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Hardest Routes in the Cascades


snowleopard_x

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well if we are going this way then what is the hardest boulder problem in the cascades cause the crux on that is probably harder than any single move on whore, yada yada yada.... rumr you are saying whore has had 4 ascents? cause there are alpine routes that are unrepeated despite MANY attempts so you have to ask yourself which is harder - the one that people repeat or the ones that defeat all attempts to repeat? boxing_smiley.gif

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no dru...3 people have completed the short version and none have completed the long version, although erik kubiak was very close before he moved to the full extension...

 

keep in mind that these couple of climbers have sent solid v12 in a handful of tries and the topo is a little off as that one move rates a v9 or 10 on the ground (not v4)...the extension is around 13 d after having redpointed a 14a...

 

this route would be considered "difficult" anywhere...not hardest but still hard...

 

also, a lot of the stuff unrepeated here is for lack of effort...face it, the cascades are not the draw that, say, the alps are...

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ya but even in the cdn rockies, say, more people have redpointed existence mundane 14b than have climbed the north face of north twin lowe-jones, or the stump/logan on robson...not for lack of trying... the hardest route is the one which WITH ALL FACTORS COMBINED including weather, approach, conditions, technical difficulty etc becomes the most difficult to successfully complete.

 

and if no one at ALL has completed it (long whore) then it can't be a "hardest route" yet more like a project... a route has to have been done at least once.

 

speaking of unrepeated routes has anyone ever repeated those russian exchange routes, one is on n face inspiration and the other is on bonanza i think?

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Ummm...there are like 4 people tops right now in Wa state that complete whore of babylon (and its logical extension that prolly goes at 14c or d) regardless of where that route is located...whether you had to bushwhack 14 miles in or walk 4 yards from your car bumper, there is NO ONE that frequents this board that could do that route or its extension...

 

say what you want about sportclimbing, none of you (myself included) will see those chains in this lifetime...

 

Man you're sensitive about sport climbing wazzup.gif. I wasn't even dissing on it. All I'm saying is that any one pitch climb, sport or trad, doesn't count as the hardest route in the cascades. I'm sure the HOB is hard and only a couple people can do it, but because it's only one pitch it lacks commitment.

 

On a one pitch climb if you can't do it you lower back down to the ground. On a bigger route you may have to do a bunch of nasty bullshit to get off of it partway up.

 

Anyway one of the climbs I nominated is a multipitch sport route on Baring. I don't remember the details. It may only be a wimpy 5.12 route, but it is pretty long.

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I remembered the sport route on Baring and looked it up in the Beckey guide last night - the description goes something like "Grade VI, 5.12b, 18 pitches, almost all belays are hanging, expect to spend up to 3 days on route". I think the FA was done by Bryan Burdo and someone else whose name I can't remember.

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With regard to long free climbs, it seems that it makes some sense to separate them into climbs that are easily worked. i.e. roadside and those that would be logistically difficult to project:

 

Roadside:

 

Lib Crack on Liberty Bell (roadside - two pitches of low .11 and the third pitch of .13b - easily "worked" for redpoint). Not sure how good/bad the gear is on the crux pitch. The only person to do it used fixed stuff?

The Passenger on Early winters – roadside: business is 5 or 6 pitches of sustained low - mid .11 trad (straightforward gear) with a single .12a sport move/pitch thrown in).

The Independence Route on Liberty Crack – all trad - a pitch of .12 and 4 or so pitches of low to mid .11. The gear is very challenging at a couple of hard spots. The gear alone would make it tougher than the passenger.

 

Just the same, there are a bunch of climbs at Index (forget the names, but upper town wall long free routes) and Squamish (the calling, U-wall/the shadow) that are easily harder than either the Passenger or Ind. Route. and may compete with Lib. Crack, not because their hardest moves are as bad as the crux on LC, but that their sustained nature makes a free ascent (onsight or redpoint) equally as chancy.

 

Logistically difficult:

These may be much easier from a free climbing perspective, but other difficulties give them a leg up.

Girth Pillar on Stuart – (seems like mainly a mountaineering challenge, with one or two pitches of high .11 or low .12? The skills needed for the icefall keep a bunch of people (me, included) away.

Colchuck balanced rock – A step down from the girth pillar – the logistics are far easier.

The Doorish route on Bear Mountain – haven’t looked at the description in a long time – how hard is the free climbing? Was it a free climb? The approach looks like a grunt and requiring some skill.

