The Zot Face

The better finish to the Great Zot. Lots of tricky routefinding on this route, but I found that the description in Rossiter more or less matches the route very well. There is a lot of runout 5.6 climbing but the "5.8+" traverse near the top looks well protected. See the comments for the Great Zot for a discussion of various routefinding issues on this route.

Start by following the first 3 and a half pitches of the Great Zot. Before you start pitch 4, observe that your eventual goal is the obvious tree and ledge directly above you. At the end of the cruxyness on the leftward traverse of pitch 4, look for a ramp-like weakness that leads up and right to the tree. Belay here.

The next pitch is where the routefinding gets weird. Traverse straight right to a dirty looking left facing dihedral capped by a licheny roof. Climb the dihedral, pulling around to the face on the right before the licheny roof. Once on the face, eye your eventual target: a small tree (the only one) on a ledge up and slightly left. Climb straight up the face looking for a very thin crack that diagonals in from the left.Traverse left on this feature (crux) to a crack and corner system which leads up to the tree and ledge. I thought that this section wasn't any harder than the pitch 4 traverse on the Great Zot.

The last pitch follows easy features to the top.

Standard Eldo rack.