Ascents by Jack Seawright having Distinct route

A pearler! Harder than rickety kate i reckon. Gives you faith in corner-smearing feet.. feel sorry for fat fingered people but my chipolata sausage fingers were perfect for the locks! Joked with Dave and Brian that a pencil sharpener might have been an alternative. A really cool committing face move to call it curtains aswell. Clip face anchor at frog and turn to jarred: "feel like i just sent a sport climb"

Yeah the starts pretty nails (for someone whos use to bumming up 14s at frog). Super nice locking and a sure sigh of relief when the ledge is gained at the top of the direct start. I think you do this route though for the rest of the climb.. very adventury, similar style to clockwork orange. The overhung chokstone bit makes you feel like your in a movie! love it. Alot of promising looking big hex placements that actually just slippery slide out the back . But ah well, good times. - Contender for best top belay vantage point at frog.

Yep.. the masses aren't wrong.. this is one of the most ideal lines imagineable. Moves coming out of the rooflet were pretty nice and the sustained nature of the climb wasn't debilitating at all due to the perfect hands nearly the whole way. Diagonal section of the crack and section above it is so swimable! Pretty dodgy getting up the first 8m with minimal placements followed by a kinda bold move getting onto the slopey ledge, but was all good in the end.. definitely easier than most of the frog 18s imo.. Anyone that doesnt have quadruples in mid-size cams should look for opportunities to place hexes of the same size to avoid running out of gear. If the line doesnt have rope on it, get on it. What a climb!

Did I climb this, or the one to the right, or five to the left? all the above. I dont remember doing any moves that felt harder than about a 16 grade but im going to log a 19 onsight cos im a scumbag that deserves to have their thecrag account suspended. Quite a nice section where it goes a little overhung: Bomber gear and holds all around. Really quite an enjoyable adventure!

Some really nice positions on this one, sick jamming.. crack starts making you get smart with beta at about half height, rejecting any jams in the wrong place, making for some slightly reachier than expected moves (for me anyway).. kinda similar to iron mandible in that the crack turns to awkward fists at the top making for an exciting finish if this is at the grade for you! (it was for me). Almost lost the onsight with a super sloppy mantle onto the ledge! Lucky theres jugs up there.. The pump was definitely present at the end. Possibly worth the third star imo lotta fun

Kinda cool, some nice high feet and chimneying early on. 19 again seems like a high grade for this climb. Gear much better than the first 3 meters of climbing would have you believe.

Did a version of this.. not sure it was the 19 version. Felt mid teens, which was good cos my placements werent working at the rooflet and had to run it out which was scary enough. Really nice orange rock in the early stages with beautiful side pull/ large layback moves. Boulder at the top on the black streak was super fun. A brooyar classic!

Pretty serious little piece. Nice to fiddle with the rps again. Nice not to test them with a 75kg fall. Moves are quite cool. Bring on arete season!

5:50am start.. probs my earliest at frog. Very humid and very underslept but nothing was gonna stop this climb from being a joy. Start went surprisingly smoothly and the moves at the rooflet made me think but nothing too desperate. More face than I was expecting and the climb has a diet of almost exclusively medium wires which was a relief since I skimped on cams. A very classy outing! Odin looks sick, keen to try.

Quite a nice line of mainly hands and a cheeky grunt up a groove in the middle. Volunteered to use my gear despite kyles non-guarantee that he wouldnt accidentally chuck it down macraderma. Thankful to be stopped from tunnel visioning past the anchor and up through chosstown though.

Spring is the season for getting stuck! They say that.. yeah definitely thats what they say.. the chockstones that were there in the old guide and out when the crag description was written appear to be back (wtf) and some of them moved around more in the crack than i could. Graded correctly at 19 imo - happy self-punishing!

Id been hanging for a while to do this one and pushed our 2nd aid training session into the sun to jump on first thing this morning, but like johnny on beau brummel, i was sadly disappointed. 1 nice rockover move high on the arete but the crack is contrived and can be used more easily to stem against the corner instead. The flop onto the ledge at the chains completes the trinity of nice looking moves that are actually a pain in the arse I took out my frustration on the portaledge later on.

Luke and i are still unsure of yims opinion on this climb. Lacking on-climb commentary as per usual. This climb was an amazing adventure through starkly contrasting terrain. Felt like a mountain climb all rolled into a pitch (rope drag was like pulling a 737). Yims current list of araps favourites: 1. Telemachus 2. Michael berry squeeze 3. Nothing. Luke had a very unexpected ground fall/jump off necrophiliac and yim turned out to be the squeezemaster later this evening as declared in the boulder and on the can. Ask him for further info he will be delighted to inform.

