Pierces Pass Area, Grose Valley

Walls Lookdown

A series of topo drawings and photographs by Mike Law describes access and the climbs themselves in the area of Pierces Pass/Walls Lookdown. The complete set of topos is combined into one PDF file, size 2,713Kb (therefore it is quite large and will download slowly on a dial-up connection).

Pierces Pass topos

(Note: this is an Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) file and requires Adobe Reader).

Since the above document was produced, Mike has developed two other climbs in the area:

Blue Ruin (24) 195m

Two awesome pitches, two nice ones and two easy choss ones.

Access: Start 20 m right of Burgermeister. Rap down Mirrorball, walk right (facing in) 50m, climb out and rap back down to lunch ledge. Traverse left at belay 3 possible to escape.

P1 40m (21) Hard layback corner 12 U's.

P2 40m (24) Follow seam to belay on right, 15 U's.

P3 30m (21) Follow seam 6 U's.

P4 30m (16) Easy choss, out left and back right, 5 U's.

P5 45m (23) Up sustained wall 16 U's.

P6 10m (10) Up easy ground past a U to belay ledge, walk off left and down hill 25m to Mirrorball top rap.

Mikl Law, Vanessa Peterson, Monique Forestier Dec 2007

Grazed Anatomy (22) 235m

Old fashioned struggle with some good climbing, the rubbish Pitch 1 could be avoided by climbing an easy wide crack 15m left of the line to reach the first belay. The hard face climbing on Pitch 2 could be avoided by simply walking up the two enormous boulders forming the "Bridge of Sighs", if you are brave enough and if they are still there. Take gear and lots of brackets for the top pitch.

Access: Start in gully below yellow corners at right side of Wall's Lookdown, about 30m down and left of Long, Strong, or Blonde.

P1 25m Up easy ground and traverse left on shattered rock to ledge and 2BB.

P2 40m (22) Up and left to break, right to bolt and gently onto
huge block. Up offwidth and into chimney. 2BB.

P3 30m (18) Out to lip of roof and up excellent chimney past gear
and 5 bolts to tree on ledge.

P4 10m (20) Up face and crack past 2 BRs. 2BB.

P5 40m (22) Traverse left 10m and up past bolts, medium wire and
medium cam, then up arete past bolts to scrubby ledge, bolt and cam belay.

P6 30m walk right and up scrubby ledge to 2BB, about 15m left of
major arete (Disco Non-stop Party).

P7 50m (22) Up wall past many bolts.

P8 10m Up easy wall.

Vanessa Peterson, Mikl Law 25 Jan 2008

The following information has been supplied by Ryan Hentschke about a new aid route.

Grasshopper (25, or 15M2/3-M4/5) 70m

This climb has now been freed by Mike Law at grade 25. It has also been equipped with rap anchors. The climb gets sun from 11:30 AM in summer.

Access: First major corner and wall visible on the left walking down Pierce's Pass track.The line follows a meandering crack for the complete length up flat overhanging orange wall, starting a few meters left of a small gum ledge. The wall is north facing and obvious from the track, about 100m before Colours of Spring wall.

P1 15m (15) Climb up and around arete to ledge and tree belay.
P2 55m (M2/3-M4/5) Step left 3m of tree and follow crack. At 18m move left with crack then step back right 2m to small stance. Follow crack entire length, passing scalloped wall on right, up overhanging face. At 45m reach for hand ledge and traverse out right 2m, or go for top on sky hooks and hair-width pitons. Belay at top on natural pro or move up 10m on easy ground to large gum tree.

Notes: Double rope abseil 50M+. Small-medium nuts will complete most of the climb. Largish offset brassies and 2-3 shallow knife blade pitons will complete the crux.

Ryan Hentschke, Justin Welch Jan 2002

FFA Mikl Law 17 Feb 2008