Ring Worm

With bolts approximately 10 feet apart on a seemingly blank slab, this route and the ones to either side (Yikes (5.9) to the left and Focus Point 5.11b to the right) look and feel way harder than their ratings. There are some wavy features that start near the base between Ring Worm and Focus Point and traverse up the wall to the top of Yikes. But you've got to pick one line to follow. I picked this one without consulting the guidebook and think I made the right choice. When I was there (Labor day weekend 2013), the first 10 feet along the base of all 3 routes was covered with a thick, wet layer of moss so stick clipping the first bolt and then yarding up the rope was mandatory. You may want to drag the stick clip up the wall with you for some of the other bolts. I'm not saying *I* did that, but I will say this was the first time I "aided" a sport route.

Keep following the obvious path to climber's right of all the other routes at The Other Place until you come to the slab. The 2010 edition of New River Gorge Rock Climbs by Mike Williams (Wulverine Publishing) lists Yikes as a trad route but it has since been bolted.

5 bolts to a pair of open shunts at the top. My preferred method for rigging a toprope on open shunts is to girth hitch a sling directly to each shunt. The tight slings are much less likely to get flipped off the open shunts and you don't have metal on metal scratching up the shunts (which will then scratch up your rope when you pull it).