Platte Magic is yet another terrific route on a great wall. This route offers very nice climbing that flirts with a black water streak that has exquisite rock.

This route starts just behind the large evergreen tree. It is the 6th bolted route from the left and the 7th route from the left if you include the '

Way Jingus

' toprope.

Begin with relatively easy slabbing to the first bolt. Some fun sidepull flakes get you up to the 2nd and third bolts. It is kind of cruxy at the 3rd bolt and eases off to sustained climbing in the 9'ish range until the angle eases off to 7'ish for the last 30 feet.

I really enjoyed wandering back and forth across the waterstreak and comparing the attributes of the water polished rock versus the rock to the sides.

Platte Magic

Clear Lycra

Traditionalists at Work

Hammerhead

Burley Dudes

Way Jingus

El Nino

Traditionalists at Play

Cup of Java

This is a great, hard-but-not-impossible toprope from the

Burly Dudes'

anchor.  Begin just to the right of the small staging area at the base of

Burly Dudes

and immediately step up into difficult, thin climbing on good but small edges and some hopeful smearing.  After about 50 feet or so, the climbing gets less steep and eases off in difficulty.

Clear Lycra is a very good, pretty long, steep slab route on nice rock.  As with all of the routes on this wall, the first bolt is up there a ways, and continuously difficult climbing is found well above the bolts.

Begin from the bergshrund-like rock gully and carefully edge, smedge, and smear past the first 2 bolts (this felt like the crux).  Above the 2nd bolt, angle up and left on easier climbing (Hubbel's blue book shows this as up and right) to the 3rd bolt.  The climbing gets less steep above the 3rd bolt, but is still fairly continuous in the 5.9 range.  Hubbel's book shows a bolted anchor to the right, but I didn't see it.  Instead, there is a fairly stout juniper on a ledge up to the right.

This is the furthest right route on the Gray Wall on the left side of Java Dome.

To reach this wall, hike the north gully past Atlantis Dome.  Follow a faint trail that descends from Atlantis into the bottom of the drainage and meets with the base of Java Dome at its lowest point.  Scramble over a few boulders and up a 3rd or 4th class cleft in the slab for a few hundred feet or so.  The routes will be on the right and fairly noticable since most have new bolts.

Traditionalists at Work starts just right of a large tree.  It is hard to pick out the buttonhead bolts at first glance.  This route has very well spaced bolts, and all are in good condition for buttonheads.  Start in the cleft between the low angle slab and the gray wall, and move left after the first bolt.  The crux comes after the second bolt.  The angle eases, and four or five more bolts lead to a two bolt anchor and an easy walk off to the left, 170'.

This route should be called hammertoes, cause your feet are going to get crippled.  Now that I think about it though, it will hammer your head while you contemplate cratering from several difficult locations....  Hopefully it won't hammer your body if you actually do cut loose at an in-opportune moment.

Make your way up to the first bolt on fairly easy climbing, clip it, tighten the velcro on your shoes, and launch upwards.  The next 2 bolts are a good distance apart with brutally sustained climbing on thin edges and smearing, with serious crater potential just before clipping the 2nd and 3rd bolts.  It felt like I had climbed 500 feet, with all of the wandering around looking for a path of least resistance, but when I looked down it was probably only 50 feet.  After this, it eases up a bit but is still very continuous.  Near the 4th bolt there is one last minor crux, which doesn't feel very easy to your blasted feet.

I thought this was substantially harder than any of the 10s on this wall, and pretty even to the 11b on this wall.  If it was in Boulder Canyon, it would probably clock in at 11d or so.

Great route, great stone, great views, this is South Platte slab climbing.

Burly indeed.  After climbing this, even if you soak your feet in the river while fishing all evening, it still hurts to walk the next day.

This is the 5th route from the left on the north-facing Grey Wave Wall.  Begin the route from an uncomfortable, step-across start and immediately face the seemingly un-ending sea of non-holds.  Awfully steep to be relying on friction climbing.  The climbing lets up after the 4th bolt when the rock becomes less steep, but it still felt pretty hard.

Great climbing, great rock.

Another Tim Hudgel slab classic, this is a great slab route.  This is the 4th route from the right on the north-facing Grey Wave Wall.

Start up on easy climbing with good edges and ledges to clip the first bolt.  Head upwards past another 7 bolts with terrific climbing and numerous cruxy spots.  I thought this route was a fair bit easier than

Hammerhead

but no less classic.  There seemed to be more stances to re-group and recover.  It is definitely better protected, but the average climber will still probably be uncomfortable at times.

This is the farthest right hand route on the north-facing Grey Wave Wall, just right of the old buttonheads that protect '

Traditionalists at Work

'.  This route threads its way up a well featured, lower angled slab.  The climbing is nice, with a lot of good edges, but a little bit of crumbly rock.  There is basically no opportunities for protection on this pitch.

This route is a steep, difficult slab climb. I am giving it the 10d rating given in the Jason Haas guidebook, but I think it feels harder. Maybe I am not the best slab climber. The hardest part is above the 1st bolt, including around the second bolt. It is slightly easier up higher but not much. It is a long ways from the last bolt to the tree anchor. A fall before reaching the tree would be long. None of the bolts are close together like on a newer Boulder Canyon route. If you are in the area, you might as well try it, but I suggest toproping it.

Description

Location

Protection

Routes in North Face