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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Topic Author's Original Post - Oct 19, 2004 - 01:26am PT
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so coiler proposed an "obscurity rating" in the "best of the best" thread... perhaps you all have some suggested candidates.
"(O0 being routes like: The two cracks just to the right of "Grant's Crack" and O7 being routes that fell off [like "Werner's Crack"] or routes of legend, or theoretical routes)"
Rating routes that are no longer in existence raises some problems for me.. perhaps these should be more like bicycle road racing's "Hors", beyond catagory climbs (on a bike).
Anyway, some obscure climbs that I have attempted (or at least looked for):
The Gardener Did It, Manure Pile Buttress, 5.9, an obscure climb right under my nose? never found it...
God's Creation, Manure Pile Buttress, 5.10a, not so obscure as to escape retro-bolting however...
Euellogy, 5.10a, Mojo Tooth, anyone do it? the definition of steep... Gary couldn't understand what my problem was, even after he lowered me from below the roof and did the bottom on top rope... how do you spell "steep"...
Wise Crack, 5.10a, The Royal Arches Area, two things: classic Valley "4th class" approach (have your rope ready), and the truely funky bolts at the "sort of" belay station atop p2...
Eric's Book or The Prude, both short 5.9's, Mirror Lake, found them one rainy day and have not yet returned...
Almost everything around Camp 4 Wall, never run into crowds there, did run into Melissa and Kate up there once... an example: The Buttocks, 5.9, a lichen scraping chimney adventure.
I have no idea how to rate these on the O0 to O7 scale, I'd suggest letting the upper end of the scale "float", rock climbs which have succumbed to geological activity, or which are theoretical or legendary shouldn't count...
what say ye?
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Oct 19, 2004 - 02:36am PT
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I think the Obscurity Rating ought to be followed by a quality rating, probably the usual 5 stars but also including up to negative three stars.
Like
Church Tower O.5? Q-* (but great summit)
Harding Route on Apron Ob.5 Q -* (but long route that's still easy)
Direct Route on Column Ob.4 Q +1/2* (Totally great except for rock quality)
Upper pitches of Maxine's wall Ob.3 Q -*** (Runout dirt hummock mantels)
Route I just did left of Bridelveil Ob.7 Q no stars
Route I accidentally soloed on Conness Ob.7 Q +1/2 star
Galactic Hitchhiker Ob.3 Q***
Cloud's Rest My Favorite things Ob.3 Q** (Beauty but climbing isn't classic)
Shultzes Ridge OB.4 Q-* (lame but gets you to the EB of EL C0
Fecophilia OB.2 Q almost a star
FWIW
Peace
karl
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Matt
climber
SF
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Oct 19, 2004 - 03:27am PT
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Inner Reaches all the way to the right at Five & Dime
5.7 easy/wide w/flake to grab in the back, goes to really cool wandering & unprotected 5.6ish chimney, goes to filthy unclimbed lichen covered 5.9ish scary exit, goes to 'how the hell do I get off this rotten hill side?'
1 star for the chimney
-2 stars for the filthy factor
and i haven't really climbed enough obscure stuff to rate it on that level.
The East Butt of Lower Cathedral Rock- all pitches after the 1st 5 were somewhat unclimbed.
(i predict there will never be a ST for this route)
The last 3rd of the death slabs, in the dark, by headlamp, with a pack on, that may be at the top of my 'obscure' climbs list.
