Torre Norte del Paine, East Face. From February 1 to 18, François Bernard, Antoine Cayrol, Tierry Petitjean, Laurent Fabre and I opened a new route on the east face of the Torre Norte del Paine. There was no previous route on the 800-meter-high granite face. We ascended the middle of the face on a system of cracks up to the summit ledges. We placed 600 meters of rope and the last 200 meters were climbed free. The summit was reached on February 17 by Cayrol and Bernard. The route averaged 6a/A2 in difficulty with two pitches of A3. The rock was good and the wind moderate, coming mostly from the west. The face was covered three times by snow, but it dried in two days maximum.

The final climb was carried out under poor conditions after waiting out three days of bad weather. We climbed on eight days, descending each night to the Italian Base Camp. There were 19 pitches of 42 to 48 meters. Sixteen bolts as belay anchors are in place. The rest were pitons, nuts or Friends.

Hubert Giot, Groupe Militaire de Haute Montagne