Bob and I had been talking about what we were going to work on this season as last year was a bit of a bust. We have a few things in mind; continue working the upper face, open up Noobie Squeeze area or putz around around on a short wall just before German Face. The short wall got our undivided attention today.
Anyone who has been to German Face knows exactly where this small face is. You pass it on your left just before you go up the hill to the bottom of German Face. It is about half the size in both height and width. The reason we went here is that the access is really easy to the top and bottom and we can quickly put up a number of moderate climbs. Bob was fartin around here 2 weeks ago and put in a set of top bolts. I put in 1 safety bolt and then put in a set of top bolts. After top roping it a couple of times, I put in 5 bolts to cover the 30-40 foot route.
It starts in the middle of the face behind a pine tree. The opening sequence is on fairly thin fingers but good feet. The route goes straight up to where I had to pull out a large loose block (left obvious scar). Use a couple of side pulls to clip a bolt just below a ledge. There is a large side pull to the left but very little else to help you get on up on the ledge. It requires an awkward mantle move. I would have been fairly heady move so a placed a bolt to protect that sequence. once the ledge is made, it is only a couple of moves to the anchors. If one were to fall there, it would be a bad ledge fall so one last bolt went in just before the anchors.
A lot of the bolt placement was secondary to the ledge in the middle so I thought that move should be integral to the name. I am off to Boston tomorrow so that was also on my mind hence...Boston Mantle. I goes about a 5.8 knowing the route. If you miss a couple of key holds, it will make it fell harder.
We figure that this will be a great learning area. We have yet to name it. We have thought about Baby Face, or the Elementary Wall. I don't know. Anybody have any thought to name an area that is specifically help introduce people to sport climbing? Leave a comment.
1 comment:
Alexe and I had go at this today, her first time out since she sprained her wrist - so props on her. I like the route, ut I disagree with your rating I think it's stiffer than a 5.8, the move is a solid 9 in my opinion. Either that or I'm way out of shape :-)
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