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12 Years Later, Daunting Scottish Winter Climb Repeated

It was one of the first routes ever established at the grade onsight

Photo by: Martin Moran of the Hayfork Wall

Top Scottish climbers, Guy Robertson and Adam Russell just made the second ascent of The Wailing Wall (IX 9), which was first climbed onsight in December 2010 by the late Martin Moran and Murdoch Jamieson.

The 90-metre climb takes the left-hand side of the upper Hayfork Wall on An Teallach, “which presents a superb fissured face 70 metres high on the left side of the classic Hayfork Gully in A’Ghlas Thuill,” as Scottish climber and journalist Simon Richardson said. About the climb, Martin told Richardson it “is definitely one of the best I’ve done.” The protection is tricky to find and the climbing is exposed.

It follows a corner right of Haystack (VI,7) before heading up an exposed face above. “The grade is a bit tentative because the route is quite short,” Martin said. “But it certainly felt ‘a step beyond’ on the on-sight lead and is quite a bit harder than The Secret.” Other nearby climbs include The Forge (X,10), Local Hero (VIII,9), Silver Fox (VII,8) and The Flying Fox (VIII,8).

Robertson gives an excellent recounting of their repeat in a piece by Natalie Berry here, in which he says, “Above the belay block, some more strenuous lock-offs lead to a sustained and tenuous series of thin flakes and cracked grooves, always trending leftwards above the lip of a great overhung niche. The exposure here is once again quite stupendous, building slowly with every move, and with protection again thankfully remaining in plentiful supply.”

 

 

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Lead photo: Martin Moran of the Hayfork Wall