Since I've taken quite a lot from this thread over the years, and have a day to kill before driving home from the Alps, I'll chip in a couple of recent routes that occupy the fairly long and moderately hard space nicely.
I can't work out a low-faff way of adding photos on my phone unfortunately so it's a textfest...
Esprit de Clocher 6c+
Petit Clocher du Portalet
État de Choc is the famous one, and there are plenty of amazing looking harder routes on the Petit Clocher, but Esprit has had a recent makeover, with cracks being cleaned and fixed gear being removed, and deserves some props.
The other routes we climbed, the SE Pillar and Le Chic, Le Cheque et le Choc, are also excellent (the granite on the Petit Clocher is stellar), but Esprit's strong line, sustained climbing and awesome position in the centre of the frontal east face, plus the fact that it's almost 'full trad' with bolted belays, made it the most memorable. More than on the other routes it feels like you're climbing a massive tower, which you pretty much are.
It's one of those routes where you can semi-ignore the pitch grades. The first feels a sandbag at 6a/+, with a pumpy fingers layback that leaves you thinking 'fuck' with regard to the steeper cracks above. But in reality there isn't a huge difference between the pitches - it's nicely sustained. As usual in the Alps, if you can crack climb (and it's perhaps not such a great recommendation if you can't), the more 'cracky' sections feel steady for the grade.
The cracks are nicely varied - a double set of cams up to blue plus a few nuts worked well. There's even a flared squeeze chimney at the top of pitch six (home to one of the two remaining bolts on the line). At the top of this chimney is a somewhat grimly hanging belay that marks a junction (if you're suitably heroic you can skip this belay, as the pitch below is quite short). The original line follows a pegged fault diagonally left to join the final two pitches of the SE Pillar, while the direct finish continues directly into an offwidth (big cams needed if you take this option). We climbed the original, which was the definite crux of the route for me - initially fingery and pumpy with poor feet.
Bivi and approach beta: the pictures I'd seen were of a big flat rock overlooking the north face. This is right next to the approach path and very close to the crag, but it isn't actually flat. We bivied further back on a big plateau in the moraines below the Orny hut, with a snowmelt stream on hand. The chairlift from Champex Lac is the best value thing in Switzerland at €19 return. The crag is about 2h30 walk from there (allow a little more probably if carrying a load of bivi stuff and to account for the final part of the approach being quite scrambly and exposed). We had some snow to cross, all manageable in trainers with poles, which I imagine would be minimal later in the summer.
Separate post for the next one...
