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the shizzle => chuffing => Topic started by: mark20 on August 25, 2015, 04:46:38 pm
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Found an unclimbed limestone wall, about 20m high, on mostly good rock with some quartz holds that can be a bit crumbly. The rock is very compact, the only gear being a peg at 6m and some poor RPs and skyhook at 12m. Added a bolt belay at 20m.
Both routes start in the same place, steady 5c to a peg at 6m, some thin moves left and up to big flat hold at about 11m. Then reach up to a good but slightly suspect quartzy hold and tricky rockover (6a) onto the big flat hold and good rest and bad RPs (12m).
Then the easy finish steps right up a steady 5a rib to the belay at 20m.
The hard finish is a bit eliminate but once committed has some thin and reachy moves, 6b/c, with poor footholds. I think all the gear would rip if you fell off this.
As it stands the routes will be very bold (E5 6a and E8/9 6c ?) and not much fun without a clean first. It’s a 30min walk round and painful ab through some brambles to gain the bolt belay at the top of the wall. If they aren't climbable from the ground they will quickly get dirty and I can't imagine anyone being bothered to make the effort to clean them.
Now I’m not sure in which style to do these routes…
1. The most ethical way, do them as they are
2. ‘Designer Danger’ Add one bolt by the big flatty halfway up to create an onsightable E4 and ran out E6/7
3. Or Add a bolt on the hard finish only, leaving a bold E5 with optional hard but safe finish.
4. Or properly bolt them to give an OK 6c and 7b+
5. Other (please specify)
Is bolting justified to create a more popular route? Or to make a route more fun? Should it be left to a better climber? Opinions please :worms:
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Where's the "Pain au raisin" option? ;)
Your call. On an unclimbed wall its the prerogative of the first ascentionist. Go with your feel of what style the lines/rock best lends itself to.
It will be grid bolted in the future anyway..
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I'm of the opinion now that nasty danger is a bit naff. It's a pretty rare cat who will roll a heavy dice these days.
Put the bolt in by the flatty and leave the runout finish, and I could name twenty people off the top of my head who might have an amazing time on something like that.
Then when, as Shark says, it gets grid bolted, another hundred might munch their way up it.
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Bolt it and they will come...
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Do whatever you fancy; its just a bit of rock.
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climb it in an adventurous style and then bolt it and over grade it
half the world will come to climb it and will have a brief chat about how it was first climbed
then you'll be famous and probably get on The One Show or something
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I reckon leave it. Assuming we're talking Peak here then at E8/9 you could have the distinction of putting up the hardest peak lime route, as everything else non-bolted has ceiling at E7. Rock blank enough to put up a limestone E8/9 that's solid enough to warrant a trad route seems to be few and far between.
If you fully bolt them, then depending on where it is and how good it is the 6c will either become a polished crag warmup or totally ignored (and hence a waste of the bolts).
Designer danger - if you stick one bolt in then more will appear in time.
Or, peg it, and ensure its debated at BMC peak area meetings in two decades time.
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climb it in an adventurous style and then bolt it and over grade it
half the world will come to climb it and will have a brief chat about how it was first climbed
then you'll be famous and probably get on The One Show or something
Its not the same since Adrian Chiles left...
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climb it in an adventurous style and then bolt it and over grade it
half the world will come to climb it and will have a brief chat about how it was first climbed
then you'll be famous and probably get on The One Show or something
Its not the same since Adrian Chiles left...
Or since Grimer's appearance, for that matter ...
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climb it in an adventurous style and then bolt it and over grade it
half the world will come to climb it and will have a brief chat about how it was first climbed
then you'll be famous and probably get on The One Show or something
Its not the same since Adrian Chiles left...
Or since Grimer's appearance, for that matter ...
https://youtu.be/fIhz6ZCLwD8?t=33s
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Sounds like you would end up with something like Midnight Summer Dream at Chee Tor.
Not sure if that is a thing in its favor or not.
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Take the bolt belay out, ya wimp. What's wrong with a few brambles? Everyone is taking the adventure out of climbing these days.
Seriously though, it would seem a bit incongruent to lead a bold 8/9 to a bolt belay - a bit like fighting for your life on a Devon sea cliff, only to enter a world of barking dogs and kids buying ice creams at the top.
If it was me, I'd either do as Dave said above, and leave it as it is (without the bolt belay), if the route is of sufficiently good quality. You could consent to it being bolted at a later date. That could be seen as a statement or expression of something worth preserving (Discuss..). Or, if it's really only so so, create a couple of sport routes, if you can be bothered, and you consider it worth the generous investment of time and money this involves.
Half way houses don't really serve anyone, and just lead to cobwebs, ivy, rust and rotting tat in a few years time.
Whichever option you take, do it well. That way, you can help have a say in a reduction of more of the soul-less crap being badly created at the moment.
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a bit like fighting for your life on a Devon sea cliff, only to enter a world of barking dogs and kids buying ice creams at the top.
Wot, you mean just like all the Torbay cliffs, and for that matter South Stack, which are generally great despite because of the entertaining contrast between wild adventure below and sedate tourism above??
