Chips Off the Ol' Block 

Named for the 4-foot block that unexpectedly dislodged and tipped over onto Greg's leg while cleaning the 2nd pitch on a fixed line. The block severed the rope 10 feet below him. He brushed it off and continued scrubbing. There were 4 of us on the route when it went down, luckily Greg was the last one up! Anyone at the base would have been hurting.

Nice work guys on a great route. You can rap with one 60m from P-5 to base with ease (especially now since the rope snagger on P-2 is gone thanks to Tai). Always glad to hear Greg is still with us.

Good route, actually a lot better than I expected! An obviously tremendous effort ws required to clean all the dirt and choss off of this thing but what Tai and crew left for us eastsiders when finished was nothing short of kick ass! Thanks!

I only take gear to three, you can get bigger stuff in but there is always smaller options. A variation of the sixth pitch can be done if you break out right along a horinontal feature ten feet above the chimney. This is somewhat runout but it is fairly easy, traverse 40 feet right and slightly up to a solid cam placement, then up and left to a slab to the anchor. More fun climbing on good rock.

We climbed this on 9/27/09 on Tai's recommendation after meeting him at Wilson's. Very fun. Thanks to Tai and the other FA-ers for putting it up.

I would link pitches 1 and 2, also probably 3 and 4 just to make it a bit quicker. It's a good route all in all. It's a nice multi-pitch moderate for the area. Pretty straight foreword route finding. You can definitely rap with a 60m rope. There is a rap station in between the 5th and 6th pitch that gives the option for a 5.12 TR which makes it possible for 60m rope to rappel the whole way.

Is it true the last pitch changed since the FA? I heard the flake used to go higher up on the wall. It looked kind of dicey getting to the first gear when I was there (May 2010)

WOW!

What a great climb. Wandered up here and was handsomely rewarded. Didn't check the MP info section otherwise would have done the sixth pitch (only had one rope), but the first five pitches did NOT disappoint. Gear to 4" and you need nothing bigger than that. This climb is simply awesome, and Tai et al did one hell of a job cleaning the route.


This route is incredibly varied but of the highest quality. We also managed to wander off route a bit (went right instead of up on P4). This takes you up a cool LB corner and on to some slabby face, I'd rate it about 5.6R or so. Definitely a no fall zone on the slab, but very fun. Beware death blocks on the ledge above, you come up 20' to the climbers right of the P4 anchor. A fun variation if you have done the route before, although admittedly the standard way of doing things looks like much more fun.

Stop reading this and go climb this route. Seriously.

this route really seems like a labor of love, from the nice approach trail, to the well bolted belays/rap stations, to the climbing itself (varied and fun, be comfortable with wide stuff). all of these things take foresight, planning, and a whole lot of elbow grease. it is very much appreciated and in a 5 star system i would rate the climbing as 4/5. thanks!

i climbed blackwater and bob-bob-a-ramp (left finish) a couple of days earlier and found the cruxes of both to be more difficult than the thin part of chips off the ol' block. thus i'd rate that part 5.9 instead of 10a (or 10b). there are good feet to get to a nice rail.

much of this route reminded me of bruce bindner, pretty sure he would have loved it (and climbed both fat variations on p5 8^). maybe it can be the aka 'brutus of wyde memorial route'...

e.stefke

Stellar line and very enjoyable, varied climbing with great rock quality and cool pitches. Certainly a modern moderate classic of the area!

The wind was whipping when we were there; thought I was going to get blown off pitch 4! Did the first five pitches with one rope and I feel its a good climb but not as good as I was expecting, mainly because of the first 3 pitches, which seemed to alternate between fun corner and uninspiring flared gully. On a five star system I'd give the route 3 stars: 2 stars for the first 3 pitches and 4 stars for pitches 4 and 5. Overall, not what I'd call a great climb, but it is worth doing.

Also, I'd probably say pitch 4 feels PG-13; it wasn't runout but far enough between pieces that I wouldn't want to fall in that classic Sierra climbing way. The climb is a good opportunity to gain some elevation. If I did it again, I'd bring doubles from finger size to #1 C4's and 1 #2 and 1 #3 C4.

Wonder what that offwidth on p5 climbs like; it looked brutal!