Ascensões em North America por David Gibbs

We ran out of light, and rather than lead/follow/follow three of us up Swiss-UK, we decided to haul our asses up the fixed rope.

Will probably end up being 5.4-5.5, but hopefully with good position.

A perhaps tricky 5.7 -- but fun climbing.

Well, P1 is sport, but the crag won't let me log it that way. Oh well.

I found pitch 2 difficult, or at least, difficult to read at 5.8. And hang-dog doesn't quite give the same as feel as "a couple lead falls on gear, including popping the top piece on one of the falls."

Gear would be, barely, G I'd say. But, the climbing is never overly hard.

Route finding a bit tricky near the top.

If dry, a decent climb. It was almost dry -- just a tiny bit of seepage at the bottom.

As of 08/2013 one of the bolts in the upper section is missing its hanger.

Seems to now be fully bolted (though a bit run-out between 5th & 6th bolt, gear could help). (2010 topo describes as mixed.)

Two pieces of gear, then bolts the rest of the way.

Used one piece of gear to reduce the run-out between bolts a bit.

Did it as pure sport -- just committed to the run-out at the finger-crack near the end. Would be far more comfortable with a piece in the crack.

Did the trad (crack) start this time, rather than the sport (slab).

Climbed the sport/slab start. Happily had gear for the final crack this time, since I knew it was there.

Did the trad start on TR. Did the final face and crack a different way, to make it harder than when I lead it.

Actually climbed this as Hirosaki -- gear up the opening section, then past the intermediate anchor on the bolts from Nagasaki to finish on its anchor.

Sport variation.

More sport than trad -- something like 8 bolts and 2 gear placements.

Lower bolted section went far more smoothly than I expected.

Had to aid over the roof. I'm just too weak right now.

Hard start, with an intimidating ledge fall if you don't make the 2nd clip -- I'd be inclined to suggest stick-clipping bolt 2.

Rest of the climb is mellow, with a touch of though needed near the end.

TR with "rest" and "one point of aid".

Mostly fairly easy climbing (5.8ish?), then a crux that I and 2 of my 3 climbing companions (who generally have no problem climbing 5.10a-b at MdA) had to pull on a draw to get through. (A 3rd, who stands about 6'4 was able to get the crux.) So, maybe for those with great reach it goes at 10a.

Lead pitches 1-3, followed pitch 4. None of it particularly hard.

Followed pitch 1, lead 2 & 3. I actually was intending to link 2 & 3 -- but I never found the anchor and the end of pitch 2, and after the fourth bolt on pitch 2, ran it out to the anchors at the end of pitch 3. Probably more than 30m run-out by the time I, very carefully, finished the pitch. Talking with others who had climbed it the day before, they ended up doing the same thing.

Did it in 2 pitches with a 70m rope.

Had to pull on a draw at the crux. The crux felt 10b+, the rest of the climb 5.9.

One fall, around bolt 3, made a poor route-finding choice. Should be an easy red-point.

A pretty soft 5.10a.

Gotta figure out the crux, and get the red-point.

Took me a few tries to figure out the crux. Hopefully I'll remember for next time, but seems unlikely.

Consistently tough the whole way, rather than a single "crux" point.

Flo lead it, I seconded. Technically, I rested on gear at one point, but that was to clean a cam that had been placed (or migrated?) far enough into the crack that the I could just touch the clip-in loop, and had to use my nut-tool to release the cams.

A nice 5.8 warm-up. Gear was good. All nuts and tri-cams.

Hard climbing, but good. I took two falls, one after the 2nd bolt (first crux), then a 2nd right at the top, where everything got thin before it ceased to be steep. After a rest on the rope, I was able to pull both sections 2nd try, so I think I should be able to red-point this soon.

Finally got the lead clean. An awesome route, with 3 different crux points of different types and a lot of good climbing in between.

Pulled more directly over the initial overhang to the jugs, rather than traversing a long way right.

Spring, first day out, and I'm not back in lead shape -- got it clean right up until the last few moves, then couldn't quite pull that crimpy final crux, even with a few tries. I took a couple good falls trying, though. Then, I had to climb it all again to clean it -- less scary on top rope, of course.

Still a tough climb.

One foot slip, or maybe it was the high winds, but took one fall on the last crux section.

Redeemed myself by climbing Lavender clean.

Again, went more easily than I expected.

Climbed it a 2nd time at the end of the day to clean the anchor.

Was looking at gear choices -- I think it would go on gear, perhaps with a bolt or two for run-out bits.

If it were for the unsettling and unprotected opening moves, I think Lavender would be the best climb at Home Cliff.

Very few easy moves, lots of different challenges throughout, and several cruxes.

Also, an important hold in the finishing crux has broken, making the finish harder than it was.

While the main crack is pretty wide, there are enough other gear placements that leading this doesn't need wide gear if you're a confident trad leader. (I lead it on a rack of Tricams from small white to big green, with doubles below the blues. It was reasonably protected with that gear selection.)