Titties and Beer (aka "World's Hardest 5.8")

I am in the process of adding some routes that I have seen reported with some FA inaccuracies in the newest Selected Climbs of North Carolina guide book. "Titties and Beer" is an example of this. The Shull/Lambert guide reports Randy Mann was on the FA of this route when it was actually Ted Anderson who was on the FA. It is important to recognize Ted as the name for this route was inspired by Ted and comes from a Zappa song. Ted Anderson is a huge Zappa fan and we listened to a lot of Zappa when enroute to our "many" climbing adventures together. We were also, of course, big fans of the objects of this song...

After we did the first ascent & named it Titties & Beer this route got dubbed "the world's hardest 5.8". The story behind that is after we did the first ascent we were telling Jeep Gaskin, Grover Cable & some other friends about the new route. They asked us how hard we thought the route was. We thought about it and it seemed pretty easy compared to some of the scarefests we had done & were doing on the Glass and elsewhere and we also thought 5.10 was about the hardest we could climb back then. So off the cuff I said "Oh, it's probably about 5.8." Future ascents later confirmed that I might have had understated the rating a bit. Hence it became dubbed "The worlds hardest 5.8" Goes to show its always good to have a concensus on ratings.... The 5.8 climber might need a beer or two after climbing the sensational, voluptuous, undulations on this route.

Regardless of the original stated rating, for its grade it is a very cool route with a lot of character for a Looking Glass climb. We originally did the route by starting from the left on the upper slab and traversing to underneath the prominent crack system where we placed a bolt and belayed. We also later added a 10+ or 11- R/X direct start that we toproped at first and I led at one point. This variation climbed direct up a step slab off the ground with little or no pro to below the belay below the crack. The route has some hard moves to gain the crack and that is what I thought was the crux on the FA. Continue on up the crack and belay near the top. From there move out left a bit to find a spot where you can move thru the bulges and start trending right and then up. It has been a long time since I have done the route but follow the natural line to the top. You might consult the guide book if you want a more accurate description of where the route goes.

Right side of the Sun Wall.

Standard Looking Glass Rack