The Ytrid Deed

This route is one of the several moderates that scale the West face of Tower One on Redgarden Wall.

The route I will describe varies slightly from that in Rossiter's book, in order to stay out of the messy chimney at the bottom. This does not significantly change the overall grade of the route, but will make the first section of 5.6 climbing less protected.

From the Red Ledge, which can be reached by climbing one of many Redgarden routes such as

Swanson Arete

(for an easy approach), or the

West Chimney

(not recommended), or the first 3 pitches of

Yellow Spur

, or... In fact, you can traverse from almost anywhere on the Red Ledge, including from the routes

Great Zot

,

Grandmother's Challenge

, or

Green Spur

• if you are willing to traverse a little way.

Once on the ledge, traverse south toward the fantastic dihedral and arete of Tower One, toward the visible top pitch of the Yellow Spur. As you pass the great dihedral (bearing the appropriately named route "The Dirty Deed", start looking upward. While the original route went up the chimney a bit before traversing out right to a crack system (20-30' right of the dihedral) it is possible to go directly up from the ground, which may make the start more like 5.6 than 5.4. This is approximately 1/2 way between

Daedalus

and the

Dirty Deed

Dihedral (chimney).

Go straight up this crack system until it ends and then beyond to a medium pine tree on a small ledge, about 90' up. A larger pine is up and left in the dihedral. Belay at the medium pine, or continue upward on Pitch 2.

Pitch two goes up and slightly right in another crack system to the left-hand edge of the ledge bearing the large pine tree, another 90' up, or so. Linking these probably requires a 60m rope. (I used a 70m and had plenty left.) Belay in the crack above the ledge at its left edge, or at the base of the large pine as for

Daedalus

.

If you have not linked pitches 1 and 2, linking pitches 2 and 3 is an option. Again, linking these might require a 60m rope.

Pitch 3. Climb the obvious hand and finger crack from the left side of this ledge to the top of the cliff. There are good jams on easy terrain here as well as some face climbing. Belay from above and then descend as for the

Yellow Spur

.

This route is nice climbing with nice views, and is reasonably safe, but requires some distance between pieces. Mental constitution is more important on this route than hard-core ability, so I don't recommend it as a first lead. It is, however, a great "Date Climb" (snicker).

A light rack from stoppers to fist-sized.