I'm with G-dizzle on this one. Not designer danger - designer scare. I think it still has a place and can give routes an intriguing character if done right. The Lime probably doesn't need a load more disproportionately popular grid-bolted bollox, nor a load more disproportionately neglected scarcely-climbed trad routes. But a neat hybrid with a bit of "feel" to it could be a good middle-ground (I may have been doing quite a bit of slate recently....).
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Given that routes such as Plectrum Maxilla Direct (E7) at Rubicon, which look like they're on semi-decent rock, are super-accessible and obvious, haven't been climbed in years... I think you can assume any designer danger route would see little attention. It's rare to find new routes in the Peak that aren't sh*t though, so do what will give you a good experience?
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Isn't Pectrum Maxilla Direct protected by an old peg and without a belay? I was thinking more along the lines of a bolt and big safe-ish runout and a good belay, a la Midnight Summer Dream, Circe, Slate stuff, Upper Pen Trywn, etc which all seem quite popular.
I think I need to spend some more time on the route and decide which style will suit the route the best. Some interesting replies, thanks a lot, loads to think about
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Given that routes such as Plectrum Maxilla Direct (E7) at Rubicon, which look like they're on semi-decent rock, are super-accessible and obvious, haven't been climbed in years
Do things like Piranha get climbed?
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Given that routes such as Plectrum Maxilla Direct (E7) at Rubicon, which look like they're on semi-decent rock, are super-accessible and obvious, haven't been climbed in years
Do things like Piranha get climbed?
Yeah, and White Bait. Pretty safe now with pads. I've been looking at PMD recently from the ground and suspect with a bit of chalk on it and a video online, it would be a popular highball/route (assuming the peg's OK and the move's low down aren't desperate due to hold lossage).
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I think it gets bouldered out to the big flake a bit, but after that I don't think so, probably mainly due to the potential difficulties in getting down again. I think JB has done it and I think slid down a tree to get off or something. The lengths some folk will go to to avoiding pulling on Kudos wall.
T_B - Have you see anyone actually finish/top-out whitebait, or go further than the flake on Piranha?
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Leave it trad = purity, respect for the rock.
Sport bolt it = add a line for the general sport climbing populace to climb.
Designer danger = ?
Is it creating a line that the average sport climber won't want to do? What's the motivation for that? To appeal only to a subset of climbing hardmen/women?
Personally I don't get the designer danger/designer scare thing. Certainly appreciate the world of bolting isn't black and white, and ultimately you've gone to the effort of finding and cleaning and equipping the route. But my opinion is that if you're going to put bolts in, do it in sport style, and put them in to keep people off the deck and in the positions they're best to clip from. I get pissed off when I think I'm climbing a sport line and suddenly come across a massive arbitrary run out. If I want 'spice' I'll go for a curry thanks.
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I like designer danger routes when they're done 'well' with a bit of art and they fit in with the feel of an area - Scary Canary on Pen Trwyn (not particularly 'dangerous' though), numerous slate routes.
The aesthetic of a climb matters more to me when the level of risk involved with climbing it has been artificially created - if the look of the line or the way the moves flow are compelling and interesting enough then it's more forgivable/justifiable to risk limb to experience that climb. If the climbing is ordinary and the line not attractive then there's less appeal to risk limb, and it would probably lead me to wonder about the motives of the first ascensionist - were they just trying to prove how hard or brave they were, or is the result artful and creative? Also, the danger on good designer danger routes adds to the experience - on poor designer danger routes it either takes away or doesn't add to the experience. Of course it's all subjective and personal.. but you could probably put people's preferences on a spectrum.
Plenty of designer danger slate routes just don't seem worth it for some reason, probably to do with the aesthetic ... and so end up getting ignored until they're retro'd or overgrown. Jacuzi Jive on LPT - E4 with a bolt on the crux... hmmm I'm not sure what it really adds to the crag. It would be a good and very popular route upstairs on Pen Trwyn where there's lots of trad, but on a 99.5% sport crag it's easy to view it as a wasted good 6b+ warm-up.
From a re-equipper's point of view pre-placing non-stainless gear is inexcusable. Stainless 12mm bolts should be mandatory, not pegs, 'trad' crag or sport crag. If you're making a compromise in style - i.e. by creating an artificial level of risk by pre-placing bomber in-situ steel gear so that you can make it less risky for you climb a line up some rock and claim it as a new route, then you owe future climbers the same level of enjoyment and security that you constructed for yourself, without them needing to litter the route with further unsustainable rusting steel in the future.
edit - Ryan McConnell recently climbed a 'designer danger' E6 6b on Craig y Forwyn without it's solitary bolt, instead placing a tied-down skyhook as the only gear preventing a ground fall from the 6b crux at 15m. E8. To me that's a better style for this particular route on a trad-only crag.
My twenty-pence worth..