Vanishing Point on Mt. Baring – it’ll take 2 – 3 days, but just the same you can walk to the top in summer and camp in luxury, spending weeks rapping down and working the route, so it might be a bit of a crossover between the two groups. Anyway, it’s harder, than the other logistically difficult routes, but the hard moves are nowhere near as difficult as LC is supposed to be. It’s more like a sporty Northern lights: If you link pitches with a 70 meter, it can be done in about 9 or 10 pitches [+ 1500 feet of vertical dirt and trees]. Given the 70-meter, the business contains two low .12 pitches, about 4 mid-hard.11 pitches. Only one significant trad pitch – straightforward gear at mid .11. BTW - Even after the rockfall, the first few pitches are still only about 5.7.

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i kind of disagree, that colchuck balanced rock is harder to approach then the pasanger. but that's just my opinion. as far as girth pillar- 11d or even 12a are not hard by modern standard. yes, it maybe harder to get to this climb, but e.face of fou was climbed at7a (11d)in the early 80's. so basically anything under 13a should not be even considered hard and should be taken out of the discussion. at this point most of the ascents under 7b+/7c (12c/d) are not mentioned by mags- and that's for the multi-pitch routes.

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For some reason, you want to impose international standards on a local discussion:

as far as girth pillar- 11d or even 12a are not hard by modern standard. yes, it maybe harder to get to this climb, but e.face of fou was climbed at7a (11d)in the early 80's. so basically anything under 13a should not be even considered hard and should be taken out of the discussion. at this point most of the ascents under 7b+/7c (12c/d) are not mentioned by mags- and that's for the multi-pitch routes.

 

It's not exactly a big surprise that the difficulty of long free climbs in the cascades lag well behind international, or even national standards. Since this is a discussion of what's hard in the cascades, however, it'd be pretty boring to only talk about only those climbs that are hard enough to make it into whatever mags you read.

We live in a small pond and the fish aren't as big as elsewhere. The simple fact that the ocean has whales doesn't make it any less interesting to talk about the size of the fish in our pond. At least not for me - I don't hang out with international standard setters much.

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Dru asked:

speaking of unrepeated routes has anyone ever repeated those russian exchange routes, one is on n face inspiration and the other is on bonanza i think?

 

I think the one on Bonanza has been repeated, I asked around here awhile back and got some feedback:

Haireball said:

Bob Plumb made the second ascent of the Soviet Route on Bonanza with Dave Stutzman, back in '78 or '79. Plumb told me the rock was abysmal.

 

Bonanza discussion

 

I haven't heard of the one on Inspiration N Face being repeated, but if true that just might be due to lack of public exposure. A few more posts around here on the subject and they'll be lining up like cccommies on the Yocum. yellaf.gif

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  • 2 months later...
A few ideas to throw around...

Liberty Crack was done all free, a 12 pitch 13B.

 

By this do you mean that somebody free climbed the roof pitch and placed all of the gear on the lead DURING the claimed "redpoint"? Or are we still talking about the fellow (name escapes me) who hung quickdraws from regulargly spaced knots in a static line tied off at the top of the pitch?

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in the same critical vein of the post above, i inadvertantly stirred up Hans Florentine by asking him if he thought that a guy would ever free climb the nose. This i asked because it seemed odd to me that the other lines on el cap were seeing free ascents or free alternate lines, but, the nose seemed to be somewhat stagnant or lacking suitors. it seems to me that with the strength of the current crowd of climbers (due to the popularity of bouldering both in and outdoors?), that more guys and gals might be eyeing the nose as a free climbing objective. Hans seemed pissed and said it has already been free climbed by a guy (even though some of it was only top roped?) Seem like there is a big difference although a struggling 5.8 leader such as myself probably has no business even commenting on the tasks involved! Brooke Sandal (sp.) was the guy on Liberty Crack, who, by the way, i think was up on the Nose with some chick for a while too.

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  • 9 months later...

The hardest routes in the Cascades

 

The North Norwegian Buttress (has it even been climbed to the full summit?)

 

If you're talking how many time it gets climbed then Eve Dearborn would maybe be a candidate, but maybe just because of conditions, with global warming it may never get climbed again.

 

How about just adding "in winter"?

 

Has the full N Ridge of Stuart in winter been done yet?

 

How many times has the NE buttress of Sleese been done in winter?

 

How about the N Norwegian Buttress in winter or Liberty Crack Free in winter?

 

How about adding "free solo"?

 

Don't tell me there's nothing hard in the cascades.

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