The Candy Shop

"The Candy Shop" is a 5-pitch variation to the NW face of Warrior 1. This route is the result of our attempt to gain the massive, stunning right-facing dihedral on top of the tower while avoiding the 5.11b R traverse that exists on the only route up this aspect in the current Cirque of the Towers guidebook.

We found no evidence of previous climbing, cleaned many loose blocks from the route, and broke many obvious holds, so we believe it is possible that this variation has not been climbed before. Every pitch has quality climbing, and traffic will clean it up!

Approach: Ascend snowfields up the NW edge (right edge when viewed from meadows) of Warrior 1 to a vertical wide crack that is visible from the meadows. This crack goes to the top of a buttress on the right side of Warrior 1.

P1: Begin where snow level allows. We had high snow, and ascended steep parallel cracks in a R-facing corner (30 ft, 5.9) to a small ledge. Follow a strenuous wide crack (4-5") for 30 meters to belay atop the buttress. (45m, 5.10+)

P2: Follow the arete past white band, step right over empty space to a clean hand-crack, continue up a wide crack in large R-facing corner, step right 15 ft to belay on ledge. Some loose rock on this pitch. Don't continue to thin finger/tips crack on left. (40m, 5.9)

P3: Climb the overhung, right-leaning hand-crack through a flake system to a roof (5.10). Pull the roof (5.10d) into a broad dihedral. Stem up dihedral into easier terrain, then pull into short chimney on the left (5.9+) and up a 5" crack to belay on a ledge. (50m, 5.10d)

P4: Follow a flared weakness up right, then back left (5.9), climb a large R-facing corner to undercling flake (5.10d), pull around the flake and exit left to ledge atop a pinnacle. (50m, 5.10d)

P5: Traverse left across diagonal flake systems to massive alcove (5.9), exit top of alcove on left, stretch rope out on casual ramps to the base of the massive R-facing corner visible from the meadows. (60m, 5.9)

This concludes The Candy Shop. From here, climb the corner.

P6: Climb corner through small roof (5.10b) to large ledge belay. (50m, 5.10b)

P7: Stem up corner, through roof to beautiful hand crack, stretch rope to good ledge beneath chimney. (58m, 5.9)

P8: Burrow through chimney, pull bulge on left via stellar handcrack, follow crack to summit ridge. (40m, 5.9)

Descent: The guidebook says the true summit of Warrior 1 can be gained via 5.7 climbing along the "gendarmed ridge." This seemed very complex; we rapped the gully to the North, found a few anchors and built a few more. While viable, consider this descent 'exploratory'.

small and large stoppers, double rack of cams from fingers to #5 Camalot. (You will want 2x #5 Camalot for pitch 1 unless you are comfortable running it out on 5.10 OW. A single #5 is useful on pitches 2 and 3)