11 Things You Need to Know about Liming
A post on China trad "lyfe" by: Ryder Stroud
with contributions from: Dan Jerke and Ana Pautler
for even more information on China climbing visit Climb China's website or Mike Dobie's blog
Trad climbing is not something with an illustrious, Stonemaster-filled history in China. Rather, it is a sport embraced by a devoted few while the rest look on with confusion saying “太危险了！”(“too dangerous!”). While it would not be too farfetched that many folks in the US might see trad climbing this way, the view has leant itself to trads slow embrace in the Middle Kingdom. Granted, the sport is definitely on the rise. The Chinese climbing scene is young; from what various climbers have told me, the Chinese climbing scene is very limestone-centric with all the karsts that populate southern China. But trad is finally starting to gain ground as more quality routes open up on gear.
But for the most part here (presently), the limestone is plentiful and the bolts flow like water… relatively speaking (I admit it, I am a bit of a crusty, old-fogey trad junkie on the inside… a little bit...). But far removed from the Avatar-looking karsts of Yangshuo and the jumbo-jet-fly-though-able caves of Getu (see Petzl RocTrip 2011), there is a place where the seed of trad is finally starting to grow here in China. That place is Liming.
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A view down the valley towards Laojunshan/老君山 from the One Dragon Buttress/Watchtower area.
Think of it this way: if Indian Creek and Squamish had a torrid love affair, and that affair produced a baby, that baby would be the sandstone cliffs of Liming. Located in Laojunshan National Park, Liming is located in the distant, northwest corner of Yunnan Province, a few hundred kilometers from the province’s border with Tibet. The sandstone cliffs rise upwards of 300 meters (~1000 ft.) and tower over the valley below by, perhaps, as much as 600 meters.
While there exists some information on the Western Internet regarding Liming, the area is still relatively quiet when it comes to climber traffic. Even with the North Face and Black Diamond hosting a trad climbing festival at the park for the past two years, the little town of Liming has remained sleepy and beaucholic, something that we in the Western world may miss when we can descend from places like the High Sierra and still find chain restaurants and highways not far off.
A Little about the Geology
You will find a lot of signs around the park that talk up the geological history in Liming. And, for once, it is in somewhat intelligible English, something that does not seem to happen too often in Chinese parks or China, in general! Liming’s sandstone is part of the network of Danxia (丹霞) Sandstone Formations that dot China’s southwest and east. Like the limestone karsts that stretch from Yangshuo down to Vietnam and Thailand, the Danxia sandstone is also in a general chain that can be found in Yunnan, as far east as Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, and as far south as Guangdong province.
A comparison of the major chained geological landscapes in China: Liming (top) is part of the Danxia/丹霞 sandstone chain, running in the southwest to the east. The better-known limestone karsts formation (here, a portion in Guangdong/广东 province) populate China's southern provinces and run into Southeast Asia.
Each area’s sandstone formations look different and also fracture in different ways. Just by walking around in the park on a casual hike, you can see all of the “cross-bedding” formed by changing directions of the water through time. Some of the formations have intricate criss-cross patterns as the sand was laid down by moving water and later petrified under the weight of eons of sand build up. In Liming alone, you can see how much the formation of the rock is affected by its primary sculpting force: water. The particular sandstone formation in Liming is a highly localized one formed by an ancient lake that once covered the area, and you can see the extent of the sandstone formation without going too far. On the way into the park, the park entrance gate is coincidentally a convenient boundary marker for the sandstone. Along the valley road on before you reach the park, all of the steep hillsides reveal limestone cliffs; you even pass through some road cuts that are built right up against the cliffs themselves. Once in the park, the climbable sandstone disappears once you drive 20 minutes in any direction.
This, of course, should come as no surprise. China alone has about half of the world’s limestone. Landmarks like Jade Dragon Mountain, the karsts of Yangshuo, and the famous gorges that surround the massive Three Gorges Dam are all testaments to how much of this kind of stone juts out of the Chinese landscape.
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`Contrasting portions of rock: the huge overhang at the top right of the photo protects the lower rock, leaving thin cracks exposed and making for more angular fractures in the rock. Less than vertical terrain, on the other hand, has a thick coating of black lichen (left).
