Sakube lwa, Honshu. Honshu, the southwestern island of Japan, offers little climbing of an original nature unless one can locate some of the small forgotten pinnacles projecting from timber covered slopes. Sakube Iwa is such a pinnacle in Ryu Mon north of Arita. Previous ascents had been made on the north side by Japanese climbers who shinnied up long bamboo poles to get up the overhang. In September 1954 Hirota Yoshinaga and I climbed the east side, the only face without pronounced overhang, using a few pitons for safety. This ascent was very similar to those in Pinnacles National Monument and was on the same type of conglomerate.

David Collins