Trad climbs

Crux is an 80m 5.14a/b pitch at 4000m altitude.

The first E10 on grit, climbed by Neil Bentley in 2000, Equilibrium has held its grade and repelled all but the most dedicated – or reckless. Neil Gresham stepped up in 2002 after a sustained effort (and yoga), whilst keen youth James Pearson sketched through the no-fall zone in 2005. The route has not been repeated since.

The route features a 7C+ boulder problem from which Neil Gresham took several ground-sweeping falls, followed by a hard runout to a pocket and a welcome cam.

References

[1] https://www.geocities.ws/readza1/climbing/gritlist/grit_e9.html

Cleasby and Matheson's first new route together. Cleasby suggested that they were a good team and decided to name the route Grand Alliance to commemorate their climbing partnership (1:38-1:46).

References

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_X4urkZnPk

One of the hardest routes at the time it was put up with a sport grade of 8a+.

Pete Crew:

Brown’s rule at that time was to use no more than two pegs per pitch, he decided to retreat, leaving the abseil peg marking his highest point. Over the years, this peg on the wall became a constant reminder of Brown's superiority over the rest of the field. He tried to climb back up the wall on several occasions but could not get past the difficult lower section. The wall grew in reputation, just as Cenotaph Corner had years before; the final blank section grew from Brown's original estimate to a figure that sometimes reached 40 feet; the wall became known as the Master's Wall - Brown's own territory, on which no-one else dared to trespass, and it was assumed that sooner or later it would fall to the Master...

On the Sunday it was still blowing hard, but I persuaded Bas to go up to Cloggy, just to "have a look" at the wall. I think he realised that it was going to be more than just a look when I carried both our 300-foot ropes up to the crag... the first half of the climb went quickly and I arrived at Brown's abseil peg feeling fresh and confident. Neither of us was very keen to belay on the minute stance, so I fixed a couple of runners and carried on. The next 40 feet or so seemed easy and then I came to the final crack. As the chocks were in place I had not brought any up with me. I realised what a mistake this was when the first one dropped out. I moved up again to the next chock, a small pebble, fixed a sling in it and stepped into the sling. The chock split in half. By now I was getting desperate as I could not take much weight off my arms and my last decent runner was about 50 feet below, on the ledge. Just above the split chock the crack almost closed, so I spent the next ten minutes working a sling into this constriction using a peg. By this time I was absolutely shattered - I was half-standing in the sling on the split chock and using a layback hold with one hand. I sat in the sling to have a smoke and the mist cleared a bit ... Once I had recovered the rest went easily ...

We had a bit of a problem naming the route. Everyone knew it as the Master's Wall, and if Joe had climbed it, that would have been the perfect name. But it seemed presumptuous so we opted for the Great Wall.

References

[1] Clogwyn Du'r Arddu Climber's Club Guidebook (1989) Page 147 /library/7278/clogwyn-dur-arddu

16 pitches of slab climbing joy/misery, questing up some of the glassiest, most glacier-polished granite out there. By modern standards the grade of 5.12c R might seem modest, but the route has seen only a handful of ascents in its near-50 year history.

The origins of the route are complex, with Mark Wilford, Dave Austin, Chris Cantwell pioneering up the wall in phases, with varying amounts of aid, between 1976 and 1980.

Jonny Woodward made the second ascent and first in-a-day ascent in 1992. Notably he chose to wear old-school non-sticky rubber, finding that modern shoes rolled too easily off the route's micro-smedges.

Alex Honnold made the third ascent in 2011.

Bruce Morris narrates the history:

The history of the Hall of Mirrors is now fairly well known. Between 1976 and September 1980, the route grew by a process of accretion, countless attempts by different teams involving various and often enough conflicting personalities. However, for the sake of convenience, the growth of the route may be divided into three distinct stages, dominated, in succession, by the skills and philosophies of three different prime motivators, Mark Wilford, Dave Austin, and Chris Cantwell. Every advance up the wall was likewise preceded by some major change in equipment, technique, or strategy. These include siege climbing from portaledges, the provisional use of aid chains, and the appearance of the Galibier “Contact” shoe, with its softer, more malleable, and adhesive rubber.

During the drought of 1976-77, Mark Wilford of Colorado Springs established the route’s first two pitches, titling his effort The Opening of Misty Beethoven, after a highly overrated, though somewhat programmatic, pornographic film. After such an ambitious beginning, it is not clear why he stopped so soon. But the route is highly tempermental at best, and its conditions were undoubtedly at their greasiest after a scorching, bone- dry summer. By self-admission, Wilford had never friction climbed before either. He had no way of knowing in advance that using chalk would increase the rating of the second pitch several additional grades. So, the hypothetical third pitch must have appeared impossible, although it was to be rated finally only 5.10a.

It was at this point that Dave Austin decided to administer a salutory dose of technical hygiene. Backed by experience he had gained on A Mother’s Lament, Austin realized the use of chalk was anathema to advanced foonting* because the particles that fell down from his hands destroyed adhesion between shoe rubber and the smooth rock surface. After recruiting Chris Cantwell and me from the Lodge parking lot, Austin now added pitches three through eight to a route renamed the Hall of Mirrors. Even with the aid of fixed ropes and siege tactics, however, we were unable to complete the Unfinished Ninth, a pitch that was eventually to be rated 5.12b.

Accompanied at one time or another by either Scott Cole or Scott Burk, Cantwell took over the lead. In the fall of 1979 he had obtained a prototype pair of “Contacts,” a new softer rubber shoe by Galibier that permitted better friction on higher-angle stone. He finished the Ninth and, over the next year, undaunted by storms and earthquakes, pushed the route up to the base of the 13th pitch. Here he decided, after drilling a few miraculous bolts up a nearly vertical prow, that a bolt ladder was finally necessary.

However, when Austin accompanied Cantwell up the fixed lines to this new high point, there was disagreement. Austin believed that following a ramp a few feet to the right would have eliminated the need for a ladder. Drilling could have been accomplished from all-natural stances, Austin argued. But in order to make the line harder for the sake of difficulty as an end in itself, Cantwell had refused to compromise with the natural rock environment and, instead, had deliberately chosen to construct a pre-placed “free ladder” up what he referred to as the “line of strength.” Feeling such tactics were unconscionable, Austin elected to drop out. Still, Cantwell persevered. After freeing the 13th, at a tentative 5.13 standard, he went on to add two more hard pitches before intercepting the Coonyard to Rim route. On this final push, in September 1980, Scott Burke was his partner.

Before they were freed, Half Dome and the west face of El Capitan had been conventional aid routes for over twenty years. The rationale behind freeing the northwest face of Half Dome was based on the fact that it was America’s first grade six. But Hall of Mirrors was the first time a Yosemite grade six had been conceived of as a free climb from its inception. However, it is especially significant that the Cantwell-Austin break underscores the conflicting face-climbing traditions that were introduced at the start of this article. Cantwell wished to maximize difficulty by constructing a well-protected free line, while Austin wished to preserve boldness by following the natural line of greatest weakness.

• Foonting is a technical Yosemite term used in friction climbing. It involves “smearing” on high-angle slabs while rapidly “padding” upward; moving up, in essence, faster than moving back down.

References

[1] https://publications.americanalpineclub.org/articles/12198204100/Method-and-Madness-Evolution-of-Yosemite-Face-Climbing-Standards

An early Yosemite 5.12. 5.10 other than a short hard section on the second pitch. Named for the direct Washington-Moscow telephone link established after the Cuban missile crisis.