Reboting The Fin Arete: 2023

October 30th, 2023 - November 3rd, 2023

Little Cottonwood Canyon

Recap by Anchor Maintenance Coordinator, Andrew Brodhead

This past Spring, during our anchors work in Altered States Gully, we kept looking over at The Fin and telling ourselves “I think some bolts still need replacement up there.” After running into an old anchor tech Hayden and chatting about future work, we penciled it in for some Fall work. Fast forward a few weeks and after some conversations with Brian Smoot about some potential areas, we committed to the job.

Over a three day period, four techs with the help from Diego P. and Brian S. himself, we were able to rig and replace the remaining bolts up on The Fin. Our main focus was to finish rebolting The Fin Arete (5.10b), established in 1978 by Brian and Jonathan Smoot. Rebolting The Fin Arete went relatively quick, thus allowing us to rebolt Dark Horse (5.11R) and the remaining bolts on the Lowe and McQuarrie 1965 classic The Dorsal Fin (5.10d).

After about 2.5 days on The Fin, we bounced down to its Eastern side. For the remainder of the week, we focused on The Waves of Mutilation (5.10+R) . Though relatively newer compared to routes on the upper Fin, this route sees most of the run off from The Fin. Most of the hangers found were in rough shape. Waves of Mutilation was a logistical challenge given its traversing terrain. Lots of rope work was needed to move about the wall. With permission from the FA party, we moved some bolts down to better clipping stances. All bolts on Waves were replaced with Wave Glue-ins…kinda fitting!

Keep an eye out for our 2023 End of Year recap. And like always, don’t forget to fill out our anchor observation form to help guide us for our 2024 maintenance season. This effort requires funding contributions from the community. Please consider JOINING the SLCA so we can continue to provide anchor maintenance in the Wasatch.

Rock climbing is an inherently dangerous activity and we encourage anyone who participates to obtain the appropriate education and training in order to minimize accidents.  We also encourage participants to consult resources including but not limited to guiding outfitters, SAR, Utah Avalanche Center, ranger stations, and weather reports. Nevertheless and although tragic, accidents can happen even when the participants have the proper training and have consulted authorities on conditions. Participants in outdoor climbing are assuming a risk, just as they do in skiing, mountain biking, kayaking, or other outdoor activities. Anchors once maintained by the SLCA are not guaranteed to be in the same state or condition as when they were maintained.