In eastern Sudan there lies a great collection of large granite domes situated above the town of Kassala with a few existing routes and plenty of impressive lines and potential first ascents (see AAJ 2014). Jonny Baker (U.K.) and I arrived in K...
In December I returned to Oman’s Western Hajar Mountains to climb long new routes, this time with Lee Burbery, also from New Zealand. We felt welcomed as always, and despite continued infrastructure development in Oman, the areas we visited rema...
It’s just a rock climb, right? That’s how it started out, anyway. In 2015, Hayden Kennedy and I planned a 10-day trip to Mt. Hooker with the goal of establishing an independent route up the large and imposing northeast face. We reeled in Jesse ...
Over the course of a year and a half, Brandon Adams established a new route on the Lost Brother that quickly became a favorite among high-end free climbers. Wayward Son (13 pitches, 5.12d or 5.11 A0) features three crux pitches of 5.12 through w...
In early summer, Chris Koppl and I hiked out to Little Yosemite Valley to check out new possibilities on some large walls that seemed to have a lot of potential. The first was the northwest face of Bunnell Point, approximately four trail miles e...
As we quietly enjoyed the waning warmth of the late fall sun on the summit of Half Dome, a breathtaking view of the sweeping valley leading toward El Cap stretched before us. After 10 years of climbing all sorts of routes, from Alaska to the Canad...
In July, Chaz Langelier, Cam Smith, Brian Prince and I made the long haul to Lake Basin to check out this photogenic place and attempt a large and likely unclimbed arête, photos of which had intrigued us for the last couple of years. With an abu...
In early June, Jeremy Ross, Sean Sullivan, and I climbed the highly recommended Michael Strassman Memorial Route (700’, III 5.10d) on the south face of Lone Pine Peak. We were planning to check out the south face of nearby Peak 3,986m on the fol...
North Dome, near Road’s End in Kings Canyon National Park, showing the two lines completed by Daniel Jeffcoach, Vitaliy Musiyenko, and Brian Prince in summer 2019. Lucid Dream (1,500’, 9 pitches, V 5.11 A2) is on the left, and Great White Nor...
Over the course of two separate trips, Joey Jarrell and I completed a new route on the Cartago Wall, the second known line on the granodiorite wall (see AAJ 2018), and possibly the first to summit the formation. We set off on our first trip on ...
In June, my good friend Andy McQuillen and I spent nine days exploring the rock walls of the Tuttle Creek drainage. We did a variety of fun routes, the longest being a new line on the prominent right-leaning arête on the left side of the south fac...
One of the mythical Sierra places I had always wanted to check out was the Spring Lake Wall, tucked in to the north of Sawtooth Pass in Sequoia National Park. Eliot Bernhagen and Tad McCrea were keen to join forces, so in August the three of us hi...
In 1985, I was managing the Bearpaw Meadows High Sierra Camp in Sequoia National Park when Claude and Nancy Fiddler passed through during a multi-week backpacking and climbing blitz. I was able to help them out of a pinch with some food when the...
Pleasant Point (9,690’) is located two miles north of the historic mining town of Cerro Gordo in the southern Inyo Mountains, a limestone range to the east of the Owens River Valley and south of the White Mountains. When viewed from the Owens Va...
In May, Chaz Langelier and I checked out the largest tower in the group of rocks collectively labeled the Broken Towers in the old Sequoia guidebook. It is immediately west of Castle Rock Spire and plainly visible from many vantages around Moro ...
I first saw the east side of Seven Gables (13,080’) several years ago while traveling through the area with my wife. Subsequent research revealed a confusing climbing history that seemed to be only focused on neighboring Seven Gables North (Peak...
A few years ago, Richard Leversee encouraged Brian Prince and me to take over a project he had worked on for several years in the 1990s with Scott Cosgrove, Jay Smith, and Jim Zellers: creating an all-free line up the prow of the Watchtower, ori...
On January 26, Joel Kauffman and I made the strenuous approach up Fifth Canyon in knee-deep snow to the Rocketship, where we had been watching an ice and mixed line form throughout the month. On the right side of the formation, a north-facing sn...
Over the course of 2019, solo and with several partners, I climbed three ice couloirs that were likely first ascents in the eastern Sierra. The colorful and obscure Piute Crags, southeast of Mt. Emerson, are plainly visible along the Bishop skyli...
Tad McCrea and I made the notorious approach up rugged George Creek late on the afternoon of July 21, bivouacking near the confluence of the north and main forks of the creek around 10,000’. We cast off for the long northeast ridge of Trojan Pea...