In the summer I made another Tilman-type sailing and climbing expedition withmy 10-meter boat Dodo's Delight. My crew and climbers were the “Wild Bunch” from 2010: Ben Ditto, Nicolas and Olivier Favresse, and Sean Villanueva. In early July they joined the boat in Aasiaat.

We moved north to explore the area around Uummannaq. On Ikerasak Island the team climbed two new routes on the peak that overlooks the village of Ikerasak. On July 13, Ben and Oli climbed the 400m left ridge to create Married Men’s Way (E3 5c or 5.10a), a very good alpine rock route, while at the same time Nico and Sean climbed the right-hand arête of the main face to give the more exciting Crocodiles have Teeth (400m, E5 6a or 5.11b/c). This gave consistently good climbing, finishing via two pitches up an overhanging crack. The area also had good bouldering.

We found our next big wall to the north, on the southeast corner of Qaquglugssuit. The climbers did two routes on the buttress forming the east side, which we named Goliath (70^°41’N, 51^°13’W), as it was big, bold, brazen, and blocky. On the 17^th, Ben and Nico climbed the left side of the buttress via Standard Deviation (500m, E4 6a or 5.11), where a band of rather loose, black rock soon after the start really concentrated the mind. At the same time Oli and Sean climbed Slingshot (E3 5c or 5.10) on the right side of the buttress. We then took the boat around to the north side of this island, where we discovered walls with tremendous potential for long, medium-grade routes on what appeared to be mainly good rock. However, they were not steep or serious enough for this team.

We traveled back south to the peninsula called Drygalskis Halvo and a formation on the northwest coast the team named Funky Tower (70^°35’N, 51^°16’W). Ben and Sean climbed it by a steep, variable, and formidable route with much loose rock, especially on the rightward-slanting ramp that gained the summit ridge. They named it No Place for People, a.k.a. Sunshine and Roses (500m, E6 6b or 5.12a). I'd anchored the boat in a cove to the northeast, where there was much good fishing and bouldering.

All the climbs had been completed onsight and free, without recourse to pitons or bolts. As usual, the climbing was backed by musical jam sessions, but as the walls were climbed in single long pushes, instruments were not taken on the climbs, as they had been during the team’s multi-day ascents in 2010.

After a good deal more bouldering in the west bay of Uummannaq, waiting for the ice to clear from the east coast of Baffin Island, we set off for a three-day passage across the Davis Strait. The team’s adventures on Baffin are described by Ben in a feature article in AAJ 2015.

Bob Shepton, The Alpine Club, U.K.