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coiler
Trad climber
yosemite
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Oct 19, 2004 - 09:18am PT
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I cant take all the credit for the Obscurity scale. It was started about 6 years ago with Ben "Benwa" Zartman, Jay"Shaggy" Selvidge, Brian "Mr. Way" Knight and myself. We were all on the quest to find the least traveled routes. the scale worked something like this: O0 being routes that are in the guidebook,usualy right next to something that gets done too much, like "Lemon" at sunnyside bench. It's the route you do when the old classic is crowded. O1 is the route at the cliff thats in the guidebook but nobody does, like, "inner reaches". O2 it's in the guide book and it still never gets done, I mean never. A good example of O2 is "Alley cat" on middle cathedral. O3, it's in the guidebook still, but nobody knows much about it, but Tucker Tech has done it; ex:"Phantom Pinnacle", or the "Flakes" on middle cathedral. O4 routes, they aren't in the guidebook but it's on the obscurist's tick list ,like "Via Aqua" or "church Tower". O5 routes, Little is know, but the consensus among obscurist's is that it IS there. Record shows there have been ascents. an O5 could be something like, "Spireview point" or Pohono pinnacle". O6 is getting tricky, It's definately not in the guidebook, and little is known about it. No know ascents among the Obscurists' circuit, "Willow th'-whisp" is a great example of this. Lynea Anderson and I have made several forays into the area of obscurity looking for it. Still we've never found it. O7 like I said is a route that doesn't exist anymore or maybe never did. Like "promulgated pinnacle" (which fell over in '98) or "Werner's Crack" which fell off in '97.
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Rhodo-Router
Trad climber
Otto, NC
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Oct 19, 2004 - 11:55am PT
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I'm reminded of an entry in the ANAM (accident journal) a couple years back about some people getting off route and mangled looking for the '5.6 second pitch' of some deservedly obscure line on the Lower Brother from the Sierra Club guidebook era.
Obscurity rules. How about the Chockstone Chimney, is that thing any good? Jose P. liked it a lot, not sure why. I wonder about the effect of this forum in the world: if a few people here began raving about a particular route, could it actually be made popular? Hopefully a truly worthless pile, maybe such that once you do it you know you've been had, and you must thereafter rave about it to others in order to sandbag them into going and doing it...
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Rhodo-Router
Trad climber
Otto, NC
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Oct 19, 2004 - 12:03pm PT
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Is that the Flying Buttress Direct?
I see from another thread that the Chockstone Chimney is well regarded.
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David
Trad climber
San Rafael, CA
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Oct 19, 2004 - 12:18pm PT
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Would anything in Yosemite Valley be worthy of a high obscurity rating? Seems like only some little known route in the Namib desert or Antartica would be truly desrving.
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Melissa
Big Wall climber
oakland, ca
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Oct 19, 2004 - 01:40pm PT
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Hey, Coiler. Jay and I play with the O ratings still. We've added a couple of rules.
For example, nothing in the Supertopo can have an O rating.
For 07 I might suggests routes that you think are your own FA's, but find evidence of someone else's passage along the way.
Also, I think that logging in around 04 (on up depending on whether or know you actually know of anyone beyond the FA whose climbed it) are routes like the top pitches of Eagles Eirie or the Choinard-Pratt (mind slip corrected) where there is an arrow in the book telling you where to start, but nothing else. We climbed an unnamed moss filled 5.7 ow w/ an arrow (beside Supertoe) at Shultz' Ridge base earlier this year and rechristened it "Super O".
I also think that some crags are so accessible and non-obsure as to limit the maximum obscurity level of anything there. For example, I don't think it's really possible to climb 06 on the Sunnyside Bench, because you just know no matter how much choss might be built up someplace, others have checked it out and climbed through...and you can't really be all that obscure if you can hold a conversation with three different YMS guided parties during your lead.
My ratings (FWIW...which is only a few minutes of entertainment for me...) (In retrospect now that I've made my list, I think that there is some O grade inflation going on!)
I actually know people (obscurists though) who have climbed the Wise Crack, and it's at Royal Arches, so I give it an O2 or O3.
The Prude is on my O list. I don't know anyone whose done that, but it gets stars in the guidebook. It's in an obscure spot. I'll guess it's an 03.
The Buttocks is more like O0+ or O1-. I've climbed it, know many others who have climbed it, and I've seen it recommended as a practice TR. It still obscure enough to fill your eyes with lichen.
Maxine's... O1. I know a few people who've done it. Lower pitch in Supertopo. Everyone knows where it is.
EB of Lower Cathedral is O0 at most. Most of the people that I know who climb in Yosemite a lot and are good at that grade have done that route. Book gives it stars. It ends up on the ticklist of non-locals too.
