I learned trad climbng in the gunks with an old pile of nuts and hexes. Then I moved West and randomly met Mike Freeman in Snowmass Co on a ski lift in 1999. That was my favorite celeb encounter of all time. He thought it was hilarious how I excited I was. I was only 21 at the time.
Millbrook rocks!!! Someday I have to do this climb. It looks so awesome. So what do you think in terms of grade? It looks more like 12c than 12d to me ... but I've never been on it.
+NickFalacci So few people have done it that it's hard to get a consensus. It's in that range of 12c or 12d. On www.thewhitecliff.com I used all + and - for this reason. The R is also debatable. Falling from the crux and you hit the wall but not hard. The run-out above the crux is scary, but it will be all air if the shallow green alien holds, if it doesn't you might get wrecked. Jamie and Cody both agreed it should get an R. Not as dangerous as Sudden Impact I think.
+Christian Fracchia Hey, thanks for the reply. Very appreciated. From the video, it does look like the crux is pretty well protected. I'm not sure I'd want to test that green alien coming off high on the 5.11 arete. : ) If you don't mind a couple more questions: 1) Do people climb the scary 5.11 R/X pitch to the belay beneath the final crux pitch? Or do they tend to rap in and down to the belay? 2) I've heard the climbing above the crux on the arete is supposed to be 5.11 ... but I've never heard what sort of 5.11. Is it hard 11? Easy 11? Or 5.10 with a crux or two? I was just starting to push past my comfort zone for leading (5.10d - 5.11b) and was starting to get some hard 12s and Survival on TR and was really looking forward to leading more out at Millbrook and pushing myself to get on harder leads -- when I had to move to LA. These videos, your site ... they help a lot! Really motivating me to get back into shape and get back to the Gunks. PS: I LOVE your Millbrook site. Thank you for creating it. PPS: When I was back east climbing in the Gunks I knew of handful of people who had done Nectar, and I kept hearing of other people going out to give it a whirl. Sounds like no one's really queried the folks who've done it in the past ... as it gets climbed infrequently. PPS: Along that topic, Al Diamond once told me he had done NV several times ... and he loved it so much that at the end of a long day of climbing at Millbrook, he told his partner (Jordy Mills?) that he wanted to take a top-rope run on Nectar Vector. So he rapped down. And was so far away from the wall he couldn't get started ... just pure air. And he had almost no gear. I can't remember exactly how he got out of the situation, but I think he had to use what little webbing/slings he had to create a couple shitty prusiks and inched he way up as it got completely dark. Think I'll skip the TR attempt!
maybe my favorite route in all of the gunks. kudos to this video for years of psych and the impetus to go try it!
I was climbing out there when Mike Freeman sent it in style.
I learned trad climbng in the gunks with an old pile of nuts and hexes. Then I moved West and randomly met Mike Freeman in Snowmass Co on a ski lift in 1999. That was my favorite celeb encounter of all time. He thought it was hilarious how I excited I was. I was only 21 at the time.
So amazing. I wish we had structures like that in Louisiana.
Millbrook rocks!!! Someday I have to do this climb. It looks so awesome.
So what do you think in terms of grade? It looks more like 12c than 12d to me ... but I've never been on it.
+NickFalacci So few people have done it that it's hard to get a consensus. It's in that range of 12c or 12d. On www.thewhitecliff.com I used all + and - for this reason. The R is also debatable. Falling from the crux and you hit the wall but not hard. The run-out above the crux is scary, but it will be all air if the shallow green alien holds, if it doesn't you might get wrecked. Jamie and Cody both agreed it should get an R. Not as dangerous as Sudden Impact I think.
+Christian Fracchia Hey, thanks for the reply. Very appreciated. From the video, it does look like the crux is pretty well protected. I'm not sure I'd want to test that green alien coming off high on the 5.11 arete. : )
If you don't mind a couple more questions: 1) Do people climb the scary 5.11 R/X pitch to the belay beneath the final crux pitch? Or do they tend to rap in and down to the belay? 2) I've heard the climbing above the crux on the arete is supposed to be 5.11 ... but I've never heard what sort of 5.11. Is it hard 11? Easy 11? Or 5.10 with a crux or two?
I was just starting to push past my comfort zone for leading (5.10d - 5.11b) and was starting to get some hard 12s and Survival on TR and was really looking forward to leading more out at Millbrook and pushing myself to get on harder leads -- when I had to move to LA. These videos, your site ... they help a lot! Really motivating me to get back into shape and get back to the Gunks.
PS: I LOVE your Millbrook site. Thank you for creating it.
PPS: When I was back east climbing in the Gunks I knew of handful of people who had done Nectar, and I kept hearing of other people going out to give it a whirl. Sounds like no one's really queried the folks who've done it in the past ... as it gets climbed infrequently.
PPS: Along that topic, Al Diamond once told me he had done NV several times ... and he loved it so much that at the end of a long day of climbing at Millbrook, he told his partner (Jordy Mills?) that he wanted to take a top-rope run on Nectar Vector. So he rapped down. And was so far away from the wall he couldn't get started ... just pure air. And he had almost no gear. I can't remember exactly how he got out of the situation, but I think he had to use what little webbing/slings he had to create a couple shitty prusiks and inched he way up as it got completely dark. Think I'll skip the TR attempt!
testing the pancake.
amazing video. thanks for posting. would be better without any music imho.