Seal Rock
Google Earth ImageEast Face South Side II, F5
We climbed this route one time. After assessing all the starting points, we both agreed that the start of the south side looked appealing. A crack following along a giant dihedral before stepping out onto the face was very sport route looking. This first pitch would be best lead with double nine's, as the traverse left, to the face, causes a bend (a longer sling was less desirable as a pendulum fall would swing you into the dihedral face). Non the less, a nice break in the typical face climbing. I do remember we passed two bolts to rappel down the face near the top, while repelling with our rope looped around a horn formation (bollard like formations are fairly common) of sorts and rappelled that way, as was our custom. We never found a second bolt to rappel, so we looped another feature. This is one of those climbs that you hope the information is good, "walking off" any formation is akin to downclimbing. Approaching the descending point you feel like you are approaching the edge of a massive drop off. Thankfully, once you peer over the edge, there is a short drop down to some easy class 4 downclimbing. One of many prayer inducing moments alpine climbing offers, when you rely on trusting a guide book, as sometimes I wonder if the authors even climbed the route. |