly.

Romain lead the pitch nicely. Could easily be a 2 star or even 3 star route if the splitter continued. Rock deteriorates after the crack substantially in the chimney. Crack is quite nice though, could be bit stiff for the grade- definitely need to be able to jam!

I got upto the 1st anchor and realized just how exposed the 2nd pitch is.. decided to have a closer look, climbed past the two bolts, placed a cam and decided it was too much for me. Cleaned the gear and downclimbed. Such a cool looking 2nd pitch, I will be back more prepared!!