Right Wing is Now Clean

With some final scrubbing, belay bolting, and pin/bolt/flake removal, Right Wing is clean once again. Here's a topo of the route. Keep in mind that it is slow to dry. But once it is, wow! From the first pitch (Eagle's Domain), one can see the entire climb---every single metre. It's an intimidating and exciting moment looking up at the never-ending Filibuster corner. Enjoy!

Scrubbing Granite

A couple of weekends ago, here's a photo that Jacqui took of Sarah going at the lichen. I'm standing down below, working on unearthing Political Ledge.











As of right now, all of the climbing is clean. What remains is an 8m section of ledge to be scrubbed, a bolted anchor to be placed, and a big nasty flake to be sledgehammered out of the Filibuster corner. And that's it.

The First Ascent, 1967

I've been chatting with Fred Beckey about the first ascent. This is what he could remember offhand:

Frankly it is sort of a blur... I remember that there was some aid and the route was sort of strenuous and on the warm side when we climbed it. Cannot even recall if we scouted it first or went up and worked on it with ropes.

It's understandable that he'd have little recollection of it given that it in 2 months, it will be 40 years since the FA and that Fred is well into his 80's now. He suggested that I check the journals. And indeed in AAJ 1968, there it was:

Squamish Squaw, Right Wing Route. On June 24 and 25 Scott Davis, Al Givler and I made the first ascent of the Squaw via the crack system running through the main dihedral on the west face. Our first problem was locating the beginning of the dihedral at the head of the steep jungle growing against the Squaw lower cliffs. Once found, we climbed three pitches directly upward, where the difficulty increased from fourth class to aid. From a spacious belay ledge two long aid pitches, separated only by a hanging belay, curved upward and right. Pitoning was always awkward and slow, as we were forced right by the overhanging left wall of the dihedral. A final vertical and overhanging pitch, again largely aid, proved an awkward if not fitting end to a classic route. We used 67 pitons, two bolts were placed at and above the hanging belay.

Fred Beckey

Sounds to me like (1) Right Wing was the FA of the entire Squaw; (2) They followed one of the bushy cracks near Eagle's Domain rather than Eagle's Domain itself; (3) There was a lot of awkward "pitoning"; (4) Let the Legend that is Fred Beckey be an inspiration to us all.