In the park, too, you can see how the water changes the sandstone in such a small area; you might think of it as various neighborhoods within Liming itself. Some formations are littered with cracks. Sharp, lightning bolt-shaped cracks spider web out across the face, and often these sandstone faces sit atop a bed of conglomerate rock—something that looks more like puddingstone than limestone or sandstone. Some formations, on the other hand, are impossibly smooth, occasionally broken only by an eerily spherical, smooth pod (think of a giant hollowing out a section of cliff with a melon baller?). Even other formations differ with hybrid cracks: the cliffs appear as if they had, at one point in their geological history, were covered in splitter cracks, only to have them round out and disappear as the soft sandstone erodes from the monsoon season rains.
Though our crew in Liming has no geologists, we guess the formation and frequency of cracks seem to be influenced by the steepness of a formation versus the water running over it. Any area where the general pitch of the cliff is gently overhanging, or if the cliff is capped by a big roof, the cliffs seem to be protected. The fracture geometry of the cliffs are, in this case, a lot more angular; the cracks are sharper, more dramatic and continuous; and generally the rock is a tad bit cleaner, with the orange-brown rock layer still visible at first glance.
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Raul Sauco on development duty on the Black Hole Project. The face on the right is less-than-vertical and coated in lichen, with any face features being highly rounded. The only crack on that face is the barely visible Lost World, which is a very wide offwidth/chimney. On the left, however, the rock is protected by an overhang at the top of the formation.
On the other hand, any terrain that is less-than-vertical is covered in a thick layer of black lichen and resemble more of the famous turtle formations that make the park an iconic tourist destination in China. For climbing, however, it spells the slow (hundreds of thousands of years of erosion) death of any cracks that might have once been on these faces. Cracks (or crack-looking lines in the rock) are highly rounded and are too shallow to take any gear. The black lichen also makes any remaining cracks hard to clean, and small face holds are virtually absent. There are a few counterexamples to this erosion paradigm. Routes like Lost World slice directly up a huge less-than vertical face, but the crack itself is massive: an offwidth/body slot/chimney. In other words, it is a big enough crack to remain even through water erosion. But the crack still adheres to the same general principles we noticed on the cliff. The outside of the crack is covered in black lichen and there is no chance to escape from having to offwidth for six pitches, as there are very few angular holds (the stuff found protected in the overhangs) to escape out to the face.
But of course, we came here to talk more about climbing, so let us get on with that.
The Climbing
Ryder Stroud on the Clam Digger Direct (5.11)
People of the US climbing are used to years of illustrious climbing history. Decades upon decades of climbers making bold ascents all across the country is an image that we have seen published everywhere: the “Gray Dick” Dick Williams climbing Shockley’s Ceiling in the Gunks naked with only a swami belt to catch any fall; Jim Bridwell, John Long, and Billy Westbay standing proudly beneath the Nose in über hippie attire following the first sub-24-hour ascent of the route. We have become so accustomed to these images of our favorite climbing locations decades before our time, and we assume that these prolific early climbers were no idiots: they ascended every bit of beautiful rock face they could get their dirtbag hands on.
The result is that we Western climbers often think that, unless you are a climbing pro who can crank out 5.12 or harder on trad on a regular basis, or climb scary mixed ice and rock lines, finding a new route on a beautiful piece of stone is all but impossible. But that kind of mindset also comes with a wonderful benefit: we get spoiled! All major climbing destinations in the US have a definitive guidebook. The rock is super clean—some will even complain it is TOO clean to the point of being polished and slippery! Trails are built up and often-well kept. And communities of climbers pop up everywhere. If you go to a US crag or cliff, chances are you will find many people ready to climb with you.
But what about on the other side of the Pacific? Well, you might liken it as stepping into your dirtbag Delorian and hitting 88 miles-per-hour; you are getting in a time machine. When you step out of those outrageous-looking seagull-shaped doors you will see stone—lots of it—that has not yet been sent. Liming falls squarely in this category.
One of Liming’s climbing forefathers, Mike Dobie, sat one morning at the van’s breakfast table, staring up for a long while at Pandora, one of the cliffs that overlooks Liming town.
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Nico Cáceres on The Great Owl (5.9), Liming's most aesthetic hand crack.
“Man,” he says “we are here, and the golden age of Liming has not even STARTED yet! Think of what this place will look like after 10 years—when Chinese climbers get more into trad. This place will be covered in classic lines!”
