Yellowwood and Chess Pieces. A climber's Guide, by Charles Edelstein and Tony Lourens

Yellowwood and Chess Pieces. A climber's Guide, by Charles Edelstein and Tony Lourens. Blue Mountain Design & Publishing. Cape Town, South Africa 2019. ISBN 9781990927836 / ISBN 978-1-990927-83-6

Yellowwood and Chess Pieces. A climber's Guide, by Charles Edelstein and Tony Lourens, to places to be missed. There are many climbing routes of excellent quality on hard quartzitic sandstone, from moderate to bold and hard.

Tony Lourens  

Climbing history

The first climbing to happen in the Yellowwood area was in 1953, when Mike Mamacos, Bob Davies, Jannie Graaff and Frank Villa climbed the knife edge ridge to the right of the main amphitheatre. They called their route Smalblaar Ridge, a route which has attained classic status. At the time, Mike wrote: "... rises a ridge which has probably been looked on as £ prospective route by most rock climbers who have passed this way, and who realise that ridges like that of the Klein Winterhoek do not sprout from every peak". And on reaching the foot of the ridge, he went on to say, "The ridge was indeed a knife-edge. And a well-honed one at that". In 1959 J. de V Graaf and R. F. Davies climbed Yellowwood Crack, taking seven hours from the road, then in 1965 K. Fletcher and R. Williams put up Black Waterfall Face, a route taking the walls to the left of Yellowwood Ravine. Soon after, some attention was given to the Chess Pieces around the corner, to the right of Smalblaar Ridge. In 1967 Mike Scott and Gabrie Athiros, put up the first route on the Castle, which was soon followed by two other routes further to the right by Greg Moseley and Andy Killick. But, for obvious reasons, the intimidating wall of the Main Amphitheatre was ignored for some time, until Tony Dick and Dave Cheesmond put up the classic Time Warp in 1977, a serious undertaking that mostly follows the obvious line in the middle of the amphitheatre, requiring bold leading on dodgy rock with poor protection on at least 3 pitches - not for the faint hearted. The next new route to be climbed - also on the walls to the left of the ravine - was Red Faced Waterfall by John Moss, Peter De Tolley and Mike Scott in 1981. Then there was z dearth of development for a few years, until Ross Suter, Jono Fisher and Gordon climbed the classic and super hard Armageddon Time in 1987. This was followed by Paul Schlotfeldt and Dave Shewell's Blood is Sweeter than Honey, and Tony Dick and Dave Davies's route, Second Coming, both in 1988. But these complex, scary and run-out-routes are seldom repeated. In 1992 David Davies and Alan Ross put up another route on the Chess pieces called Nc More Bells, which has become a modern-day classic. Then for 17 years nothing more happened on the walls of the Chess Pieces, until there was a mini explosion of routes from 2009 to 2011 when a number of excellent routes were put up by the likes of Rob Zipplies, Malcolm Gowans, and a bunch of other climbers. It wasn't until 2004 that the main amphitheatre attracted more attention, when Leo Rust anc Lloyd Turner put a bold line, called Prime Time, up the centre of the amphitheatre. The route was freed by Rust and Tony Dick in the same year, and a few years later, in 2008, was given a direct start by Charles Edelstein, giving the amphitheatre its hardest route to date. Prime Time Direct, which goes at a punchy grade 25R, is "a route in a league of its own in the Western Cape and one of the finest routes of its kind anywhere in the world". [...]

This is an excerpt from Yellowwood and Chess Pieces. A climber's Guide, by Charles Edelstein and Tony Lourens.

Title: Yellowwood and Chess Pieces
Subtitle: A climber's Guide
Author: Charles Edelstein; Tony Lourens
Publisher: Blue Mountain Design & Publishing
Cape Town, South Africa 2019
ISBN 9781990927836 / ISBN 978-1-990927-83-6
Softcover, 15 x 21 cm, 152 pages, throughout colour photos