... climbers Tim Anderson, Laura Hahn and Mike Royer (L-R) and the 'Beast Wall' - the 'Beast' is the line that ascends just to the right of Laura in the photo...
... staring straight up from the base of that thing - around 200 feet of vertical ice topping out through a maze of large, overhanging sickles high on the wall - Grade 5+/6...
... for scale, Tim Anderson at the base of the wall...
... and a short time later making his way high up the wall...
... in what would be the first ascent (February 4, 2007) while exploring conditions on top-rope in preparation for a later free attempt - Tim's last "stick" at the top of the wall breached a "geyser" of ice water - most of it right in his face - that subsequently helped fill in much of the 'top-out', which Tim later commented was "pretty thin" and "probably would have been very difficult to protect considering the thin ice conditions along with the strenuous climbing needed to get that far"...
... the following weekend Eastern PA climbers Brintton Price (L) and Rob "Griz" Ginieczki (R) are in town for a weekend visit to the area...
... after spending Saturday mostly checking out the conditions along the shorter, 'Central Wall' (Grade 4+ to 5), 'Griz' decided to give the 'Beast' a try on gear on Sunday...
... 'Griz' making the initial "ground moves" off the start...
... working up the lower wall...
... moving from pretty much the last good rest ledge...
... on to the committing, thin and overhanging upper wall...
... placing a screw from a very exposed position high on the wall...
... and topping out - if you compare these photos with the above photo of Tim topping out, you can see the top-out really filled in in just the week since Tim "breached the geyser" - lots of fat, 'blue-ice' up there...
... a "work of art" on Griz's part - no preview - no hangs - no falls - climbed in "impeccable" style - always smooth and in control - definitely ranks up there as one of the biggest and most difficult climbs "in the east" - Brintton followed this day as well, making the third ascent overall (to date, as far as we know) - with a big assist from Tim from a week earlier...
... by the way - we were fortunate enough to capture both ascents on video - Griz's climb can be viewed on the website in the filmshort 'Taming the Beast' - will have to work on Tim's - as we recall, Tim hanging exposed 200 feet in the air and getting "hosed down" in single-digit temperatures should be (now) pretty entertaining... HA!...
It is pretty obvious where this is located, but my only question is where would you park your car? I have been wanting to see these in person for quite some time!
ReplyDelete