The man speaks the truth. He, along with a devoted handful of foreign and Chinese climbers, has put up around 200 routes and 300 pitches in the region in an area with hundreds, if not thousands of potential crack lines. There are a many crags that have a smattering or even a solitary line on them.
Some climbers on our side of the Pacific might ask, “Well, if it is so good, the why aren’t people flocking to it? A trad mecca in China should be drawing the hordes!”
There are a few things.
1. The sandstone ramparts of Liming have not reached American shores in a huge way. The Liming Trad Climbing Festival is still in its infancy for a mere two years, and, while big-name pros have showed up at the event—Cedar Right, Will Stanhope, and Yuji Hirayama to name a few—not much information has crossed the Pacific. What exists on the Internet is a few articles, a smattering of short videos, and some beta posts on our favorite climbing forums like Mountain Project. These things certainly do prime the appetite, but it still has not reached a level at which foreign climbers think to themselves: “Yeah! I will pack up my heavy-ass rack, dodge the skeptical and suspicious looks of TCA and fly myself (with said gear) to a remote region in Yunnan! Wait… where is Yunnan?”
2. China does need more stoke in its trad climbing scene. The sport is also still young amongst Chinese climbers. According to Zhoulei, one of Liming’s early Chinese gear-climbing aficionados, China’s climbing scene started in a substantive way only after 2000. Consequently, homegrown climbers are still lighting up those ‘darker corners’ of climbing that we Western folk already have established back home for the better part of 50 years. Trad is not something that has firmly ensconced itself as a future for climbing in China. With multiple lifetimes’ worth of limestone blanketing the country—of which only a tiny fraction has been well-developed with bolts—it might be easy for locals to see, at least for the moment, that limestone is China’s climbing future.
But the transition is slowly happening. Every time we return to Liming, there is usually some posse of Chinese climbers passing through, and always a different group of climbers. Some of them certainly know how to crank it out, climbing 5.11+ slopey, overhanging liebacks that lead into grotesque 6-sized offwidths. So while the development is slow to get off the ground, the direction and momentum has already been set. It will just take a critical mass of climbers to show up to fully open Liming’s untapped potential
So with that in mind, keep some handy tips in mind when you DO decide to cross the vast ocean to get here.
11 Handy Tips when Climbing in Liming
1. New routes are everywhere.
Want to pioneer something new on gear? Liming is the place. The national park encompasses miles and miles of various branching canyons surrounded by towering sandstone cliffs up to 300 meters high. Only a tiny fraction of the cracks on these cliffs have been climbed. The originators of Liming trad climbing, Eben Farnworth and Mike Dobie along with a devoted but small group of local and foreign climbers have put up ~300 pitches of climbing. Some cliffs only have a single route on them; others only have a handful. Even then, classic lines that were established early in Liming’s trad history (now about 4 years old) still have beautiful neighboring lines that have not been touched!
You want to find a place that has not been ‘climbed out?’ Go to Liming.
2. Liming is China’s Indian Creek… in a way
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A view down to the belay trying Liming's hardest route on top-rope: Flying Buttress up on the Firewall. This route was recently freed by Australian Logan Barber at 5.13d/5.14a, making it China's hardest trad climb to-date.
Beautiful splitters, burly offwidths, laser-cut corners, and even an inverted OW… all can be found in Liming’s sandstone. Some will draw comparisons to the desert cracks of Utah, and the comparison is partially accurate. The cracks are beautiful. The stone makes for excellent crack climbing. However, the rock doesn’t fracture into laser splitters in such tight concentration as often as Utah sandstone. Some formations in Liming sprout with cracks in all directions. Others will be completely blank without any conceivable way up the enormous faces. As listed above, one driving factor for this difference may be the environment in which each set of cliffs lives: desert (Indian Creek) and monsoon-affected forest (Liming).
3. Tape up (and bring LOTS of tape)
Liming sandstone is incredibly abrasive… much like sandstone found in the US. But there is an added layer to the gritty-ness in a literal sense. Developing new routes—and even climbing established routes that do not receive much traffic—often have a layer of harsh grit slathered deep in the cracks. A lot of route development involves layered scrubbing. The outer layer of this soft sandstone simply sloughs off with a bit of scrubbing. You will have to expose the more compacted, stable stone beneath the eroded outer layer of sand. Even with the solid stone in-play, bring plenty of Metolius tape for all of your tape glove needs. If you want to cut down on the tape waste, invest in a pair of crack gloves.
