Just left of Puddle of Holes is a pocket-covered face. Start on a ledge a few feet off the trail. Clip the first bolt and make a hard move to a hole and flake. Climb up the steep face and make another hard move getting past the fourth bolt. Reach a two-bolt anchor.
Funny how when entering the Bank, the sign clearly states that only 2-3 star routes should be bolted, yet the FA gives the line (among others) only 1 star.
matt- in defense of those putting in the hard work to bolt all of these routes, besides a visual guess, often one has to do a route to figure out it's quality. while i dissaprove of bolting in a lot of climbing areas, shelf is one of the places where it seems ok. and while bob might put up the occasional route of marginal quality at shelf, he has also put up plenty of mega classic routes as well. if anyone should be bolting there, he should be one of them.
Agreed, it is a little hasty to judge a route with climbing it first, but I was going on Bob's opinion of the quality (star rating). So routes of marginal quality are now acceptable because there are routes of similar to worse quality in the area? Granted, Shelf has an abundance of route possibilities, but is it necessary to add another route of less-than-stellar quality? Should we ask the BLM edit the signage in the Bank campground to now say _bolt whatever you want - this is Shelf_? I know this topic has been beaten to death on this and other sites, but at times bolting ethics at Shelf seem to be an afterthought. My two cents, for what its worth.
Maybe you missed the point of what I was saying. Often you only know the quality of a climb after it has been climbed. If the climb looks like it might be of decent quality (as is the case with this climb), then how else are you going to judge it's real quality besides climbing it? As it seems you climb at Shelf maybe you should be thanking these guys for bolting instead of harassing them. One has to accept that in the process of finding classics a couple not so classic climbs will be put up.
I thought the route was 3 star material, fun movement on good pockets with lots of variations possible. It has much better climbing and bolting than its neighbor (Puddle of Holes)- and it's a little harder in my opinion. It would be a a classic in my book if it were twice as long.
Just goes to show that one man's 1 star is another's 3 star!
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