The route follows the large grey dihedral to the o...
Description
Located between Coyote and Anaconda- West Owl Direct was 1st free climbed by John Bachar and Douglas Snively in the 70s and renamed Silly Putty. As a freeclimb its still a Lumpy Ridge runout testpiece, but it's still an enjoyable aid climb, as well. West Owl Direct is a step up in difficulty from Anaconda; however, the quality of the rock is not as good. Much of the way you're dealing with banged-out pin scars yet this climb also places you in one of the best positions on Twin Owls.
Protection
If aid climbing, bring a standard clean aid rack and extra TCUs. Lead one long pitch (60m?) to the roof, or belay on the top of the 5.9 flake and then fire to the roof from there. Anchor below roof has old bolts but one can back it up with a crack above. From this belay, escape out left and continue up above the Wolf's Tooth column. PS- Don't use the bunk anchors half way up to the roof!
Photos of West Owl Direct aka Silly Putty Slideshow
The first pitch of this route is an excellent 5.9 flake crack. Definitely worthwhile by itself. In addition once installed on top of the flake, you can toprope the really cool (but not very protectable) dihedral to the right, which is about 5.11+.
One can rap with a 60m rope from the anchor below the roof down to the top of the 5.9 flake. Plus, the anchor below the roof now sports a spankin' new bolt as of 02/2002.
I wasn't too happy with the rap anchor at the top of the 5.9 flake. It's a bunch of decent slings over a big horn, but there is a horizontal fracture line at the base of the horn. Beware.
I climb the 5.9 flake, and it was worth it. It looks easy but is for sure a Lumpy 9. We did top rope the dihedral, Eric did a great job. The horn at the belay does seem sketchy, but I gave it a couple headbutts and it seemed to hold.
By Eli Helmuth From: Estes Park, CO 21 hours ago rating: 5.12b C1+
I'd recommend changing the route name in the database to Silly Putty as the free ascent is really what counts and there is a long tradition of renaming routes once they've been free'd...almost every route at Lumpy can be clean aided, so why bother with these ratings/old names?
Replaced the second anchor bolt on this yesterday and put quick links on the two new bolts.
This route felt much harder than the neighboring Coyote and every other 12a I've done at Lumpy or Eldo, so I'd suggest a 12b rating. The pro is really good if you've got the right sized pieces and can hang-on to put them in, so not really any R on this pitch- a brown tri-cam is key at the crux (15' up).
The rock here is extra crumbly and on numerous laps I was losing many footholds each go- so can't give it many stars. It could use a 100 clean aid ascents in boots to scrape off the outer crust and then it might be worthy of many star status. There is one fixed angle 1/2 way up that is not super solid and an ancient 1/4" bolt just below the anchor, but I stepped left to avoid this altogether.
RSS Feed
Slideshow