Chockstone Chimney...I'd love to do this one. I'll give it an 02 b/c I know about 8 people who climbed it, but they are all either obscurists or climbing w/ obscurists. Rhodo, you can guess who went up w/ Jose et al. and also regarded it very highly. I think that some of those routes (i.e. the Hourglasses) at Ribbon Falls used to be more popular than they are now. Guess that's true of a lot of wider climbing areas (i.e. Elephant Rock).
Phantom Pinnacle has been highly recommended to me...as something that I might go do with an non-obscurity seeking partner, so I think that it might not suffer from some of the same sandbag and sand-filled issues as a lot of the 0-scale routes.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 20, 2004 - 12:11am PT
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My list of climbs in the Valley is something like 2500, I'd guess something less then 250 climbs get done regularly... or about 1 in 10; a lot of "obscure" to do for the obscuristas.
It is fun to hear from others about there lists. I've got Little Wing Area and Audubon Buttress on my list, among others. Obscure because of location and distance from the well worn paths, but not a very far approach, and very nice locations.
Chockstone Chimney was recommended to me by a venerable obscurista, Eric Gable, who really liked it....
...what about the unlisted climbs which were in old guides or magazine articles, like the stuff around Chappel Wall?
Intentional obscurity is something I've participated in. Developing areas often means being sworn to secrecy, late night hikes in the dark and non-kosher bivy's. But the experience is "priceless"... but I can't tell.
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maculated
Trad climber
San Luis Obispo, CA
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Oct 20, 2004 - 01:48am PT
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Aww, Karl you bagged Cloud's Rest and Shultz's Ridge?
Cloud's is my favorite formation in Yosemite. I've never trekked out there to do anything, though - not worth it, eh?
And I found Shultz's Ridge to be pretty darn fun. Those 10+s are a neat sporty break from all the crack climbing I was doing every day.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Oct 20, 2004 - 01:56am PT
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Supertopo definately influences what is popular or not. When I did Tenaya Peak there was no topo. It was pretty obscure. I couldn't find someone who had done it anywhere.
Now there's lines on the thing.
Coiler listed the O rating criteria so I see that I might have over O rated some of my routes. Still, there is a difference between the upper and lower pitches of some routes.
For example, lower pitches of Central Pillar and Kor Beck, not obscure. Upper pitches, plenty obscure. Bet a lot more folks have done the first pitch of Yin Yang, than the second!
Peace
karl
Oh Here's another one
West Arrowhead Chimney 0b. 5 Q -*** (Loose, Horrible!)
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coiler
Trad climber
yosemite
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Oct 21, 2004 - 10:32pm PT
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Chockstone chimney is one of my favorite Obscurities. It realy IS adventure. Great natural climbing too. Another great over looked route is Pohono Pinnacle, I did this with Tucker Tech a few years back. That route was alot of easy scrambling with some good little cruxes and some big views. The spire is obvious from camp four if you know where to look. A great little spire, we did the only ascent in ten years according to the summit register.
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Michelle
Sport climber
Zone 10
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Oct 21, 2004 - 11:03pm PT
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" Would anything in Yosemite Valley be worthy of a high obscurity rating?"
uh, Dave, sorry, but you need to go hiking. I find new and nasty dirty climbs to add to my list every week. I've even done a few (shocker).
sounds like all free climbs here, but what about Camp 4 Terror? Does the suckness of the approach enhance/detract from the overall obscurity rating or is there a suckass-approach rating as well? Is the mental health of your partner factor in as well? Does climbing, no matter where, with certain people qualify as obscure ("It's only about .10b." - my ASS)?
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 22, 2004 - 01:15am PT
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Well every area has a "relative" list of well deserved "obscure" climbs... it might be hard to believe that an area like Yosemite Valley, as popular as it is, has any obscure climbs, but only a small fraction of climbs are in fashion in any given climbing era. Popular climbs of the past often fade into obscurity, sometimes well deserved.
On the other hand, there are REALLY obscure climbs. Perhaps my most proud moment came rambling around in the Canadian Rockies. We went up the Saskatchewan Glacier onto the Columbia Ice Fields headed for Mt. Columbia. We were whited out on the Ice Fields for 3 days. The evening of the 3rd day the clouds lifted just enough for us to shoot a bunch of compass headings, both to our objective and the escape route back out. The 4th day greeted us with a snow storm, so we decided to bail.
