What route were we on? --Moore's Wall (photo)

Before getting rained out last weekend, we had the chance to get on one route. It's something I've climbed before but never knew what it was.

We beared right at the top of the climbers trail (above the gravel road) so that leads toward Sentinel Buttress yeah? Then we get to a large, rounded corner, and a dead tree to our left. Turn right and walk up hill for about 150 feet, that's where we started.

The climb was very very ledgy, and surprisingly hard (at least the variation we took), probably 5.7-5.8 (or we're utterly weak :P ) and the total height was about 170' (I had about ten feet of rope left on my 60m when I reached the fixed slings. There were two trees with fixed slings, we ended up at the one on climber-right. It was a pretty big ledge we finished at, with what looks like probably ~50 feet of climbing left till the summit.

Photo below, can someone help??? Maybe it's just me, but I still haven't figured out how the Lambert and Shull guide organizes the routes at Moore's. Thanks.

Looks like a route right in between the fire wall and hanging garden areas to me.

That looks like Fire Wall to the left and the Hanging Gardens above you. Midlife Crises would be the 10+ w/ a bolt about 15-20 feet up, I think it would be a bit right of where you started. There are a few fixed pins and different cruxes on Midlife Crises... maybe you wandered onto that route?

Whatever route you did, it wouldn't be in the Select Guide. I'll look in the Kelley Guide when I get home if no one else answers you first.

From the Kelley Guide:

84. Staircase - 5.6 R
... starts just right of the Fire Wall. ... once popular ... numerous accidents ... poor protection. P1 - Climb a shallow groove to a face. Continue up face to ledge. P2 - Climb face to a ledge at the base of the obvious crack. P3 - Continue up the groove to the top.

85. Midlife Crises - 5.10d
... mixed route just left of a small arch below the rappel tree on the Hanging Garden Ledge. Climb past four bolts and two pins to the HG rappel tree. Light rack.

86. Sandbox - 5.9 R
Not recommended. Start right of the Fire Wall beneath a rusty bolt. Loose, disgusting, poorly protected. The bolt is bad. The route ends under Zeus Wall.

I can't tell from the picture where Midlife Crises is, and that's the only one that I've done. It finishes below a tree w/ slings and also a chain slung around some branches about 8 feet up the tree. If you finished near that and/or saw any bolts, you might have wandered onto this route. It feels harder than 5.7-5.8 though, so I doubt it.

You were probably on Staircase. 5.6 at Moore's can feel pretty hard and unless the "R" is a mistake, probably very runout..

PS, it's not on MP. Post it up! You might have been the first person to climb it in years!

That's a variation to staircase - I think the normal first pitch is the next face to the right. There have been a number of accidents on that thing throughout the years due to the semi-unprotected middle pitch and bad rock. The last pitch corner is kinda fun though.

Awesome, I too thought we were near the Hanging Garden area. the problem with it being Staircase is that there was only one pitch, maybe a short second one and the only runout section (~20 feet) was very easy, 5.4-5.5ish terrain. Nonetheless the ledge out potential was pretty high but overall it was a fun route! I might post something on the routes section, but I don't want to claim a new route if a name/rating do exist.

We had the biggest trouble identifying this route. Are there pictures with labels overlaid somewhere? Or at least some sort of map?

Nicholas Mauriello wrote:We had the biggest trouble identifying this route. Are there pictures with labels overlaid somewhere? Or at least some sort of map?

From another view...

Maybe the photo below will help. There aren't many spots at Moore's wall that haven't been climbed at some point. Much of the undocumented stuff has either been soloed or just not included in the guide for some reason or another. I personally would like to see everything listed in a guide for the sake of posterity, but that's just not the way climbing at Moore's wall is.