Really flowey climbing down low.. the flow gets interrupted somewhat by a time consuming search for gear but once sorted, a cool move up to the finishing jugs. Rate! Got rained out then saw an echidna. Gen reckons 3 stars are for the echidna. Im happy to assign a couple to the climbing.

"Weoowww this is soo good" kyle sounded like a toddler in the ball pit from the roof jug. We went 2 different ways at the top and after raving about my one, kyle decided hed second it barefoot to experience both. A terrific line with sinker wires everywhere you look. A bit of a confidence booster for me after judgement day. Felt very in control the whole way. We rapped back down horn piece and went up to paladin. Passed an hour sitting around talking about potato guns for flies, marvelling at australia shaped flakes and enjoying the views.

As wild a climb as it looks in the guidebook. Started the day off with a bit of storm repair and pouring water out of climbing shoes, before heading up to Huey, an 18 finger crack that i faithfully clutched at kyles crux gear after 4 downclimbs. Stairway to hell provided some nice 'araps' moves, although im still understanding what an araps move is cos it feels like anything except what your expecting at this point. We waltzed down to the shady side of the pharoahs which turned out to be anything but! Sizzling on belay ledges was the flavour of the arvo, but id sizzle to a crisp for that second pitch: An experience as absorbing as it gets. Helped old mate out on his crux on the next route as he snaked under our traversing rope. Gen guided the pitch, very impressive. We all aided the final pitch crux.. fkn nails move. A plethora of excuses were offered but at that point no one could care less. Beers were beckoning.

What a climb!! Couldnt believe the movement up top that the description says is 'unpleasant'. Insane position. Will yim and i had rolled up to a sunny zig zag after overshooting the walk in and almost ending up in lithgow. Jumped on black bart and shakes and flakes. SF was fantastic through the middle section after which it is named but yim and i wasted no time aiding the diabolocal move at 7m. We are still nonethewiser as to how that gets done. Relatively happy with our little sport foray, johnny came and scooped will up for his first gear lead, leaving yim and i to multi it up! Despite the arvo sun gleaming on the orange face, Taipan had a certain allure, especially the top. I trucked up the chimney and brought yim up. He took little convincing to jump on his 1st gear 19 up the daunting p2 face climb. After some careful gear substitution, he pounced through the crimps and up to the ledge, an impressive onsight with gear safe as houses. I snapped a photo of him midcrux with my hand never leaving the rope, using the forehead phone stabilisation technique. Im not sure how impressed he was. Thankfully i didnt need to work too hard with the nut tool getting the wires out and got to enjoy what was a delightful pitch! I got to lead the romp through the roof. The secret hand jam above the boulder then cringe out left is mindblowing. Chimneyd the final move out just as the sun dipped below the hills. Will and johnny came past at the perfect time to grab our shoes so we bashed out the top. Steves leftover barra was cooked for dinner! Boys on tour day 1 ended up pretty good.

Blinder of a crux sequence through the horizontal crack with the cut and swing across to the hand crack. Absolute all time. Phil: "do i need crack gloves" me: nah dude youll be fine!!" Trying to reassure him. Phil zips up pocket containing crack gloves and starts climbing. Phils internal monologue: "you c**t jack". P2 belay in the roof was intreguing.. ended up with all the load on a roofcrack microcam! Was happy to start p3 to say the least

Are you kidding me? What a sensational climb!! All of these features packed into 100m of climbing is spectacular. It also embodies the distinction i appreciate in multis where it is THE way to ascend the wall through unlikely terrain. Yim had previously researched the meaning of stud and declared that we would be sexually attractive males if we got up the climb. Theres been an extra spring in his step since yesterday. Watch out ladies of tassie. Some wet crack on pitch 2 did nothing to spoil an amazing corner into the undercling flake traverse that may well be visible from space. Yim also had a grand time on this pitch, announcing each jam to the greater hazards main wall. We bailed off pitch 1 originally after trying to climb direct past the traverse and came back after realising wed cooked it. Pitch 3 was heartstopping for me as a crap face climber. 19 isnt a massive numbee but was pretty chuffed to onsight the pitch as it felt hard and packed punches throughout. Finished the day meeting gfoz and tom at the top and having a trot around the skyline traverse together. Another unforgettable day on the Tassie summer tour! Cheers yimmy boy!