Ocún makes an excellent pair of crack gloves, if you are able to get your hands on a pair. Singing Rock makes them, too, though the ICC crew prefers the Ocún gloves. Find them here.
4. Protect your rack and ropes from the sand
Rocks erode… slowly. They shed like dogs if dogs lived for millions of years and licked your face with grains of sand instead of love and saliva. The cliffs slough off their old layers and often leave it around on the groundfor other people to find. Liming, being sandstone, decays into sand as it erodes, leaving nice swaths of sand at the base of the cliff. Considering how abrasive sand can be, always bring a tarp for your rope and keep your rack off the ground. If you plan to open a new route, concoct a solution to protect your cams as you clean out cracks.
The ICC crew is a fan of half-cut soda bottles of various sizes to catch and divert falling sand away from cams when scoping out new lines.
5. Love Jerry and Ding Dong… but make sure they behave
One of the local hostels, the Faraway Inn, is the local climber hangout. The hotel’s two mascots are Jerry—a German Shepherd mix—and Ding Dong—a… well… we do not know what Ding Dong is. We call him awesome. While they always crave attention from climber guests both when you want to love them and when you are too busy to love them, always show the dogs love. They are some of the nicest dogs you will ever meet; they seem to know who the climbers are and have an instant affinity for them. Locals we have talked to say they do not really interact with people unless those people are climbers. They also now how to get to virtually every established crag in the Liming valley.
That being said, they know climbers adore them and take full advantage of it. Jerry will always try to forcefully intervene if Ding Dong gets love and he does not. The two are also known to cause trouble around town, having recently hunted down and killed a baby goat and a duck, the livestock of local farmers. Jerry has since been put on a leash, but still gets around town on occasions. When going to crags in the South Valley (i.e. The Guardian, Die Sternwarte, Indy Wall, Bull Crag, Angel Wall, The Diamond Wall, and Gorilla Face) the dogs should NOT go with you. Having them cause more trouble for local farmers will not just cause headaches for the Faraway’s owners and Mike Dobie (Liming developer and more-or-less keeper of Jerry), but also their behavior may someday endanger themselves if they are not curbed.
6. Patronize local businesses
Chinese national parks and scenic areas, on the whole, usually do not like climbers. Climbers like dirtbagging and avoiding paying for things like entry tickets, and every national park has a (by Chinese standards) steep price to enter the park. In the case of Liming, the entry ticket is 110 RMB. While corporate tourism groups often run each park, the towns within the park are often genuine old Chinese towns that have lived in the region for centuries. In Liming, the valleys are home to the Lisu people, one of China's many non-Han minorities (and one of the 52 officially recognized by the Chinese Communist Party). Climbers’ future access to Liming—or other major crags in China for that matter—will improve and stick around if locals are on climbers’ side. A good way to get in good with the locals is to patronize their businesses. Convenience stores, restaurants, and hostels are fairly easy ways to get to know the Liming locals and get them to see climbers as a benefit to them and their community. These connections will prove to be a good benefit for the Liming climbing community should there ever be trouble from park management.
7. Bolt anchors are key
While gear anchors are true “traditional climbing,” a lot of the routes in Liming are oftentimes splitter cracks or laser-cut corners without much viable terrain to build gear anchors, especially in the single-pitch cragging scenario. If placing bolt anchors, use 5-piece, long expansion bolts, or epoxy glue-in blots. Stubby 3-piece bolts are dangerous because of their lower surface area contact with the rock and the soft nature of the stone.
All of this being said, Liming is NOT a sport crag! Bolt only when there is no crack to protect or you are establishing an anchor.
8. If you plan on developing, bring a full development kit
Ryder Stroud kitted out with all of the tools of cleaning: copper wire brushes, hammer, crowbar, etc.
We often take for granted beautiful, clean rock that we can simply walk up to and climb. What is less known is, oftentimes, how much work the first ascentionists made to prep the route for YOU. Scrubbing, loose rock removal, and occasional bolt anchors (depending on the rock) are all the product of someone’s vision and time commitment to make the route stellar for you to climb.
If you plan on dropping into Liming to open your own route, you will need a few tools of the trade: copper wire brushes (predominantly the soft bristles that will not mar the rock), a spade, nut tool, saw, crowbar, a drill, bolts, and perhaps other dirt-removing devices. Of course, the drill can be the hardest to get your hands on. Hand drills are also viable in Liming because of the softer nature of the rock.
