Coast Range Outdoors

Although the forecast was calling for 30 degree highs in Squamish, Nina and I decided to climb Born Again on the Apron. We started early so we’d mostly be in the shade, with the plan of getting off the route before the sun hit The Apron.

I linked the first two pitches, and belayed Nina up. This was in the 5.9 range, and was a mix of gear and bolts. Nothing felt too difficult here, and there were no runout sections.

Nina took pitch 3 – a 5.9 fingers dihedral. This pitch was one of my favourites. Typically, finger sized crack climbing isn’t my style as my fingers are somewhat sausage like, and don’t fit into finger cracks all that well. But this pitch worked well for me and it was all smiles.

Next, I lead the crux 10b pitch. This involves a well protected slab traverse which crosses over towards Diedre. I find slab / technical face climbing are my strongest areas, and I was psyched to get the send on this pitch. I’m not a particularly strong rock climber, so a 10b lead for me doesn’t always go clean.

Nina then took on pitch 5, which involved briefly climbing over and down into Diedre for a few metres, before climbing out and left back onto the main face. This pitch was awesome as well. We felt thankful that we were on Born Again in this section. Diedre had 6 parties on the first 3 pitches, while we had the route all to ourselves.

I took on pitch 6, which is a 5.9 steep hands to fist splitter. I was cruising up to the final bulge section, when suddenly I was falling before I knew what was happening. I’m not totaly sure what happened, but I took a 10 footer on some solid gear. All was well, and I climbed through the bulge no problem on the 2nd attempt. Perhaps complaicency? Sometimes falls happen when we don’t expect them.

Nina then linked the last 2 pitches to get us to the top of the Apron. Just as I was getting to the anchor, the sun came out and blasted us with heat. We felt happy we were heading down at that point. We took the Moonwalk back down, and before we knew it we were back at the truck.

Born Again has every style of climbing, all at a very high quality. From slab, to splitter cracks, to dihedrals, to technical face climbing, there’s no shortage of climbing styles. This is a great alternative to many of the more popular Apron routes, especially on a busy day. We took a double rack, Set of nuts, about a dozen draws, and used a 70m rope. All anchors are fixed.

This climb was awesome. It had been on my list for a while, partially for the climbing, and also because the first ascentionists Kris, Fraser, and Phil are all friends from SAR. Thanks gents, for establishing a great route!