Crowds during Mountain Festival

[flyinglikepan]

Hey guys,

Never been climbing out here. Going to be passing through with the girlfriend the week before and after the Mountain Festival. We were wondering, are the crowds on the walls going to be heinous around this event? Is it even worth our time to stop? Or does everyone clear out pretty fast?
Thanks for any info.

[squamish climber]

I can add some thoughts on this. The amount of climbing at Squamish is huge. The classics can have lineups most weekends and even weekdays during the summer. This applies if it's Mountain Festival weekend or not. So the conventional wisdom is if you want to climb some of the classic lines, especially moderates, hit them early or late in the afternoon. On the other hand there are so many great climbs that don't have lineups on them, look around here on the forum or the Bourdon select guidebook. Have a great trip here, and enjoy the vibe, it's unique.

An obscure classic. Supposed to be better than Sunblessed. Can anybody guess?

photo credit J Mace

[jerblumel]

Cruising To Infinity?

Looks rad

[tobyfk]

Split Decision, I think.

From this thread http://squamishclimbing.com/squamish_cl ... f=2&t=2905

[marc_leclerc]

Hi flyinglikepan, while crowds will increase somewhat during the festival, this is normally limited to a select number of popular routes usually in the 5.11a and easier range. Be wary of routes given the label of "Top 100"' in the select guide, as the label tends to draw much attention, but not in every case.

With careful route selection crowds can be avoided, and 5 star routes of any grade can be enjoyed without line ups. For example, on any given day at the "Squaw" (can't remember how to spell the politically correct name) the Great Game and Birds of Prey will likely have line ups while phenomenal Right Wing in between will likely be totally un-crowded. On the bulletheads, Liquid Gold might involve a fair bit of waiting for other parties to get up the last pitch. But Wild Turkey to the left will likely only require waiting for your partner to slowly slither up the horrendously flaring and seemingly unending slot of misery, which could be a while. (Not nearly as bad as it sounds)

It is true that most of these uncrowded routes, much like humans, may sometimes have slight reputations for being more awkward than their more popular neighbors, these reputations are sometimes warranted but often times not (wild turkey and pipeline fall into the warranted category due to wideness) and there is only one way to find out! I hope that you enjoy your time in Squamish and have a great experience!