[TR] Mt Grimface, Cathedral Provincial Park - North Buttress Notch Direct 8/21/2015

[JanD]

Trip: Mt Grimface, Cathedral Provincial Park - North Buttress Notch Direct

 

Date: 8/21/2015

 

Trip Report:

We intended to climb the NB (Fairley Discroll 1985) as in Beckey guide but got confused about the start. Upon looking around the gully, we ended up about 1/2 way up the gully and noted P1 of the description below. This may have been climbed before but we are not sure. Since we did not find it documented we give a topo and description here since it’s a truly great (although short) climb.

 

P1: Climb stellar dihedral and face crack for 35 m, when dihedral ends, break right onto large block and belay. 35 m 5.9

P2: Scramble up gully over large blocks with a couple mid 5th steps to within 10 m of notch col. 50 m mid 5th.

P3: Climb stellar, straight in, overhanging finger to hands to fist crack and belay on a block. 30 m 5.10+ (?)

P4: Continue up stellar hand crack and avoid some loose flakes. Top out on large sloping ledge on ridge crest. 20 m 5.9

P5: Cross ledge to right edge, climb around arete and up, trending right over large blocks and some cracks to gain a large corner/chimney that is capped by huge blocks. Break slightly out left from corner to belay at base of cracks/blocks 5 m left of corner. 50+ m 5.6

P6: Climb cracks and blocks to large blocks/ledge on buttress prow. Step off blocks onto low-angle face and start traversing out right on ledges and cracks to base of final dihedral/crack. Just around the corner and down from the belay is a large free standing pillar on the right margin of the buttress. This is a good landmark and can be seen from the NW col on Grimface (the decent col). 55 m 5.7

P7: Up the dihedral to the summit. 35 m 5.7

 

Some notes:

- P5-P7 seem similar or identical to the finish of the NB in the Beckey guide.

- P1, P3, and P4 are stellar 5 star (out of 3) cracks that are all well protected.

- The crux pitch has a sister crack to the left that looks good too.

- We cleaned a lot of loose rock but some large loose flakes still exist, in particular on P4.

- There appears to be an easier variant for the last pitch around the corner to the right.

 

Cheers, Jan

Topo

 

P1, stellar dihedral and face crack:

 

Crux P3 overhanging fingers to hands to fist:

 

P7 with free standing pillar in background:

 

Gear Notes:

We climbed on doubles to BD #2 and a single #3 which was OK but somewhat runout (there is a ~8 m section that takes #3 size). Doubles to #3 would be better.

 

Approach Notes:

Approach up Gully climbers left of NB to about 1/2 way up to SE Notch. Scramble up Gully that turns into wide chimney/chasm capped by huge boulder. Break out left up ledges to base of right facing dihedral with face crack on left wall.

[bwwakaranai]

Damn that looks sweet! Stellar is right. Such a wonderful area

[mountainsloth]

I am beginning to believe that BC truly has it all. Nice find!