BETA PHOTO: This is an updated photo of Crack Land, part of Av...
Description
Crack Land is the leftmost area on the Third Tier. Most routes here were established by Richard Rossiter and Pebby Johns in 2005 and 2006. Because of the orientation of the rock (north) and the newness of the routes, expect to see some moss and lichen when you climb here. If this bothers you, climb someplace else. Better yet, bring a wire brush and whisk broom and help clean up the routes as you're rapping off.
Crack Land starts just beyond the West Gully. Mystery Ship (10c) is the first route you see. Just past Mystery Ship are three new crack routes established in July 2006: Ghost Ship (10a), Ship of Fools (10b), and Mystery Tour (9).
Hike east down the trail and into the woods to get to Ancient Light (10a). Climbing Ancient Light takes you to a big ledge, where the second pitch of Ancient Light (10c) and Ancient Fright (10c) begin. Climbing Ancient Fright takes you to Resurrection (9). Climbing Resurrection takes you to the summit of Avalon, a magical place with wonderful views.
In May, June, and July 2006, Richard Rossiter and Pebby Johns added eight more routes on the far left side: The Art of War (10b), The Enemy Within (10a), Thus Us (9), War Horse (10d), Crack Love (10a), Crack Love II (9), Crack Love III (10c), and Blade (11a). The Art of War is a sport route; the others are trad climbs.
Crack Land now has a number of good routes in the 5.9 to 5.10 range, making it worth a visit by every Avalon climber.
L->R:
On the far L side: A. Crack Love, 9+, 1p, 75', gear to 4". Hand crack up corners & roofs. B1. Crack Love III, 10, 1p, 75', gear to 2.5". R finish to B2. B2. Crack Love II, 9-, 1p, 75', gear to 4". Hand, fist, & offwidth past a roof. C. The Art of War, 10, 1p, 100', 9 bolts. Steep arete. D. The Enemy Within, 10-, 1p, 2 bolts & gear to 2". Squeeze chimney. E. Thus Us, 9, 1p, 75', gear, extra 3" to 4". Hand & fist crack. F. War Horse, 10, 1p, 75', 3 bolts & gear to 1.5". RFDs. G. Ancient Fright, 10, 1p, 5 bolts. Steep face. H. Resurrection, 9, 1p, 2 bolts & gear to 3". Crack & face to summit of Avalon. I. Ancient Sight, 8+, 1p, 100', gear to 3". Cracks and face right of Resurrection. J. Ancient Light, 10, 2p, 150', P1 bolts, bolts & gear. Exciting traverse under a roof to an arete->Pillar to steep face. K. Blade, 10+, 1p, 90', gear to 3". RFD R of p2 of Ancient Light.
Routes near the West Gully: L1. Ghost Ship, 10-, 1p, 90', gear to 3". Left crack. L2. Ship of Fools, 10, 1p, 90', gear to 3.5". Middle crack. L3. Mystery Tour, 9, 1p, 90', gear to 5". LFD on right. M. Mystery Ship, 10, 75', 6 bolts. Roof to face to steep headwall.
Getting There
From the Wall of the Goddess, drop down to the bottom of a boulder-filled gully. This is the West Gully. Crack Land begins just past the gully.
The Classics
Mountain Project's determination of some of the classic, most popular, highest rated routes for Crack Land:
Blade ascends the blatant, overhanging, right-facing dihedral just left of Dragon Slayer and is a link between the second pitch of Ancient Light and the final corner of Dragon Slayer. Good jams on the left with the opportunity for daring stems all the way up. The crux is the last 20 feet before joining Dragon Slayer. Good rock and good pro all the way. Blade makes an interesting circuit. Begin with th...[more]Browse More Classics in CO
Avalon is a fairly complicated crag consisting of 3 large tiers set off by two broad ledge systems that span the whole crag horizontally.
The First Tier is not too formidable and is host to 9 routes that all face west on two different levels.
The Second Tier is more difficult to visualize and is host to 33 routes on a series of walls and slabs facing west and south that are stepped upward from left to right beginning with the Tarot Wall and ending with Wall of the Dead.
The Third Tier is host to 29 routes on five distinct facets: The Northeast Face, Wall of the Dragon, the West (or Upper) Gully, Wall of the Goddess and the Southwest Buttress with the route Black Tiger.
The broad Northeast Face includes the following 15 routes (all of which face northeast):
Crack Love Crack Love II Crack Love III The Art of War The Enemy Within Thus Us War Horse Ancient Fright Resurrection Ancient Light Blade Ghost Ship Ship of Fools Mystery Tour Mystery Ship
The West (Upper) Gully is host to five routes. To the right of Mystery Ship, the wall bends around to face west and climbs to a notch just east from the balanced rock atop the Wall of the Goddess. A fairly amazing chockstone or fallen block hovers over the gully to the south of the notch.
The west-facing Wall of the Dragon is located directly above the West Gully and is host to just two routes, or three counting the finish to Blade.
The Wall of the Goddess faces west and features several short (but good) routes.
Finally the Southwest Buttress has just two routes on very good rock.
All this should probably be listed under Avalon. I laid it out here to clarify the extent of the routes on the Northeast Face. For that matter the whole Northeast Face could appropriately be called CRACK LAND, since crack climbing is most of what it has to offer.
This should probably result in some minor changes in the outline of routes on this website for Avalon.
I 'schwacked up to Crack Land yesterday to check it out. As many have said, there was an impressive amount of work done to create this area.
We made the mistake of coming up to Crack Land from the left (East) side of tier two. There was a faint trail, but it was mostly bushwhacking. Looking at pictures now it looks like you can access this area by going to the third tier on the better trail up the right side (passing Wall of the Dead), and crossing the ledge system below the third tier.
We didn't print out the MP info for the area before going (it wasn't the original destination), so we were "using the force". We ended up doing Thus Us and War Horse. The base of these routes is a tough place to hang out. It is a highly vegetated (stinging nettles), steep, loose hillside. RR (and others?) have done a lot of work to even establish a trail in this lush area, but I think we could do a bit more work at the base of this area. I'd be game to go do a bit of work up there this summer if anyone else wants to help.
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