West NW Face Anderson-Garrett

This is a really good route on really good rock leading to one of the Wind's only true "Spire"-like summits. Quite unique, and of course, Fred got there first.

Dave Anderson had scoped the route and pieced it all together and though we swapped leads, he had drawn a "topo" of the line from camp days before I even arrived. The only deviation from the plan was at the tension traverse and the poised flake. Conditions may vary.

Pitch #1-#3: Due to wet conditions, we started to the left of some obvious possibly easier chimney systems working up some very pleasant crack systems that trend back ove to the top of the chimneys. Once The Gray Bands are reached, the difficulties increase significantly. 5.7-8

Pitch #4: Climb a spectacular corner trending right of a deep flake system. 5.10

Pitch #5: Climb up to a grassy alcove where a belay can be established on a good ledge below a left curving overhang. 5.9+

Pitch #6: Climb left under the overhang and during the FA and due to some seeping wetness at that time, a CO tension traverse off a large Hex which we then left in place gained access to another good ledge and belay under a quality crack system. 5.9, CO.

Pitch #7: Climb an easy corner

Pitch #8: Awkward and strenuous steep crack climbing up a dihedral that lead at that time to a scary poised flake (this is likely no longer there). After some time studying it, we again went left powering through the overhang up better rock. 5.10b

Pitch #9: Above the dihedral pitches, continue up and left on wonderful knobby face climbing where protection can at times become taxing, but it is lower angle. 5.7/8.

Pitch #10: Layback a crack to a large ledge and link up with Beckey's North Prow route to the top.

Rappel the North Prow Beckey route.

The route line is relatively accurate as noted in Joe Kelsey's 1994 Wind River Guidebook on page 330. The huge roofs near the tension traverse are obvious from below.

Pitch count is approximate and to the best that memory serves me.

No bolts were placed. A few hexes were left fixed, most notably at the tension traverse to another crack system.

A full set of Camalots and Nuts will be more than what we carried.