Our secondary objective was the West Ridge of Mt. Saskatchewan... a "recommended" route in the Kruszyna and Putnam guide. We went up there, a ridge is an easy thing to find, and tried to puzzle out the description in the guide, to no avail. "Put the guide away, we'll just climb it", of course the guide has no rating in it, the description weighs in with about 30 words for about 700 m of climbing (!).
After traversing on stacks of book sized blocks across to a gendarm we gain the ridge and some scary loose climbing with an ultra-light mountaineering rack (a set of nuts and hexes) in plastic mountaineering boots, we rapped off the ridge on single nut placements convinced that the first ascent couldn't possibly have gotten the location right. While 15 of the 30 words seemed to fit, the other 15 didn't seem to.
Well after a rainy descent down Terrace Creek (if you ever go there, do not bushwack UP the creek, you will be in a world of hurt if you attempt it!) to the Alexandra River, and a hike out across the flood plane of the braided river (which had over run the trail) we made it back to the road and caught a ride to our car (we ended up a couple of drainages away from where we planned).
We went to talk to the wardens about the situation back up from where we had come and learned that they had not heard of anyone going up there in 10 years. The asked us about the state of the bridges (nearly washed away in one case), and the trails, etc... talk about obscure climbs... we were out for 11 days and saw people on the first and last days only near the trail head.
So there is obscure, and there is obscure...
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Gary Carpenter
climber
SF Bay Area
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Oct 22, 2004 - 11:25pm PT
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Ed:
Northwest Buttress of Lembert Dome??
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 23, 2004 - 12:49am PT
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Gary refers to an obscure climb in a popular place, Lembert Dome just left of "Cryin' Time Again"... Gary and I went up there on some sort of completeness jag of mine. The '85 TM guide has the Northwest Butt. of Lembert (5.9) as "notable". It is all rather obvious from the ground, not that I have ever seen anyone on it, nor has anyone 'fessed up to doing it.
It starts as a fourth class scramble, we went kinda high on that... when I saw the fixed pin in a crack Gary was just observing the rather airy aspects of our unprotected position. We got an anchor in and Gary went for the obvious corner. I took it from there, rather convoluted and though I wanted to go one way, I thought better of it and went another, to the right of the obvious corners. It was rather licheny, but after a bit I found the remains of a bolt, someone else had been here before.
Up on top of that pitch Gary lead the very loose third pitch to the top. It was an adventure, and fun because of it. Don't think anyone will go up there too soon. There was booty along the way, but it was old enough to be scary.
But my guess is low in the obscurity ratings...
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le_bruce
climber
Oakland: what's not to love?
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"I've got Little Wing Area and Audubon Buttress on my list, among others. Obscure because of location and distance from the well worn paths, but not a very far approach, and very nice locations."
Ed H, based on your fine TR's that I always enjoy here, I've got to recommend The Riddler up at Little Wing. Not obscure, I don't think, but a wild feature that climbs wide and well!
I see that this thread is now almost five years old, so maybe you're all over that.
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scuffy b
climber
just below the San Andreas
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Ed & Gary,
After climbing Northwest Buttress of Lembert, I noted in my
guidebook "Don't do this climb."
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Mungeclimber
Trad climber
sorry, just posting out loud.
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I thought The Prude got buried in a rockfall?
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bob
climber
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Northwest Butt of Lembert gets done quite a bit, considering its an obscurity. I've seen three different parties on it over the last two years and I have two buds who've done it. I've only done the first pitch that has pins. Funky little moves past pins up to a huge ledge. I put a route up that goes off of the initial crack of the next pitch. Just stay in the right corner and don't go over to the buttress out left. Good corner climbing to a bolt and a hard airy mantle thingy. Next follow the flakes and corners to the top. The exit moves are airy for Lembert! Super fun route in my opinion and obscure.
Wow did i just babble. Someone go enjoy it next summer!!
Bob J.
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