Minuteman Tower, East Face

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Minuteman Tower, East Face

Minuteman Tower, East Face

Leading the crux pitch (#5) of East Face of Minuteman Tower (III 5.10- version). Fingers to hand crack rated 5.10 by Nelson and Potterfield. I'm grabbing a slightly "wiggly" flake inside the crack with my left hand. The going below this portion is a bit scary (for me anyway) as you're pulling on thin flakes (which move under your weight) and protect using movable thin flakes. Once you get past this part, climbing is outstanding. See here for larger version of this photo. Also check out this outstanding photo of crux 2 pitches from cascadeclimbers.com (August 7, 2005).
rpc
on Aug 8, 2005 7:50 pm
Lat/Lon: 48.51500°N / 120.6568°W
Image Type(s): Rock Climbing
Image ID: 119150

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Eric Sandbo

Eric Sandbo - Aug 12, 2005 2:47 am - Voted 10/10

wow.

I wonder if this is the aid pitch Beckey described. He mentioned a pitch with four A1 placements. Derek & I climbed deep in the chimney just right of here, and it was easier, but crumbly at first.

rpc

rpc - Aug 12, 2005 1:58 pm - Hasn't voted

Re: wow.

Thanks Eric!

Yeah we saw the chimney you mention about 30 feet above this crack (there's a link in a couple of my captions to a photo on cc.com that shows both this crack and the chimney you mention). Aiding the crack would indeed be C1 today (w/o cams Beckey might have to use a hammer). Rock Climbing WA book by J. Smoot refers to this crack as being 10b. I didn't think it was that stiff but it's highly dependent on the person's hand size (my wife had a harder time wtih the upper portion of this rack above roof due to wideness).



I will try to type up a route/variation description and send it to you in the next couple days.

radek

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