Where can I learn to clean aid?

[hakioawa]

Willstrickland suggested a good way to practice placing gear is to find a good route to practice clean aid climbing. So the question is . . . . Where are good EASY clean aid routes? I can lead 5.8 trad free climbs but would love to be able to clean aid a little to get that up to 5.9 or so. Any thought?

 

[Lambone]

City Park on the lower wall at Index would be the obvious choice. Easy C1, takes lots of nuts and small cams.

The lower wall has lots of routes that are C1-C2 and some more spicy stuff as well. Look for the guide called Sky Valley Rock.

Have fun!

[Charlie]

I second city park- it starts with a bolt ladder and then joins a straightfoward crack-easy to solo, tie off to the big tree at the base and feed yourself out slack using 2 clove hitches as a belay. You will need a second rope though, to rappel back down and clean your gear.

[TimL]

City Park is a really good clean aid climb. If soloing sling the big rock at the base of the climb and tie-off a couple of the bolts as additional anchors. After you graduate from CP try 10%. It is a really good C2 micro nutting test piece to the left of Jap Gardens. Iron Horse and Stern Farmer are both good clean aid routes but both require a hook move. Be careful of zippering Iron Horse I've seen it happen before. I've also seen people aiding Thin Fingers. Enjoy!

[two-flats-fer-sure]

Squamish has lots of climbs that are too hard to do,(for most mere mortals) but great to aid on....The gear is usually awesome and the variety endless!

[specialed]

Town Crier, upper Index town wall, if you want an fun, easy multipitch route with a lot of easy hammerless aid.

[mattp]

ed -

Your're back. Good to hear from you.

[Dru]

Any continuous crack climb (doesn't have to be an aid climb, lots of good free climbs like Classic Crack make good clean aid practice climbs under the right conditions like nobody there) can be clean aided on cams and nuts. great for pouring rainy November days. and you can do it on solo-aid with a couple of clove hitches or a Soloist as a back up so you don't have to drag your girlfriend out in the rain to belay you.

[This message has been edited by Dru (edited 10-05-2001).]

[ScottP]

The first pitch of the Golden Arch at Index (the one off the ground) is a good, fairly easy aid pitch. Has good placements, a camhook move or two, and more good placements.

Try to avoid free routes that get a lot of traffic. (Godzilla, Thin Fingers, Davis Holland, etc.)

[This message has been edited by ScottP (edited 10-05-2001).]

[michaeljosephnozel]

Depending on your location (for example, Portland vs. Seattle), the Lower Gorge at Smith is a fantastic place to practice clean aid--on either side of the river. Combining both sides of the Lower Gorge, you have about 600-800' of nearly continuous columnar basalt, with cracks spaced about every 4-6'. Almost nobody down there, even on the most crowded of weekends, so you just jump on whatever looks good. And in my opinion, this is the best climbing at Smith, anyway!!