Squamish 1

I got a chance to check out several great climbs at Squamish this summer that I had always wanted to get on. First up was the link-up of Borderline, Angel's Crest, and High Plains Drifter, which I climbed with my friend Ty Johnson. I had done the Angel's Crest quite a few times already but this adds a nice beginning and dramatic ending to an already awesome climb. Borderline starts off with several enjoyable pitches of 5.7/5.8 with one 5.9 move at the start (these can be linked with a 70m rope), then traverses out left onto a nice 5.10+ face crux to a perfect finger crack. This is followed by two short pitches of 5.9/10-. The first pulling a small overhang on perfect hand jams and the second tackling an impressive (bolted!) offwidth roof. After several false starts while attempting to wiggle up into the thing I realized that you can lieback/undercling around the outside before swinging back around into the 5.8 squeeze above. While liebacking around the crux proves to be much easier the pitch is still quite physical. The rest of the climb is rather non-descript and involves mostly easy climbing with one short 5.10 face crux thrown in.

Borderline then joins Angel's Crest maybe a third of the way up the wall and continues on that route until about three pitches from the top. This part of the route went very quickly as we had both climbed the route many times and there aren't any particularly difficult pitches in the middle section. When climbing the Angel's Crest in the past I had always looked over in awe at the overhanging headwall to the right that is split by the hand crack of High Plains Drifter. It is quite an impressive looking climb! The beginning of the route is reached by traversing several hundred feet to the right and then up some great Squamish style tree/root climbing with a fixed line. The fixed line ends on a large platform with the overhanging crack looming above.

Ty Johnson on the the first pitch (5.11a) of High Plains Drifter, Squamish, B.C.


Ty got the first lead as for some unknown reason he thought that I would have a better chance at leading the second pitch. He turned out to be totally wrong. The first pitch ranks high on the list of the "Best pitches at Squamish." It would be high on the list anywhere and is one of the most perfect hand cracks I've ever seen on granite. Perfect hands should be easy right? Not quite. Due to it's leaning and overhanging nature it clocks in at a very physical and pumpy 5.11a. Bring lots of #2 (mostly) and #3 camalots and not a whole lot else. The 110' pitch ends at a small stance and bolted belay below the even more overhanging second pitch.

By this time I was feeling quite fatigued as the pitch before had nearly spit me off and the accumulation of all the pitches had caught up to me. It was a bit of a lost cause but I gave it a go anyway. Much flailing and pulling on gear ensued. Pitch two starts up a deceptively awkward and off-balance corner then traverses over to the right on a pumpy rail to a tight hand crack in the back of a flare. As you can imagine, this is quite the demanding pitch. The tight hand crack then punches up the ever steepening wall and begins to narrow and arch slightly left. The only respite from the onslaught of tight jams is the occasional face hold on the left wall. The problem is it seems that every "rest" involves a slightly off balance position so any recovery is difficult. If the rest of the pitch wasn't demanding enough, I was thrilled to find out that the crux comes at the very end. As the crack arches left it slowly peters out and you are left with only one option which is to face climb out the overhanging wall to the arete on the right. A V3ish boulder problem out of the crack is followed by a long reach to the rounded arete which isn't nearly as good as you were hoping it would be. To top off this amazing pitch, the anchors lie another 10' or so up the arete and some wildly exposed liebacking is followed by a beached-whale belly-flop onto the belay ledge. At this point all I wanted to do was throw up and go to sleep.