Coral Sea Super Duper Direct

Written by LakesBloc Monday, 17 October 2005 00:00

The first piece of news to report is slightly backdated but well worth the wait! In Trowbarrow Quarry John Gaskins has climbed a super super direct start to the classic V.S cracked wall route Coral Sea. Start in the centre of the slab left of Coral Sea and follow holds trending slightly rightwards to an obvious layaway. From this step back left to poor holds in the centre of the slab and make a tricky move to reach good edges just below Coral Sea Direct. Reach up to Coral Sea Direct and either reverse it or Coral Sea, or top out (V10/7c+ish). John did keep as direct as possible, if you trend further right, with height,it's more like 7b/c.

Next up, Greg Chapman has been beavering away on the high hillside at Carrock Fell and come away with three good new problems. The first of these (Queequeg's Coffin) is located on the Whale Boulder and traverses the lip (facing Mungrisdale) from right to left and finishes via a tricky rock/mantle on to the slabby top. The problem was climbed from sitting (6c+/V5ish), although due to the uneven landing below the start it is a much pleasanter problem if started from low rather than actually sitting, this goes at 6b/V3.

On the same block 2.5m right of Hi Karate the slightly inclined wall was dispatched from sitting using a very thin diagonally left trending clack, two poor crimps and finishing with a barndoory slap to gain the top to leave Monstro V8+/Fnt7b+ Greg thought it was the second hardest problem he had climbed at Carrock, commenting that only Nightrider (7c+/V10) involved more precision! [A hold has subsequently broken on this and made it a more amenable 7a/V6.]

The third problem is located on a block in a dip behind the green boulder with a high knife like arête, 30m diagonally up and left from Kits Boulder. This line climbs the 4m downhill face from sitting. Starting on the right pull on and trend left before finishing direct. Entitled Absinth Makes The Heart Glow Stronger (7a/V6), this is really good and well worth seeking out.