Sneaking in a couple last climbs at the gorge with chris. We entered gabriel buttress during a helicopter search for a missing person. The copter was searchiny right around our area and the sound was deafening. Made for quite an atmospheric rap in, but ultimately we decided it would be in bad taste to pretend to be the missing person and wave the search team over. Between my lead on this climb and chriss on the 19 corner in the ampitheatre, we placed 7 times as many rps as i did on the rest of the trip. I thought this climb was gunna break my legs on the 2nd last day on the island but went up and sussed the first crux and before a while had a nice little nest built. Quite safe in the end. We confused a few grey drunkards exiting the penny royal with a torch lit gear audit in the carpark.

Another imaginary ascent on this line. Fresh off a bed sleep in sydney, we were ready to g.. lethargic as fuck. Parked up, impressed the muggles at the tourist area with our busty racks, fixed a line to a shiny new bollard. Felt like cheating but the ladders simply arent an option anymore. Teetered across the ledge to the start. P1 was smooth sailing, p2 was a problem solving challenge but the y man nailed it. I was chuffed to figure out the very cryptic boulder problem off the belay. That second pitch is like the spartan but over the ocean with more exposure and atmosphere and imo better climbing, allbeit harder. Reaching down on the slab to get the feet gear was my crux in the end. Part of yims anchor up top was a construction site fence. Im sure the fullfilment those tradies would feel to hear this would make their year.

Among the wildest of wet weather days spent at sublime point. The point being to seek refuge in binary caves and climb hard sport. We missed the point. Yim started the day jumping on a sopping wet trad multi with Zi literally 3m from the dry rock in the cave. I delighted in aiding martys roof 25 swinging in the rain with double slings off bolts aswell as a horn sling. Some very confused sport climbers watched on. I took a wander to ben trovado wall to have a look at a few of the climbs we had scoped from the coffee shop that morning and to my surprise, the wall appeared almost completely dry, including the corner and a couple meters of the perpendicular wall. Realising this meant bentrovato and colloseum mightnt be a completely obscene idea, i raced back down the trail to the cave and caught yim just as he was tying into a cave climb and delivered an excited barrage of words about the wall being dry. Yim took approx 0.03 seconds to convince, throwing his already tied figure 8 in the dirt and running to grab zis cams, his would-be belayer left astonished. I snagged martys rope and 5 draws and we hurried back to the corner. I got 2 pieces up the first pitch when yim realised he left his tc pros in the cave. I tethered a cam while he lapped back with the shoes. The first pitch was magnificent. Classy as hell stemming with a committing seam section where both of us had to resort to grabbing the piton. Yim also stood on it, declaring he may aswell cos he already touched it. Yim found a double knee bar at the end of the pitch and posed for a cut loose photo with his red fingernail gloss still in perfect condition from jungle juice. Yim lead the second pitch, writing it off as easy before placing a single piece and pondering aloud 'why does the climb just eat my gear'. I was having the exact opposite thoughts on the 3rd pitch after stupidly dispatching the 2 biggest cams in the first 5m and having to climb most of the pitch far less protected than id have preferred to be. The condition of the piton did nothing to neutralize my position. Reaching through the dense bush at the top of the 3rd pitch, i slung it and jumped on belay, directly below a couple carrots i forgot i had bolt plates for and belayed yim while lying across the tree trunk. Yim lead the encore through soaking off-width territory and reportedly regretted his decision to volunteer for the lead, shouting out 'this is the most disgusting amazing climb ever!'. After what felt like a fairly epic arvo, we were happy to hangout in the climbers cave, get some touristy shots. Yim bit the nozzel clean off my water bladder. I taught him how to use it and not bite too hard. 'More like a nipple' he said upon understanding the technique. Our only remaining problem was yims bag lying at the base of the corner cos he ditched it mid pitch 1. Sucks to be him. He raced down the track to grab it while chris came to save our bacon for the second time this week. A larger day than originally planned! But a great one. An amazing feeling to get away with such an incredible climb that feels like it should have been off limits in the weather and feeling appreciative to have such a stoke-machine climbing buddy in yim to participate in my ridiculous ideas.

