Time Moves Slow starts out to the left side of a small gully on the Big Ben Tower. Start out climbing on easy terrain up through bolt 2. Make an easy traverse over the gully on well cleaned holds to establish onto the main feature of the Big Ben Tower. Ride the easy slab up on big holds up to the meat of the climb. From here the wall turns dead vertical and starts to get a bit harder. Climb straight up and make the traverse left, being met with the crux of the route. Climb through the crux on good holds and keep climbing left and up on sustained terrain to the anchors.

Time Moves Slow

London Calling

Karwendel Dreams

Heart of the Sunrise

Howl

You Break It You Buy It

Alpen Symphony

Diamond in the Tuff (closed project)

Twice A Day

Water Groove

Eat Your Leberkase

Good Dobby

London Calling follows a crack to the left of the 5.12 sport climb, Heart of Sunrise.  It stays independent for the initial 30 feet, then as the natural protection runs out, it joins HOS for three bolts before cutting left toward a steep and splitter fist crack for the final 40 feet.

 Props to Chris Hatzai for installing this route's anchor and cleaning Heart of Sunrise.  London Calling piggybacks off his initial efforts.

First climb You Break It You Buy It.  Then... 

  Pitch 1: (5.6) Traverse up and left 10 feet, then scramble up to an anchor at the base of the gully.   

  Walk up the gully 50 feet carefully so as not to dislodge rocks.  

  Pitch 2: (5.10c) Look on the left for a corner with a crack with two bolts visible towards the top.  The crack has a small roof you will need to overcome. Beware as roof has large suspect block.   The remainder of the pitch is bolted. 

  Pitch 3: (5.10b) The difficulty eases off a bit towards the end.   

  Rappel anchors are 15 feet north of the summit of Big Ben (when climbing up the final pitch, rappel anchors will be hidden on the right side.  Carefully glance around the edge to locate them).  Do two single rope rappels to the gulley.  Walk down the gulley and rappel from top of gulley (top of pitch 1) to the ground.  Stay away from base of walls when partners are rappelling when possible due to loose rock.

Start out climbing in the obvious crack system. Clip the first 2 bolts from the crack and work right onto the face. Climb through the boulderly 5.11 sections working up and left. After a good rest at bolt 5, work back into the crack system climbing on good holds up to another great rest just below the mini roof. Once into the roof sequence the route stays on you until you pull the lip 15’ above the roof. Do a couple more slab moves until you clip the chains. (Using the large hand crack to the left of the crux sequence knocks the grade down significantly.)

Aesthetic line that climbs the sharp arete. Tricky barndoor sequences and tenuous clips. Old-school hard, compare to Spank the Monkey or the Blade.

Crux is getting off the ground to the first bolt.  The rest of the route is sustained. 

  When the climber approaches the top and starts to traverse left, there is some loose rock.    Belayer should stay as close to the wall as possible and wear a helmet. 

  Would give this two stars after more traffic and most of the loose rock is cleared out.

Pitch one: 5.6 or 5.10a. Either climb a mellow slab to the base of pitch two, (we didn't) or climb Dead Baby Bubbas (10a) on the left to access the same point.  DBB feels hard for 10a and wasn't that awesome.  Definitely some choss.  (the slab might be a better option) 

  Pitch two: 5.12a. Spectacular, hard, cryptic, and very, very atypical of Smith climbing.  Start up some easy choss and clip the first bolt.  Two more bolts of easier stemming and palming lead to the fourth and final bolt.  Clip the bolt and pull into a bizarre sequence of overhanging groove climbing to gain the aesthetic corner above.  Still pumpy lie-backing and jamming will eventually take you to a two bolt anchor on an excellent ledge. 

  Pitch three: 10d. Jaw-droppingly good.  From the top of P2, you can just crane your neck far enough back to see a wildly overhanging crack system traversing out to the left of the corner above the belay.  It looks improbable and difficult to access, but ties together incredibly well.  Mellow moves up the corner lead to a techy traverse left that gains a leftward trending ramp with bolts.  Mantle onto the ramp and and commit to a wild undercling traverse up a thinning flake.  Clip the final bolt and pull into an incredible sequence of  long moves on huge holds that takes you to a final crux on gear.  Belay at a two bolt belay on a sloping shelf. 

  Pitch four: 10a. The escape pitch. A thin slab move on bolts leads to easy climbing and a slightly manky bolted anchor on the summit.  There is a brief stretch crap rock at the top of this pitch. 

  Descent: walk back along the summit towards a small cairn looking for a bolted rap anchor the sends you into the gully climbers right (east) of the summit.  Two single rope raps drop you into the gully where you'll have to walk down to another two bolt anchor that will shoot you to the ground in one more single rope rap.

P2: 5.13a/b? This second pitch route is currently red-tagged and is closed to climbing. Please do not climb!!

Just right of Good Dobby. Ascend juggy, low angle, albeit loose terrain at roughly 10- to a midway anchor. From here, the rock changes texture for the better and becomes vertical and challenging. Tackle an obvious roof featuring strenuous reaches & trickery. The final bolts protect loose terrain; caveat emptor.

The obvious groove directly left of You Break It, You Buy It hosts a high quality, technical route. Climb the slab below the first bolt and get ready to rock yourself right into the business. From this point on, you resist succumbing to the barn door until the chains. Make your way up tiny crimps and smeary feet for a few bolts, then balance your way into the right facing side pull. Take a breather, grab the good edges above, and slowly make your way up to a scoop. You get a really good rest here before you pull the final bulge and clip the chains.

 Stick clipping the first bolt is recommended. Not runout like it says in the Watt's guide. 

Extension rising above Good Dobby. Leave the anchors and stem up to a jug. The crux is mostly straightforward pulling on flat holds through the bulge. Should be a quick tick for those up for the grade.

 *Leberkase consists of corned beef, pork and bacon, ground up and baked into a loaf.

Climb pockets on low angle rock until it steepens to balancy sidepulls and edges. It feels runout at points but the falls are clean. the crux comes at a small crimpy sidepull and moves delicately up to a posotive edge. the anchors are wierd to clip and feels somewhat spicy.

Big Ben faces pretty much due south and, as a result, picks up lots of sun.  It's also shrouded in obscurity so you'll likely be the only person there when you go.  With a handfull of cragging routes at the base and two full length routes to the summit, it has a lot to offer anyone who doesn't mind the occasional (or not so occasional) creaky hold.

Description

Location

Protection

Routes in (4) Big Ben Tower