9. Bring plenty of aid equipment
While you may not need super fancy aid gear like beaks and Fifi hooks, it is often very hard to establish new routes free from the ground up. While this is Utah-esque sandstone, the cliffs of Liming exist in a much wetter environment. Exfoliating soil, sand, rock, and lichen are just a few things you will encounter when preparing a new route.
10. Beware of “Liming Stomach”
Liming food is generally pretty palatable. But often, Westerners often find the use of oil to cross from “liberal use” to “excessive.” Granted, you are truly in the boonies of northwest Yunnan. That being said, there are occasions, especially for new arrivals coming from overseas, that the reused oil results in some bad dishes that twist and strain your digestive tract. For some it will last a scant day or two. For those less fortunate, it can dog them for five to seven days. All this being said, it is also a problem that is often encountered by foreigners in China no matter where they live. Home cooking is always a plus in Liming, if you have cooking gear. There is one shop run by a Naxi woman that is sort of the fresh produce aisle of Liming village. Meat can be easily obtained on market day, but keeping meat while camping is always an issue.
11. Love the wild shit you are doing
China has so few trad developers. Crossing the Pacific to open a new route in Liming groups you with a select few of devoted, exploratory climbers. This group numbers only a few, so get excited that you may very well be helping to bring about another golden age of rock climbing in the world!
Select Liming Climbs
As a final note to all of this Liming stoke-psych advertisement, I will leave you with a few of the climbs that may best give you a damn good reason to pay the heavy baggage fee on Cathay Pacific (Cathay, if you’re lucky… seriously) to haul all of your trad gear over here.
This is a good preview, but if you do not want to ruin your future on-sight attempt, STOP READING HERE!
The Pillars
The easy-to-access area that is a good introduction to Liming climbing. You may even feel like you have not left the US! A well-constructed boardwalk built by the national park covers half the approach. Here you will find some of Liming’s earliest and classic lines.
The Clam Digger (5.11)
The original Clam Digger route, already a Liming classic, has a recently added extension above the normal step out to the right 2/3 of the way up marking the 5.10 finish. This route is the lovechild of a body slot, squeeze chimney, and an offwidth AND there is a handcrack in back, useful only if you can reach it! Be prepared to feel like you have just sprinted a 10k race! This route will leave you full-body tired...
Begin by wedging yourself into this giant overlap and proceed to brawl your way through the lower crux with a combo of chimney and offwidth technique. Rests will only come with good technique and body position. Pass some miniscule faceholds and get crafty moving in towards the handcrack and back out towards the arete of the clam. Squirm your way up to the 5.10 exit move (the old bolt protecting the 5.10 exit has been chopped) and keep forging upwards towards a flared pod. Above the 5.10 exit, the crack at the back of the slot will thin and the overlap/"clam" will squeeze you into increasingly strenuous positions. Reach the chains before your quads and calves give out.
Gear: TCUs 0-2 (or X4 equivalent), double .5, triple .75, triple 1, double or triple 2, double 3
Faraway Corner (5.11a)
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Rapping the "Screaming at the Faraway Corner" link-up. Faraway Corner is the skinny lieback corner at the bottom of the picture. The second pitch of Screaming at the Moon is the wide crack above.
Most people’s first 5.11 lead in Liming, and deservedly so. It is a beautiful corner with a manageable, not-too-long crux. Traverse in on a right-arching crack into a left facing corner. Getting into the corner is the crux, as you pull a bunch of face-y sporty moves to get to the crack. Once you enter the crack, start repeating your favorite lieback technique, being observant of key feet that will save you from the pump. This pitch is best linked with the second pitch of Screaming at the Moon in one mega 30m pitch, if you have the gear. Otherwise, you can split into two highly enjoyable pitches.
The second pitch climbs the wide corner crack just off the ledge above Faraway Corner. Some awkward weide jams off the ledge will bring you into offwidth territory. Keep an eye out for face holds that can save you from full-on groveling. Continue wide jamming until you reach a rock fin inside the crack. Be gentle as you pass it and pull above to slabby terrain. The bolts will be above in an alcove.
One rappel with a 70m rope will get you to the ground. A 60m rappel will necessitate two rappels.