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The aesthetic of a climb matters more to me when the level of risk involved with climbing it has been artificially created - if the look of the line or the way the moves flow are compelling and interesting enough then it's more forgivable/justifiable to risk limb to experience that climb. If the climbing is ordinary and the line not attractive then there's less appeal to risk limb, and it would probably lead me to wonder about the motives of the first ascensionist - were they just trying to prove how hard or brave they were, or is the result artful and creative? Also, the danger on good designer danger routes adds to the experience - on poor designer danger routes it either takes away or doesn't add to the experience. Of course it's all subjective and personal.. but you could probably put people's preferences on a spectrum.
Plenty of designer danger slate routes just don't seem worth it for some reason, probably to do with the aesthetic ...
Very well put.
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I like designer danger routes when they're done 'well' with a bit of art and they fit in with the feel of an area
I agree, and by done well I mean the fixed gear is of the best possible quality and in the right place. People have mentioned Midnight Summer's Dream on Chee Tor but on the same crag Laughing is a really great example - racing the pump and the run-out as I headed up towards the break on typical Chee Tor slopers was a particularly memorable and worthwhile experience. I don't think it would be good as either a sport or a trad route.
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a bolt and big safe-ish runout and a good belay, a la Midnight Summer Dream, Circe, Slate stuff, Upper Pen Trywn, etc some of the stuff at Kilnsey which all seem quite popular.
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If your line is going to get an annual coating of crust and slim like at the Cornice and the left end of Chee Tor where the sun don't shine then I doubt you will get that many people abbing in through the bramble jungle to give it an essential scrub down. Clean crags or ones with easy access from above or from adjacent routes is another matter.
Or does it even matter if anyone repeats it.
I did an E8 once up the Pass and as far as I know that has not been repeated.
Is that good or bad?
I don't do trad so it was a personal experience and what happens to it after does not matter to me.
My sport lines are mostly cared for creations.
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a bit like fighting for your life on a Devon sea cliff, only to enter a world of barking dogs and kids buying ice creams at the top.
Wot, you mean just like all the Torbay cliffs, and for that matter South Stack, which are generally great despite because of the entertaining contrast between wild adventure below and sedate tourism above??
Ha ha, yes, precisely! It was something of an ironic reference, not necessarily to invalidate the experience.
Discord, when produced well, will have a powerful effect, but if not, may just create a bit of an ugly clash.
Some great thought and debate in this thread, IMO.
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The comments about the quality of the line are really true.
The only thing I have been willing to really stick my neck out on in recent years was a stunning line. It really grabbed me and I was willing to go for it.
I would not have been willing to risk a lot on a scrotty no star route.
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I would not have been willing to risk a lot on a scrotty no star route.
Not these days at least.
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I’m guessing you didn’t place the peg, so I assume the wall has been at least looked at before by climbers.
It entirely depends on the merits of the climb in my opinion. Peril associated with the risk of falling off is ‘better’ than peril associated with a hold falling off and taking you with it. One involves a careful assessment of one’s own ability the other involves a lucky/unlucky guess and some crossing of the fingers. What is justifiable is a purely personal thing but most folk won’t take much risk unless the route is really ‘good’.
I’d base my decision on honest answers to these questions:
Which way of climbing it will I enjoy most?
Which way is likely to see someone repeat and enjoy the route?
What visual/environmental impact will the cleaning/bolting have – does my experience and that of any repeaters justify the impact?
What is the crag/area ethic – does the line justify straying from this?
How will other climbers judge my approach?
Personally a large part of the appeal of doing new things is seeing them repeated by others and discussing the climbing afterwards. I don’t put time or effort into climbs I don’t think are worth repeating. If something is only just worth the effort for an FAist then it is almost certainly not worth the effort for a repeater. There are unlimited possibilities for these sorts of new climbs but they just strike me as pointless clutter in a guide which just serves to make the worthwhile stuff harder to find. Everyone has their own threshold on this and mine is doubtless way lower than others. I dare say what you are considering is pretty decent though or you wouldn’t be putting mental effort into it.
For me I’d rather have one or a few repeaters appreciate my route rather than a whole bunch of armchair critics approve of my style but nobody actually do the climb.
Bear in mind that ‘purity’ is not a simple concept in climbing and one type of ‘purity’ tends to preclude another. The ultimate purity is untouched/unclimbed. Climbing something covered in dirt and grass that you could have easily cleaned on abseil is in my opinion more contrived than climbing a cleaned line, purity of approach is reducing purity of experience.
Designer danger is a bad term as it implies that this approach is contrived when the alternatives are not. In fact whatever you do involves a level of design, right down to choice of line and cleaning. It all depends on the climbing but I don’t sign up to the idea that all bolted routes should have regulation spacing. Loads of routes benefit from runout sections and I find it sad when folk ruin these by adding extra bolts (the top groove on Urgent Action/The Thumb for instance used to a have a huge and totally safe runout which was an exciting and fitting finale to the route). That said there is a fine line between a well-considered runout and plain old bad bolting and it takes a deal of judgement to get it right.
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Designer danger is also a bad term because it implies the route is specifically dangerous and has been created as such, which usually is neither the case nor the purpose. Designer scare is much more suitable....
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But designer scare has no alliteration though. Formulated Fear Factor?