Ascents in Oceania as trad by Francois Pieterse

A really good route, but I think we have very different definitions of 'Tree' and 'Ledge'. The belay on top of P1 has pretty good gear near the back and a rather small tree on the edge of the ledge. P3 has sufficient gear and is not very hard, I found it much less committing than parts of the Caves Route that we did later today. I just-just reached the stance on top of P3 with 50m ropes after linking P2 and P3 and the drag was a little rough. I missed the tree belay on top of P4 (probably on account that all the trees looked very shrubby and ended up linking P4 and most of P5. Just 5m from Cave 3 I found bomber gear just in time as the rope ran out again - belay was off and seconds were ready to simulclimb.

We tried to reach the summit by going up the Caves route and got as far as the last pitch before reaching the summit ridge. My big toe was starting to bug me and we were having some trouble finding the last scramble to the top. We went down the Caves route and almost stepped on a snake on the trail.

Adam's beta on the start was key to this send!

Above the lower crux I wished I still had a red and yellow C4. All gear I could find was a cam behind a flake and a tricam in a very parallel crack. So I downclimbed, fetched some gear placed lower on the climb, and got it onsite.

The section of the route that uses gear is very easy so it feels more like a sport route than a mixed route.

Wow! Very nice.

Pretty hard crux move with a very awkward position to clip the bolt from for shorter people.

There were some wasps at the crux, they motivated me to get through it faster.

Excellent gear after the initial scramble up to the tree.

Wow!

Got scared at the thrutchy bit and downclimbed a couple of times. Decided to give it one more shot before I give up and managed to send.

A really good position.

left hand direct start

Pretty loose, I don't trust the gear or the holds. It felt good having done it but it didn't feel good doing it.

What an epic route! At the start of P3 I stepped on to the face right of the chimney and got sucked into a scary gearless traverse around the corner. The last bit looked scary AF so I built a stance under the roof so my belayer cam watch me.

The decent was really exciting.

First pitch was just really nice face climbing with well spaced pro, just perfect. I don't know why but I thought P2 was going to be a ramble for the top and then it started out with a huge move and kept going. An absolute super route!

Really committing moves on the start of the first pitch!

For me pitch 4 was one of the best pitches at the grade - an absolute classic. It's quite overhanging and pumpy, it could be an 18, but it is very juggy.

Triple rack helps (a lot).

Felt really easy compared to previous tries.

The plan was to just try the route today and maybe figure out where to put gear for the redpoint, but I got up to the start of the first crux with not too much effort and decided to keep trying. I had to downclimb a bit to retrieve a cam I knew I needed later and managed to keep going to the real crux and pull trough. Excellent route with excellent gear!

Tried this one two times before this season and got it clean today. I only took one red cam to not get too used to having two and regretted it the whole way. After the crux I jammed a gold C4 in and it got stuck at a crap angle. I had to place a tricam because I was getting pretty led out and managed to send. That means I got most of the hard bits on passive gear, only the green cam at the crux-crux! (tricams are passive right?)

It helps if you have two 4s

Paniced and lowered out of the lower crux. Placed an extra piece on the second go and made it.