Faraway Corner gear: TCUs 0-2, doubles .3-.75, single 1
Faraway Corner-Screaming at the Moon Link-up gear: TCUs 0-2, doubles .3-.75, single 1, single 2, double 3, double or triple 4, single 5
Morass (5.10c)
A great Liming moderate. Start up the big lieback flake to the right of Faraway Corner. The flake will terminate and yield slopey awkward ledges transitioning into a very narrow crack. Finesse your way along the boundary of crack and sport climbing to reach a stance beneath a left-facing corner-ish crack. Jam the corner from fists to hands size until you reach a pedestal. A few awkward moves to stand up on the pedestal will lead to the chains.
Gear: TCUs 0-2, X4s .1-.2, doubles .5-1, single 2-3, optional single 4
Born to Be Wild (5.11c/d)
One of the few routes whose send or fall success will depend least on crack climbing, Born to Be Wild will test your ability to sport climb in a crack. Begin under a right-facing corner that terminates in a large roof (right of Dirt Devil and left of Over the Rainbow). Climb the awkward corner off the deck (could use a bit more cleaning) to a ledge just underneath the roof. Protect the roof and extend with long slings to avoid send-killing rope drag and launch out into the skinny crack extending out the roof. Smear and smack your feet as you climb out the crack on sporty, pumpy crack crimps. Reach the end of the roof and reach up to start turning the roof. Stay aware to spot a big-ish hold. Get acrobatic and contort your way up to a standing stance using a flaring crack above. Once you stand up, a few easy moves will yield the chains.
Gear: Single .1 X4 or equivalent TCU (optional), double or triple .3, single .4, single 2, single 3
Over the Rainbow (The ultimate in sandbagged 5.10b’s)
The first ascentionist of this wild route is Raul Sauco, a career climber who has climbed everywhere in the world. He FFA’d this wild crack. The word “futuristic” is often cornily used to describe cool routes, but this route might well deserve it. Begin underneath a massive roof to the right of Born to Be Wild. The roof will split with the main face via a wide crack. Start up the corner on its left side until you can squeeze chimney up into the roof. Place a wide piece and wriggle back town to a small stance where you can turn in face out from the cliff. Done? Good. NOW FLIP UPSIDE-DOWN. From the ledge stance, your feet will invert into the wide crack above. Using wild leg locks and hand stacking, traverse the crack right to the chains at the right end of the roof.
Gear: .3 to 5 or 6
Pinecrest Buttress
A small buttress that separates Primitive North from Primitive South and the Pillars, Pinecrest has a high concentration of classic lines. Getting to the top of the buttress is a great way to take in the full panoramas of the main Liming valley all the way out to Laojunshan Mountain without having to commit to the many difficult pitches of getting to the top of larger formations.
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Nico Cáceres on the glorious hand crack of The Great Owl
The Great Owl (5.9)
Whether you climb 5.8 or 5.12 on gear, The Great Owl should be the first Liming route you climb. It is as if the geological gods responsible for Liming made this crack specifically for climbing. Never pumpy, it is a stellar, perfect handcrack from nearly bottom to top. Begin by stemming off of the tree to get into a squeeze-hands-sized crack until the crack opens up a bit to reveal bomber hand jams (perhaps solid fists for those with exceptionally small hands). Hand jam past a wide pod to reach a great rest stance and continue marching hand-over-hand up the rest of the climb to the chains.
Gear: Single TCU #2, single .5, double 1, triple or quadruple 2
Boy with a Coin (5.10+)
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Ryder Stroud at the chains of Boy with a Coin. Gore is the overhanging crack above.
An excellent route to hone your offwidth climbing technique, Boy with a Coin is yet another Liming classic. Begin in the slightly overhung corner to the right of Scarface 2. Some awkward hand to fist jams will continuously expand until you are forced to butterfly stack and knee-bar. Pull a bulge to find some wider pods. The angle will steepen a bit into a splitter easy OW. Continue butterfly stacking and knee-barring until the crack suddenly cuts back behind you into an overhang. Transition into the overhang and continue by the technique of your choosing to the bolt anchors shared with Scarface 2. Combine this route with Gore for an excellent outing to the top of Pinecrest!
Gear: Single 2, double 3, triple 4, single or double 5 (single can be easily trolleyed), single 6.
