Grooved Arete, East Face of Tryfan - Hard Very Difficult

There are several brilliant long mountain routes on the East face of Tryfan and this is probably the most popular. This is partly due to its inclusion in Ken Wilsons book Classic Rock. The walk upto the Heather Terrace and the start of the route takes about an hour and serves as a great warm up before the climbing begins. The route is described as being 8 pitches long but in reality the middle pitch is a walk along a grass ledge/path at about half height.

The start of the route has unfortunately been marked by vandals who have scratched the initials GA into the rock. This first pitch is extremely polished but fortunately this is not representative of the rest of the route. Perhaps the most famous pitch is the knights move, I'm not going to tell you how to climb it, that would spoil your fun!

You can escape off to the North Ridge without climbing the last pitch but its worth doing for completeness. You can choose to descend the North Ridge (grade 1 scramble) or scramble up to the summit and descend the easier South Ridge.

This route gets very popular at weekends and bank holidays so go mid week or start early.

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