Wildmere

If you have an adventurous spirit, and have traveled the long road of 5.10 in the Gunks, this route may be for you. There are lots of mossy, lichen-covered holds, loose rock, and route-finding challenges, although generally the route goes pretty much straight up.

P1: Climb the left side of the starting flake/block and make some dirty 5.7 moves up onto a dirty slab. My friend Ryan, who led this pitch, exclaimed that this was “gardening, not climbing!” Work slightly left and then back right into a cruxy orange alcove/scoop/tips crack below a hanging cedar. Make more cruxy moves on the small face just right of the cedar and continue up to good stances and small ledges below some intermittent overhangs above. Find a way past/around the first two overhangs and then up the fun grey rock to yet another cruxy move just before the NSGT ledge where a semi-hanging belay can be found. 5.9 PG IMO

P2: Work up past many overlaps with runout gear on 5.9 or 5.10 moves and some loose rock. Climb basically up and slightly left until the last overhang where a bulge above forces you to traverse 9’ left and then mantle using dirty but good holds. Continue up and left onto slabby rock to a large tree at the top. 5.10a PG/R

From Grease Gun Groove, walk to climbers' left for a minute or so. Look for a 8’ high detached block/flake 15’ up from the trail, just past Lonely Challenge.  If you arrive at Elder Cleavage you have gone too far.

Pretty good pro in most spots on P1, although it’s work to get in and there are definitely some spots where a fall would be bad. P2 has a few good pieces in the first 15’ and then is runout on 5.10 terrain until you get established Up and left into the larger roofs. Decent gear from there to the finish, considering the fall would likely be air at that point

Bring a full range of cams and nuts. I used a #1, 2, 3, and 4 on the last pitch. There are crucial small(finger and below) cam placements on both pitches. We brought a bunch of crap and used less than half but were glad to have a wide selection.