Scarface 2 (5.10+)
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The sickle-shaped crack of Scarface 2 (left). Boy with a Coin is the right crack. Gore is the roof crack leading to the skyline. Scarface and Boy with a Coin converge beneath Gore.
There is a reason this route is featured on the cover of the Liming guidebook. This sickle-shaped crack features all sorts of great jamming from hands to fists and (optional if you want it to be) butterfly stacking offwidth. Begin off the deck in a tall alcove with a roof. A few secure hand jams in this roof will bring you to a stance above the roof (you can optionally protect the roof and back-clean it from above to avoid rope-drag on the rest of the route). The crack will quickly expand to a briefly OW sized crack as the crack makes a dramatic crescent-shaped cut to the right. Pass a small roof and continue up on bomber hands to fist jams on a right-leaning crack to the bolted anchor station shared with Boy with a Coin.
Gear: Double 1, double or triple 2, double 3, single 4, single 5
Gore (5.11)
An excellent 2-pitch outing when combined with Scarface or Boy with a Coin. The money portion of Gore is shorter than the lower two routes, but the difficulty and the steep position make for an outrageous pitch. Climb off the belay shared by Boy with a Coin and Scarface and boulder through the crux immediately off the anchor. A few bashing moves of bouldery, overhanging liebacks will yield a decent, but still steep, stance and fire through overhanging hand jams to the top of the bulge. Above, a wide, detached flake (wide gear) will bring you to the top of Pinecrest Buttress. Enjoy the panorama!
Gear: Double 1, single 3, double 4, single 5, single 6 (optional)
The Reckoning (5.12a)
A great “entry-level” 5.12, The Reckoning has some interesting movement and a manageable-sized crux. Start 20 feet right of The Great Owl in a wide crack above a spindly tree. Fight through the wide start to some more secure jams and continue up a short corner into a large pod and a stance. Creative movement will save you a bunch of trouble here. From the pod, exit left into a ring-lock barn door crack up and over a bulge. Fight the pump and reach a small hand-sized pod. Stand up and pull over the next bulge on skinny finger locks. Hold off the pump for the last skinny locks (pretty skinny) up to a horizontal jug and the chains. The first ascentionist, Mike Dobie, recently bolted an airy extension out right from the belay, continuing up and right from horizontal around a sharp, airy arête. Taking the extension ups the difficulty to a .12c.
Gear: Single .4, double .5, single 1, single 2 (optional), single 3, single 4 (optional), single 5
Primitive North
This area covers just the section of wall to the left of the Great Owl. Here you will find anything from overhanging offwidths to sporty lieback cracks.
Boving Reflection (5.11+)
A climb that feels a bit easier the cleaner it gets, Boving Reflection is an excellent, sporty crack climb that will test your pump endurance! Begin by bouldering off the deck up a small overlap to a sloped stance beneath a roof/overlap feature. Plug some medium to small cams and lieback out the first roof on fingertip liebacks, using your lower body to manage the pump the best you can. The terrain will turn vertical for a short stretch with some locks before turning into another roof/overlap feature. Turn on the afterburners, do not get hold blindness, and lieback to a thank-god jug. Continue on ledgier terrain (a bit sandy) to the chains a few meters above.
Gear: TCUs 0-2 (optional), doubles .3-.4, triples .5, doubles .75, single 1-2
The Raven (5.10+)
A great roof crack climb that will test your sequencing in a “roof crisis.” Start off the deck up a short, right-leaning ramp to the left of “I Don’t Like Chickens.” The crack will lead to a blocky, left-facing corner that protects with small gear only. Get up higher in the corner and the crack will open up before shooting left into a pod and an overhang. Traverse out left to a semi-decent rest and reach high over the roof to find some jams to turn it. Above the roof, squeeze-hands will give way to easier hands and fists terrain up to the chains. This route can continue higher to a second set of bolts if you bring extra pieces of wide gear. The extension will also push the grade to 5.11.
Gear: Single X4 .1-.2 (or TCU equivalent), doubles .3-1, single 2-4
I Don’t Like Chickens (5.11+)
Overhung, burly, and wide. Begin up the crack corner to the right of the Raven. Stem up terrain that gets progressively harder until you reach a small stance beneath a bulge/roof featured with a little bit of the sandstone turtle formation. Form here, the crack quickly widens into offwidth territory through the overhang. Find some power and some crafty technique to thrutch through the overhanging terrain into the vertical section of the wide crack. Inside, a flaring, slopey crack will appear. Use both to squirm your way on butterfly stacks and knee locks up to a big ledge with the chains. This route continues into the über-wide multipitch Lost World.