Telstar! Apparently the ultimate battleground for epic crag reviews. Ill do my best. Fontaines took us to the better land through the dirt trail to ikara head. We had recruited johnny for our 4 man party the day before after hearing he had done his first trad lead at zig zag. 'A spicy chimney traverse dude, youll be fine'. After will reminded me this was the first of many routes he had linked me via messenger in the lead up to this trip, there was no stopping the stoke train. Our rough plan was yim leads team 1 through all pitches setting up slingage for optional aid incase anyone wigs out in the chimney. Johnny partnered with him for the day and will and i paired up. I took the opportunity to have a stab at caladan which was one of if not the best single pitch of climbing ive ever done! Tricky anchor placement for will on second tryna knock off the crux though. We rapped down and lunched on the ground while the other boys started up telstar. After a premature belay and subsequent relocation from yim, 3 of us were up in the 'alcove' the word that apparently confused yim. He fired off the chimney and set up the gear as wed discussed. Johnny punched on through on second. 'Are you still talking?' Johnny lashed mid-crux as yim muttered some probably useless shit from the belay above. Will and i sat in the shade and chatted all things things and laughed at johnnys almost timetable reliable spitting from the belay above until the fateful 'climbing' call from johnny signalling that wills time had come. After dipping his foot in the first aid sling and not liking it, will neglected aid and just sent the pitch free with more pure chimney technique than all of us face hold prancers put together. I paid for yims gear usage fee in the form of a chunk of knuckle skin trying to get a particularly sturdy wire out of the roof. Pitch 3 was quite tiring but went off without hitches.. climbs really well. We trooped up the final slab on hip belays with the boys all ready yelling at us to just solo. Apparently abit of an alpha tussle between johnny and yim after yim asked his 'slave' (johnny) to fill his water in the morning. This was more than resolved post climb with both gents refering to eachother as 'boss'. It was truly the better land at top out. Brilliant hazy post sunset with an almost full moon casting light on pierces. We trooped back to the car and rolled through blackheath in search of a pub and to our surprise, it was open (9:30pm monday). A round was bought and 1 particular patron was intregued greatly by my water bladder in the pub and what it contained. Luckily didnt attract the bartenders attention, would have looked abit iffy. But yeah nah yeah there ya have it, the boys did telstar. One for the books.

Chris was rearing to go the morning after jungle juice and i was keen to escape being home and hungover so we grabbed elo and ciaran and went to find I31. An exciting wet approach with a creek jump and some sketchy wet gully descending. Eventually our canyoning efforts deposited us right in front of the line and it was pretty epic. Chris put the gear up and led smoothly. We all had a run up it, ciaran stubbornly refusing to use the crack and then running off to deliver a tutorial online from the middle of the bush! With a new batch of rain gently setting in, i thought it would be a sound call to start up bairds effort cos the first 7% of the climb was undercover. A very aggressive start getting off the deck into the levitating sealed corner went as a rock over on rattly fingers followed by a nice gr 13 swing around the roof. Some desperate looking finger crackage above turned out to be very reasonable with the right feet and wire placements. The carroted runout slab to the top felt alot more committing than the approximate grade 8 climbing in pouring rain. A spooky alpine touch. Nice wet weather adventuring!

Steak-salad-day. 'If you cant climb the good-looking 1000m peak, climb its chossier sister'. Id heard about the training methods for this route involving garage door sitting and asphalt parking lot crawling but really henry and i should have put more time into practising going down waterslides at wet and wild without sliding. We got the day started at 5:30 in the carpark to avoid pony-boy's unplanned summit shiver-bivvy scenario. An added incentive was the thunderstorms predicted for the afternoon. But it doesnt rain in yosemite so we werent worried. Got to 'the narrows' at about 2:30, just as the thunderstorm rolled in on schedule. I struggled through with much swearing, henry got the bag stuck on second. I tied him off and rapped back into the chimney to encourage him to ditch the bag! Lucky he had slightly better sense to just take stuff out of the bag till it fit through the chimney. Squeeze struggling while feeling the thunder rattling the rock is a slightly stressful but pretty cool experience. The storm cleared and we went through to the top via an incorrect but very fun series of sporty flake pitches out left, got some photos and then saw another storm inbound. A double header! Tailed it down the gully at 7:15. The rain belted us as we raced down choss, followed by slippery slab waterfalls, henry hurriedly navigating. One particularly sketchy downclimb was bailed off and an impromptu rap down the slabs cost us a couple of slings but we were granted our continued survival in exchange. This journey was being viewed by all our friends through binos in the comfort of camp 4 so were glad we could provide some wet-weather entertainment. After another hour of glissading through broken trees and avoiding unannounced cliffs and waterfalls, we stumbled across a tourist track at 10:15. The car was parked for 16:45. I cant imagine what henry and i will go through on our second climb together. We both deserved the bin pancakes i promised for someone climbing stalathe with me on my facebook ad.

