Durham/Chapel Hill area trad climbers?

Hey! I’m considering a job in Chapel Hill and wondering what the climbing community is like in the area. My passion is trad climbing, but it seems like there isn’t much in the way of local outdoor trad options and the gyms are more bouldering focused rather than ropes. Is this pretty acurrate? Are any of you trad climbers currently living in the area? I’d appreciate any advice!

I'm Durham/Chapel Hill based and while I only sport climb and boulder at the moment, I know quite a number of local trad climbers.

Chapel Hill and Durham only have a bouldering gym, but the Durham gym should have an expansion opened next year with some awesome TR and sport climbing areas. Most people in the triangle go to Raleigh to climb at TRC which is a little expensive but really legit.

As far as outdoors goes the closest crags are Pilot Mountain and Moore's Wall. Moore's wall has a bunch of great trad routes and bouldering, while Pilot has both sport and trad. Both of these crags are about an hour and a half away, making them an easy day trip. You wouldn't have to worry much about keeping to a schedule.
The next closest I think would be Crowders Mountain just west of Charlotte, so it's probably two and a half hours away. I haven't climbed there yet, so that's about all I can tell ya.
Then another hour or three west you hit the Blue Ridge Mountains which has climbing and bouldering out the wazoo, but you'd probably only hit those if you have a whole weekend free.

To sum up, if you moved here you would probably only out climb on the weekends, depending on your work schedule. There is definitely a thriving climbing culture (of all persuasions) in the Triangle, not just bouldering :)

Let me know if there's anything more specific you'd like to know, I may have answers!

Lots of trad climbing in the area.

Moore's (trad), Stone (slab), Ship Rock (trad), Linville (trad), etc.  You need to drive a ways to get there, but there's tons of good climbing.  

I would shoot down Pilot - the rock there is somewhat suspect I wouldn't want to place gear in it, even on the routes noted as trad in the guidebooks.  TR/Sport there is good, though.

There's a great gym scene with boulders, TR and lead all very well represented.

Like Andre said, ask Qs if you want specifics.

If by local you mean being able to climb a few pitches after work then there really isn't anything. But Moore's Wall is around an hour and a half away from Chapel Hill and is an amazing trad crag. Further west there's a huge amount of high quality trad climbing but you're looking at more of a 3 hour drive so it's mostly a weekend sort of thing (even though my crew does day trips that far pretty often).

Triangle Rock Club has three gyms in the area. The one closest to Chapel Hill is mostly bouldering focused right now but they are working on a new roped climbing area which should be open next year. The Morrisville location has a good bit of decent roped climbing.

Thanks for your responses! It’s helpful to know all this and encouraging to know there are other trad climbers in the area. An hour and a half is doable. Right now I live that distance from the Gunks, which I am going to miss no matter where I move! What about the trestle? It’s listed on Mountain Project as having a few trad routes. And I’m not opposed to sport, just hoping I can continue to build my trad skills as a relatively new leader (currently leading gunks 5.7’s).

I used to go to the Trestle once in a while a long time ago before there were any decent gyms in the area but it's really not worth it now.

If you lead Gunks 5.7s you'll feel good at a lot of our cliffs. Zoo View (5.7) at Moore's is our classic awesome Gunks-like roof and face climb. In places there's a similar sandbagging of grades but there's a good number of fun moderates to be had too. Lots of variety too depending on whether you are open to overnight trips or just wanna go with day trips. Face with interspersed cracks, slabs, shortish approaches or longer adventure multipitch in the Linville Gorge or out on big slabs further West. Our crags don't have the near unlimited number of routes that the Gunks does but not many places do! For something closer to that volume you're not that far from the New River Gorge either (about 4 hrs from Chapel Hill). 

As mentioned above, the Durham TRC location is currently 90% bouldering (phase 1), but they will be adding 47' walls sometime in 2020 (phase 2). Membership comes with access to yoga and fitness classes as well as the other gyms in the area (Morrisville has 55' walls). There's a preview video of the Durham facility on YouTube:  https://youtu.be/cGXC20iyRgU?t=95.

There is a good community of climbers in Chapel Hill that climb on gear in NC.  Well, actually, maybe only two of us.

Moore's may not have the quantity of routes as the Gunks, but it also doesn't have anywhere near the quantity of climbers.

The trad 1.5 to 4h away is great (Moore's, Ship Rock, Stone, Linville, Looking Glass, New River. At Stone you probably won't get very proficent at placing gear though).
The weather can be miserable in summer (Ship Rock is often bearable). On the flip side you can climb through winter (last season was rainy though).
There is also a bouldering gym 10 mins from Chapel Hill (Progression) and a community center with short top rope climbs.

Betsy Jackson wrote: Hey! I’m considering a job in Chapel Hill and wondering what the climbing community is like in the area. My passion is trad climbing, but it seems like there isn’t much in the way of local outdoor trad options and the gyms are more bouldering focused rather than ropes. Is this pretty acurrate? Are any of you trad climbers currently living in the area? I’d appreciate any advice!

NC trad climbing is some of the finest in the country. I lived in CH for about 8 years and the climbing was excellent. No you dont have real options for climbing with a short < 1h drive, but in the 1.5-4h driving range it is fantastic.

Also - as an aside, in spite of the responses to this thread, it's not all just dudes who trad climb in NC. Lotsa crusher ladies out there!

Matt Westlake wrote: Also - as an aside, in spite of the responses to this thread, it's not all just dudes who trad climb in NC. Lotsa crusher ladies out there!

I didn't see any gender references here.  What's the point?

My passion is trad climbing, but it seems like there isn’t much in the way of local outdoor trad options

According to MP, 48.6% of the routes in the state are trad, only 16.9% are sport. And there are areas not published on here.

When I lived in the area there was a pretty solid group of trad climbers that made regular weekend trips to Moore’s (my favourite crag in the world). I never had a problem finding people to climb with, even when I wanted to drive all the way to Rumbling Bald to red-point one route.

There might not be after work climbing or a huge amount of trad climbers to choose from, but people in the Triangle tend to be friendly and usually don’t take themselves too seriously. Makes it much easier to find good partners than some other areas I’ve been.