Ascents in Robin's Buttress

Super awesome first pitch. Starts with perfect hands, and basically just keeps going right to the belay with a couple of slightly wider sections. Thought the crux was definitely the overhang on p2.

Another fantastic pitch. The guidebook description is perfect.

Oh this was so good. So many #1's. Best thin-hands crack I've climbed outside of Indian Creek. Borrow some cams and get on this.

Dreamy man-sized hands.

Good crack climbing but I thought the face sections weren't awesome. Somewhat suspect rock.

Lovely.

forgot how much foot jams hurt! classic route

simply awesome.

Everyday I'm shuffling.

Lead pitch 1. We took triples .3 to #3 and a 4, and a set of nuts, which were surprisingly useful. The 4 and a .2/blue alien and smallish nuts would be handy for the anchor at the top of the first pitch. There is currently no rap anchor.

Climbed to access lunch. Felt a bit tired after all the stuffing around on Rondeau earlier.

Seconded Nate up the mega classic first pitch. Rapped from tat rather than do the awful second pitch, then proceeded to get our ropes stuck. I spent ages ascending the stuck ropes, got them unstuck, then re-stuck, then unstuck again. Finally got them back after a couple of hours of shenanigans.

Up the 5 star first pitch before rapping off and having an epic trying to pull the ropes down.

Up the 5 star first pitch before rapping off and having an epic trying to pull the ropes down.

Will lead the first pitch and I got the second. The first pitch is amazing, a choose your own crack adventure for the first half, finger locks, bridging, fist crack and thin hands. about halfway it transitions into the best hand crack i have experienced on Ben Lomond, this continues to the top of the pitch. Second pitch to the top is choss, Next time I climb I would climb on half ropes and rap off the tatt at the top of the first pitch.

Isaac led so that he could rap down Master Blaster to sus the gear. I followed to clean. A combination of laybacking and bridging works well. I had to sit twice to clean some very bomber wires.

Fell off with about 5 m to go. Left a trail of blood and tears up the upper half of the crack. This one is unforgiving! It lulls you into a false sense of security early on with lots of edges for your feet and the odd pod for a good jam and a rest, then slowly ratchets up the difficulty as the crack gets just a little bit thinner and all the helpful footers disappear. 3 green cams, 5 red, and 3 yellow (plus some smaller stuff for the bottom) are plenty as long as you manage them right, which I didn't. I'll be back as soon as the skin on my hands has grown back. They look like sausage mince now.

A poor start by me lead to a slow seconding after a great lead by Issac.

After a bit of a mission on Darkness Visible we ended the day with a quick lap up Rajah, excellent jamming as always, a great way to end today.

Nate laybacked to about halfway up the first pitch before pumpung out and whipping onto a green cam, munching the rope in the process. I top roped up to his high point and rested for a minute before finishing the pitch by stemming between the two cracks. We swung leads from there to the top. Great sustained laybacking or bridging (or both?) on the first pitch, burly hand/fist crack second pitch, and the usual chossfest exit pitch.

With Graham. 1st pitch only (the hard one), then rapped because we were running out of daylight. Accessed by top roping the rigudon offwidth from the chains on Ramadan. Just barely managed the onsight. I had to fight for this one! Intricate sequences of fingerlocks and pulling on rattly faceholds. We had an incredible sunset on the walk out.

So close to the onsight! I found staying concentrated for the length of the pitch super tricky! The gear was also pretty hard to find with the crack not being just parallel. The climbing at the bottom section was super cruise though! A foot slip at the final rooflet sent me flying with a quality whip! Will have to comeback for this one! (First pitch only)

Hardest 17 i have ever climbed, the first pitch being just off hands and not quite fist made it super desperate and quite tricky! Second pitch was a bit spicy climbing the choss arête with the ledge and gear well below. Third pitch had another desperate start and a scary mega choss section to finish! Nice to finally top out the ben!

I cruised most of this on second only to have it turn into a desperate battle at the top trying to remove gear from rattly finger and ring locks. Ended up collapsing on the belay ledge quite exhausted but stoked with my effort. An awesome onsight attempt by Harry which was thwarted by a pesky foot skip. The first pitch is really only 35m long and we rapped off here due to time constraints.

I led the first and third pitches on this and man it felt hard for 17. Sustained off hands on the first pitch left me gasping for air and then terrifying choss on the last pitch combined with quite funky climbing also had me working. Superbly awesome last route out here though and a great way to top The Ben. Hands are now absolutely messed after 5 days of jamming dolerite.

Toproped the first pitch only, laybacked into the squeeze chimney, really couldn't be bother off widthing!