On August 15, Harlin Brandvold, Duncan Pawson, and I loaded gear into a helicopter for a return trip to an isolated valley of glacier-clad granite walls in Foch-Gilttoyees Provincial Park. Having spotted the unnamed valley on Google Earth, and lacking any photographs or reports of prior human travel into the area, our initial helicopter flight in 2019 was a huge gamble. As we flew southwest from the town of Terrace, rocky foothills gave way to rugged, glaciated peaks. The unclimbed 1,200m north face of Gilt Peak (1,893m) soon crested into view, marking our destination on the horizon. The scale of the wilderness embodied a prehistoric aura that would later prompt us to give the valley a nickname: Pangea.

One result of that 2019 trip had been a partial route called Lizard King (300m, 5.10 C1, to the high point), which climbs a dike and splitter chimney perfectly bisect- ing the 700m face of Extinction Wall, along the northern flank of Gilt Peak, at the head of the valley. An incoming storm, which would ultimately end our trip, forced a retreat from our portaledge camp atop pitch eight. The initial objective for our 2021 return trip had been to complete this route. Unfortunately, we arrived to a wall soaked with the snowmelt, ending our bid before it began.

Through a spotting scope, we scanned kilometers of granite in search of a feasible new objective. We panned northward from Extinction Wall to Cambrian Wall, a smaller southwest-facing feature between Chiq Peak (1,741m) and Gilttoyees-Ecstall Pass. There was no shortage of potential route options, but having been humbled here before, notably on a 21-hour epic establishing Flight of the Dodo (350m, 5.10) on the Cambrian Wall in 2019, we tried to keep our ambitions in check. We decided to spend our first climbing day exploring a slab ramp up the east flank of Chiq Peak. The result was Planktonic Relationship (450m, 5.8) an easy ramble of mostly mid-5th class with some 5.8 moves to the top of the slab. Comfy shoes and bug spray are highly recommended.

The following morning, we felt ready to choose a larger objective. Through our scope, a prominent buttress on the south face of Chiq Peak caught our attention, with a succession of discontinuous cracks and corner systems. A promising line! We each loaded up ropes and racks and set out across the valley that same morning. About 600m north-northwest of our base camp, atop a snow slope and some fourth-class scrambling, we reached the base of what we came to call the Primordial Buttress (53°57’35”N, 129°14’04”W). Wasting little time, I tied in, pulled over a small roof, and pieced together the first pitch. Duncan and Harlin each led a pitch that involved slabby face climbing, bolting on lead as necessary. The 5.10 slab featured some of the most peculiar and undulating granite I had ever seen: ripples, chickenheads, and pods that we later learned could result from hydrostatic pressures at the interface of rock and glacial ice. We fixed lines to the base, and then returned to camp to wait out a storm.

As low clouds rolled past the seeping walls, we each peered through the scope to take stock of the terrain above our high point and set milestones for the following days. After many hard-earned lessons, setting achievable goals has proven to be one of the most important pieces of advice I have received for first-ascent climbing. With the weather improving, we gave the rock one more day to dry off. We packed up 200m of rope, an ungodly amount of rack, bolts, and drill batteries, as well as bivy gear, and then shuttled all the equipment to the base of the route.

The next morning, we charged up the fixed lines under blue skies and climbed three more pitches. Pitch five began with some mossy hand jams before shooting out right through technical and adventurous face climbing. Duncan drilled a handful of generously spaced bolts between 5.11- moves, eventually leading into a beautiful, clean hand crack—a stellar pitch.

Black Sabbath roared through our portable speaker the next day as Harlin took the lead on one of the major unknowns of the route, questing across slab into a steep, shallow groove. A combination of free climbing, hooking, and bolting led him through the technical crux of the route. A drilled bat hook was used to surmount a short, particularly blank section. After two more pitches, we fixed the last of our ropes and headed down again.

The commute back up the nylon highway the next day took some time. Six more pitches of 5.9 rock mixed with heather scrambling then led us to a logical end to the route. We did not scramble the remaining few hundred meters to the summit of Chiq Peak. After a brief celebration, we bolted the final anchor on Disaster Fauna (600m, 5.11 A0) and rappelled to the ground.

We reclimbed the first nine pitches the following day in an attempt to free every move and clean up some of the vegetated sections. Only one move on the seventh pitch didn’t go free; we think it would go at around 5.12-. An extra aid bolt was added in lieu of the drilled hook placement, creating a three-bolt ladder that goes at A0. In all, we placed 40 lead bolts and 26 anchor bolts on the line. Satisfied with our efforts, we cleaned our fixed ropes and returned to camp.

With bad weather on the horizon, we messaged our helicopter pilot. We spent our last day packing up, finishing off our whiskey in the sun, and taking in the views of the valley, just one of many untouched granite cirques nestled among British Columbia’s vast Coast Mountains.

— Nick Hindley, Canada