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G_Gnome
Trad climber
Cali
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Oct 21, 2015 - 12:35pm PT
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Some really, really lose, dangerous and crappy Todd Swain route in Josh. The only question is which one was actually the worst!
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Ksolem
Trad climber
Monrovia, California
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Oct 21, 2015 - 12:47pm PT
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Something on the west face of Winchell. Roper says of the SW Chute "No one really knows where this route goes, perhaps..."
Secor says "Southwest Chute... this route is also known as the SW Arete." Hmmmm.
Eve L. and I went looking for this mystery. We figured by the books it couldn't be technically hard so we took one 9mm 50M cord, a few slings and a set of stoppers. Big mistake.
After a couple pitches of crappy 5.9 we found ourselves at the base of a gigantic chute. Seemingly vertical, this chute featured excellent quality granite. The problem was this rock was cleaved into plates, each about two feet thick and about the size of a two car garage door. They were stacked one upon the other and the whole house of cards was held together by the concave nature of the chute which wrapped around us in the shape of a huge horse shoe. Arming myself with the logic that this house of cards had survived countless seismic events I led up.
This place really gave me the creeps like nothing I have ever climbed before or after. I had this weird taste in my mouth all the way up. Eve insists that there were some 5.11 bits, finger traverses back and forth across the tops of some of the plates. My brain was too fried to know what I was doing.
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Sierra Ledge Rat
Mountain climber
Old and Broken Down in Appalachia
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Oct 22, 2015 - 06:59am PT
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Okay, I'll bite. the worst climb that I ever did was a volcanic plug in New Mexico. The rock quality on the first 4-5 pitches weren't bad, but the final summit pitch was vertical, loose, soft ash conglomerate.
My brother led the final summit pitch. There was no belay at the bottom and no protection on the lead.
He was sending down TONS of debris and rocks. So he told us to untie from the rope and seek shelter while he finished the lead. Basically he free-soloed the pitch.
On the summit he had a scree bollard for a belay.
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Gunkie
climber
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Oct 22, 2015 - 07:46am PT
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on the border with Ny; at a place called Suffren, we called the cliffs Tory ledges.
I climbed a lot at that place in the mid-70s to mid-80s. We called it the 'Transit Authority' probably because it sits behind a school bus depot and one of my favorite Chicago albums at the time was 'Chicago Transit Authority'.
I actually think the rock is quite good there with numerous quality pitches and some really intimidating roofs (central section). There is an upper tier with some very short, but awesome cracks in the finger to OW size. Basically bouldering or TR kind of play.
We got many warnings about climbing there before finally getting caught by some NY state police and I was an adult by that time. Not good.
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rmuir
Social climber
From the Time Before the Rocks Cooled.
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Oct 22, 2015 - 08:07am PT
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Probably the worst first ascent I have ever done… The Escarpment outside Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, a.k.a., Jebel Tuwaiq (pronounced "Twayg", Arabic: جبل طويق). A 600 m cliff running about 800 km through the plateau of the Nejd—certainly some of the crappiest Jurassic limestone this climber has ever seen. Two expats, one American and one Brit, in search of adventure… The ledge I was standing on in this picture fell off from under the feet of my partner as he left.
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Brokedownclimber
Trad climber
Douglas, WY
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Aug 21, 2018 - 03:33am PT
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My nomination is of the Regular route on the Rotwand in Eldo Canyon. Starts out by wading through enormous patches of poison ivy. First pitch is entirely fractured and is something like a pile of stacked-up large bricks/concrete blocks. Pull outwards on a hold--slides out like a drawer--don't like it? slide it back in. I think on the entire first lead I was able to get a single wired stopper that had maybe a 50% chance of holding a short fall. Last pitch has the only redeeming climbing, a piton protected small roof/overhang that went at 5.7 (old school ratings). The descent sucked since it too went through a forest of poison ivy.
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AP
Trad climber
Calgary
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Aug 21, 2018 - 09:17am PT
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I haven't done any of these but they are listed in guidebooks:
Cdn Rockies - "The Worst Route in the Rockies" and "Crapaloose"
Skaha - "A Real Piece of Shit" route description: an awful crack climb disowned by the first ascentionists
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