Bongo has character. It is a fun route, but it is also a heady route. It is easy, but it is hard.

The route follows a splitter crack up a slabby face. Most of the climbing is on the surrounding face, but knowing how to jam will help a lot on this route.

The "bongo" is up high, a plate of friable rock that resounds when knocked upon. Unfortunately, there is a perpetual wasp nest somewhere inside the cavity of rock. It's usually not too bad if you tread lightly, but there is always some joker in your party that has to knock around on the stuff.

Bongo

Buckeye Testpiece

Strick 9

New Red River

Red River Renaissance

Funhouse

Anne's Crack

Blue Balls

Pink Panties Pulldown

Campfire Crank

Toxic Avenger

11:11

Cold Shot

Hair Of the Dog

Sisyphean Labor

Start by climbing the face to the right of a small left facing dihedral.  Climb up and left to reach the crack and overhang above the small dihedral.  The first piece of gear can be placed in the crack of the overhang.  Pull the small overhang using finger locks and face holds to gain a stance in a short fist sized pod (crux).  Continue up the beautiful finger crack to its end.  Place good gear at the end of the crack, the last 15 ft is somewhat friable and dirty.

Forget the fact that you see a crack splitting the lower part of this face. Don't even think of protecting out of it. Best to top rope this route from Strick 9 anchors or the anchors on the ledge above the route with long slings (cordelette).

The climbing is fun, through cool holds and reachy moves for the grade. There is a bit of sand, especially on the lower part of the route, but this hardly detracts from the route.

The rock is soft, and the crack is friable.

There is a distinct crux midway up the route. But it isn't terribly harder than the climbing before or after.

Fancy footwork will serve you well as you stem and edge your way up this route.

This was my first 5.9 lead and it is a good route to break into the grade. Just make sure you get good gear before moving past the roof.

Tricky, but typically Red River Gorge, start leads to unique climbing.

This route seems to be poorly protected (it flares inwardly), but with hexes it actually is very safe. The upper part is easily protected with smaller gear.

It's hard to set up a TR from the anchors. Better to belay up, or sling the anchors long and leave directionals.

Nice dihedral just right of Bongo.  Starts by climbing up a somewhat chossy pillar.  Once you gain the pillar the fun begins.  nice small hands sized crack with plenty of lay back moves possible in the dihedral.

This route just keeps going. The climbing is varied along the entire route. The crack is wide, then narrower, then jumbled.

There is some face, some crack, some weirdness. The rock quality also varies a little and the upper section of the route has some potentially loose rock.

The route is in a great setting, with the sound of the whitewater of the Upper Red River Gorge echoing from the opposite walls of the gorge as you climb. The belay ledge is a neat little perch and seems about as far from civilization as you can get in this part of Kentucky.

Mossy and green but the jams are good once you get to the clean part of the crack.  Plenty of face holds also but the jams are great.

Crux definitely seemed to be trying to get a good jam in the moss down low.  Walk right and rap from Pink Panties

Interesting face start to a nice horizontal where a #3 or#4 will protect a ground fall. Tackle the chimney offwidth, protect with small gear towards the top. Lay back and Step up underneath an intimidating roof , look left for some bail gear and Nuts on top of drug pusher to get down.

There is a nice looking crack system that appears to continue to the top called "genital warts" 5.10

This route looks good some days and looks horrible other days. The day I did it it looked pretty good.

It was burly for the grade, wide and only slightly dirty. It seems like it was mostly fist crack, but it also climbs like an offwidth a bit.

I actually enjoyed this route, despite fist and OW being my nemesis crack sizes.

A thoroughly underappreciated route.

Start using a large cheater stone.  Jump up and heel hook your way up and right over very overhanging rock to reach the jug near the first bolt.  Continue up making some desperate reaches on small or sloping handholds to reach the 2nd bolt (crux).  Follow the route straight up to gain a small flake and the 3rd bolt.  Climbing eases up considerably from here to the top.  You would have a long ride if you blew it near the 4th bolt.  A very nice climb that would benefit from more traffic.

I don't like to call this route a sport route. It's a bolted route for sure, but there are only 4 bolts in 60 feet and no separate anchors for this one.

To some it will seem runout and to others the bolts will seem undersized.

Regardless, this is a classic route and deserves your attention.

Edge up a black streak to the ledge. Traverse left until you can move up on to the ledge and belay from anchors above Buckeye Testpiece.

Start up on the arete and work to its right side. Continue up the right side past a flat spot and up into the rippled wall on small holds to reach the top.  Belay from trees above.

Walk North for 60 meters or so along the left side of the top of the cliff to a gully which can be easily scrambled down back to the base of the cliff.

This route is an obvious hand crack that goes up and tops out on the summit. There is an awkward offwith for the first 15 feet

Power through the start in a finger crack up the narrow dihedral to a dirty ledge.

Description

Location

Protection

Routes in Wall of Denial