Treebeard

Another committing FA from the Chip Chace & Ray Ringle Summer of 1980. This one has seemingly fallen away into obscurity and for good reason. This route follows an obvious & continuous left leaning system in the center of the wall. Tremendous exposure through stints of surprisingly overhanging terrain with continuously committing climbing on notoriously bad rock. The crux corner, however, is a classic section of rock climbing otherwise drowned out by the rest of the route.

Despite also having terrifying rock and committing climbing, CC & RR’s ascent of Pitch 2 is the highlight of this route, and unless you are doing the entire route to satiate some curiosity about the line, I’d recommend starting and finishing on other routes. 

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In Steiger’s guide, he writes “the first pitch and it’s possible alternatives are superb… …the upper two pitches climb some fairly unnerving rock, and should be done only if difficulty is your principal requisite” 

The first pitch (not superb) originally crossed what is now Charybdis, and the “direct” first pitch leading straight to the Heat Wave anchor still has lots of loose blocks despite a few getting cleaned off when I climbed it in 2018. But I don’t think either of those starts has climbing worth doing.

Alternatively, you can climb Charybdis and then transfer the belay - walk right along the ledge, place a bomber #1, and lower a body length to the Heat Wave anchor directly below P2 of Treebeard. 

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Pitch 2 | 5.11 R ** 100 feet: Carefully scramble around fractured blocks to the base of the massive flake that forms a squeeze chimney. The crack in the back goes from fist to fingers as it steepens, with intermittent jams between chimney moves. The climbing is really fun, but is unfortunately through lots of hollow & detached flakes inside. When the crack & chimney peter-out, commit to more cool moves out left to a stance below the overhanging corner. As the terrain steepens, a critical #00 cam is your only good gear outside of optional finger pieces behind a detached flake marked “loose” on the topo. A cryptic sequence guards entry to the awesome overhanging corner, a bolt protects the powerful crux here leading to sustained and but rad moves to a piton before a steep mantle up the ledge to your right. 

Rack: 00 - #4, Doubles of finger pieces incl. stoppers

From here, CC & RR traversed right along the ledge to the base of the massive tree, and FA’d the upper pitches of what would later become Snow Arch. The next year, Ray returned with John Steiger to establish the upper two pitches. 

Pitch 3 & 4 | 5.11 R - 150 feet: Start up & left through unprotected terrain for about 40 feet until your first & only piece for a while is a #3 in a unique hole. More runout climbing through rotten rock leads to a pin & a small ledge below an overhanging block with a finger crack.  

Unfortunately, this marks the start of a section on Poseidon that has been taken over by bats. Excreta coats the inside of this crack, along with the overhanging leftward flakes visible higher up. Part of me wonders how much worse it has gotten over the last 40 years compared to the time of the FA. While the rock & runouts can be pretty terrifying, this pitch would not be nearly as bad if it wasn't that disgusting.

In between these two terrible sections is a rad boulder problem to exit the finger crack & pull over the block, place a #000 and/or ballnut, and enjoy a few moves on good rock before the rock deteriorates again, leading to the disgusting leftward flakes. Pumpy & airy moves continue left around the corner to easier 5.10 R, leading to more fractured & loose flakes. 

The climbing on this pitch up to this point gets a bomb. 

FA party belayed on small ledge with tiny tree (where P3 of Deep End links into this pitch) but due to the lack of gear here, I linked to the top. 

Continue up a fun 5.9 corner on better rock. At the huge horizontal, traverse left to a #3 & awkward move to an easy offwidth summit grovel.

Rack: 000 - #4, Doubles .3 to #3 incl. stoppers, lots of runners, N95

Poseidon North Face

Pitch 2 heads straight up from Heat Wave anchor

Doubles #000 - #4

runners