New Routes at Up Among the Firs

[matt magee]

Hey,

A couple of new routes to tell you about at Up Among the Firs. There is a crag just north of the main area (Little Testis, Poster Boy etc), if you continue up the trail. Head north for just a few seconds and the wall will come into view.

Drama Club 5.10 ish: climb easliy up to the recess in the middle of the wall, pull over the buldge (crux) into a finger crack. Continue up the sustained finger crack to the top. Chain anchor.

Honeymoon Repreive 5.9+/10- ish: Climb the crack up to the small stump below the recess. Traverse right on parrallell horizontal cracks then up the tight seam that widens into fingers/thin hands on the left side of the small pillar. Make a commiting step left and reach into another small hand crack that slowly widens to the top. Rap rings anchor.

Both routes are around 15 meters ?? and I believe make a couple of fun addtional pitches for the grade if you are in the area. If you do try them I'd appreciate your thought on the grades.
I want to thank Chris Small for helping out with the anchors, cheers Chris.

I'll see if I can actually manage to post some photos,
Cheers,

Matt

[smallman]

Kevin Henshaw and I climbed Drama Club on Monday. Super climb with a couple perplexing cruxes. I would say it is fairly graded at 10-. Quality stuff Matt. The climb to the right we thought was still a project and so we left it alone. But it also looks like a quality route. Bring a couple long slings for the right route though to prevent rope drag at the crux.

Thanks a lot.

[matt magee]

Here is an attempt at some photos. I should mention a single rack to 2" should work for both climbs. You will definitely want small pro for the start of both climbs. Cheers

[smallman]

Hi All: I did Honeymoon Reprieve today. Another great route but found that 5.9 is rather stout for the grade, especially for those vertically challenged folks. I would put the grade at a solid 10a/b. The climb was like a slightly harder version of Flying Circus. But then maybe I was having an off day.

Chris Small

[hevyduty]

Hi Chris talking about under graded routes i found your Noodle routes a tad stiff; i watched a couple of parties back of them .Maybe were getting soft,however when you clean routes one knows all the beta and it does help a ton . Im going to try the routes this week will let you know how my take on the grades Hevy!

[smallman]

No worries Hevy: Grades are arbitrary until consensus is reached anyway as with Rap down cleaning you have a lot of beta. I am interested to see what consensus is on the grades at Lost Tribe. I was told that my Commonwealth grades were soft and I also think the style of climbing at Lost tribe is similar to the rock I learned to climb on so it seems easier to me.

[jstod]

For what it's worth, i found the noodles to be pretty solid at 5.9. Perhaps a little on the + side because the difficulties are more sustained, but for me they are definitely in the same ballpark (difficulty wise) as Mushroom, Up Up and away, Penny Lane, Cold Comfort.

The 11a also felt pretty spot-on for the grade, though the crux is really short so some might disagree. Perfectly bolted!

Julian

[matt magee]

Thanks for the feedback Chris. I'm terrible with grades, so for others please take them only a rough starting place until more of a consensus has been found. Happy to hear you enjoyed the climbs.

cheers
matt