Great adventure route. Pick your own line up 'the wall of knobs'. Many knobs to choose from but only 2 of them clipped the chains at the top of pat and jack pillar. Tony has rediscovered himself as a chimney climber - positively brimming with joy as he back pressed the final chute to the summit. I expect to have to talk him out of free soloing steck salathe.

One of the most identifiable pieces of rock (or mud?) in the world and a great experience being up on the diving board. Pretty good level of strenuousness for 2 pretty cooked individuals. Glad antoine suggested this one

Well the day started off with Gen bailing for work and then in an unprecidented move, unbailing and driving out to frog to join the fun and even the party numbers (big hype). Even more memorably, Yim accidentally eating weed cookies from an unknown cooker deposited in his fridge for a midnight snack and being baked while climbing! Didnt change the backseat sleeping routine, no surprises there. Despite inquisition not being my lead and drawing rack and ruin instead, this was the highlight of my climbing day. Brilliant high foot stemming and pulling in the odd looking groove in the first half and some fairly rudimentary offwidthing to unlock some rocking moves in the second. Minus the first 5m, all classic climbing that i shall be back to repeat. RnR finger crack start went much smoother than last year so nice to see improvement there but was a bit surprised about the difficulty of some moves entering and also exiting the corner and gear availability in the thin part above it. Might be my fault for taking less than 7 .4s up!! Pretty serious lead for 20 points at frog imo. Ended up bailing into flies just below the tree which was a little disappointing but good climbing all in all. Head game is still really out of sorts.

Pretty nice. Great 1st day in bruny with a party rap down the zawn. Some beaut atmosphere.

Very very sick! Walking up the layback finger crack was epic on good wires. Tried the mantle up top, headbutted the wall and lost my headtorch.. lucky for the grassy ledge below (rare to say that about a ledge on a single pitch). Lying on my belly to reach down and grab the torch, I could see will shaking his head.. The things you do aye. Anyway, the mantle problem made a mess of me, tried to traverse left to stem the void and get back right to the line on small holds and couldnt.. eventually made the mantle work. Pretty tricky but fair at 19 i reckon. Ringlocking the thin handcrack at the top before getting a cam in was an oddly heartstopping experience

Desperate first 6m to the point of lobbing seriously undersize cams at the crack and just ripping them down till they were wires. Beautiful the whole way.

Another electric warrior moment on the first crux, baulked 4 times and almost bailed but figured it out and pulled it clean, only to drop the next move. Bummer to punt on a not particularly tough bit but great stemming and jams up the rest. Definitely my kinda route. Stoked to squeak this in before another rain storm and take william on a tour de eskimo nell.

Bummer not to get it clean with a silly misread at the start but quality route. My favourite style. Some of the right foot smears were very flimsy looking but careful movement saw them all hold. Happy to punch the last 5m though, too on to place gear so probably would have had a pretty good flight off. Gooned right past the bolted anchor with rap rings on it and summitted the choss corner, ended up having to trad belay and rap off another crags anchor.

Jumped on this and a couple other routes with some lovely launnie folk a few days ago. Route to the left had a really cool off-facing groove for some 'say your fkn prayers foot jams'. The right man itself had a really nice boulder sequence up top.. maybe my smearing on dolerite confidence needs work, but this felt about 21 for me.. copped a ledge landing and 2 more whips before hanging onto the flaring jam finish on my 4th crack by the absolute skin of my teeth. Hardest 19 ive done in a while. Good hands from em on belay. Good to meet some friendly people and enjoy a nice arvy sesh in the gorge. Followed up the next morning with a gr 13 grovel up a chimney i thought would be good for teaching eric trad! Probably got abit to brush up on if i wanted a guiding cert

An absolute belter crack through inhospitable looking roofage with sufficient feet. All there.. in terms of holds anyway, my attention on the other hand, was on another planet. Dropped the crux move after a shocking misread of a pretty clear sequence. Shame to give away such a quality line. Chris made up for it with a much cleaner looking ascent and then we went 'to the crux and beyond' where i accidentally stood on a cam through the wideness. Through my increasingly blurred perspective as to what constitutes free climbing, dont think thats it. Ah well win some lose most. Great arvo!

This was a real fight. Pumping out in a slightly-bigger-than-fists section ultimately ended the onsight campaign. I then got rained on in the off-width.. despite not all going to plan I felt proud to push through the body crack and not bail, and honestly quite enjoyed the change in style. Would like to start pushing more routes like this.