Gear: Single .3, double .4-.5, single .75, doubles 1-5
Primitive South
This cliff separates the Pillars from Pinecrest Buttress. It contains Liming’s most iconic multipitch: Back to the Primitive.
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(From left to right) Dan Jerke, Ana Pautler, and Ryder Stroud at the top of Back to the Primitive
Back to the Primitive (5.11d, 8 pitches, grade III)
Pitches: 8
Grade: III (the approach is rather easy given the stairs for half the approach).
Length: ~200m
THE multipitch of Liming, and perhaps one of the best multipitch trad routes in Asia. Back to the Primitive is a good dose of hard adventure climbing up one of the most iconic formations in the park. If you are making the trip across the Pacific for rock climbing, this MUST be on your to-do list! Get an early start and be ready for an killer time!
Approach: Head out of town away from the front entrance of the park along the main road out of Liming village. Continue 10-15 minutes (if walking) until you see a stone scenic turnout with a sign reading "Anqini Scenic Lookout" (Chinese 安七尼). From there, cross the river on a built-up trail and up the staircase towards the park's via ferrata. After about 10-15 minutes going up the staircase, you will pass a huge slabby boulder on you left; the "Split Boulder" (a boulder with an obvious OW boulder problem) will be in the bushes on your right. A faint climbers trail will exit the staircase on the left. Follow this dirt trail until you are directly beneath the Pillars/Primitive formation. The trail will then fork at the base (there is also a fork lower down that traverses some conglomerate rock. This is NOT the fork.). Cut left at the fork and jog slightly uphill for 1 minute. The trail will then split again: left will head to the Pinecrest Buttress routes, and right (also uphill) will take you to the base of Back to the Primitive. You are looking for a slightly sandy corner with two big trees at its top. This is P1 (Lollipop).
The route:
P1 (Lollipop variation): 5.8, ~20m: One of the variations alongside Train Wreck and Saving Face as the start of the route. Climb the fairly dirty corner (to the right of the offwidth crack marking the start of For Hammer) to where the corner splits in two at the large pine tree. Place some gear and take the left corner (right is flaring and hard). Follow this corner and trend slightly right to reach a big ledge and a slung tree belay.
P2 (crux pitch): 5.11d, ~20m: From the belay, walk right (extend the belay) about 8 feet and start up a narrow corner. Follow the crack as it thins into the corner and do some fancy stem moves to get above to a stance. The crack will restart in the face above as a right-leaning, skinny finger crack. Rail through some powerful, sharp finger locks to find some "thank-god" holds and continue up on flared hand jams to a two-bolt belay alcove on your left.
P3: 5.10+, ~20m: Exit the belay from the right and pull into a small roof and arete feature. Pull the roof (exposed, awesome position!) to a right-leaning hands to fist-sized crack that will run up into a big yellow pod/alcove feature. The belay bolts will be on your left.
P4: 5.11, ~35m: Move up the long pod/alcove feature from the belay. Check your comfy ledge rest stances for loose rock and do not knock it down on your belayer. Continue up easy terrain until you reach a steep crack and a shallow corner that the leads up into a roof. Turn the roof on wide but fairly secure jams to gain the wide crack above. From here, the crack will widen to #5 and larger. Start full-on offwidth-ing (chicken wing!) up the top half of the crack and exit left when you hit the roof, and exit the roof left. Follow a short hand crack feature over a small bulge and up to the belay on a sloping ledge beneath a gaping crack (bolts).
P5: 5.11, ~35m: This pitch the puts you 'in the mountain.' Climb off the belay trending right into a massive crack. You are literally climbing inside the mountain. Though the first 15m are unprotected, it is virtually impossible to fall if you stuff your body in the crack. Gain a ledge above the wide stuff and traverse right, following the ever-thinning crack. The crack will eventually thin to fingers over a super exposed, vertical wall. Continue up this crack to some cruxy, wildly exposed finger locks and belay on bolts on a small ledge with a small pine tree growing on it. This pitch is full-value adventure climbing, for sure.
P6: 5.9 A0, ~12m: A short aid pitch that could go free if the bolted section gets scrubbed (though it looks hard, potentially 5.12). From the pine tree ledge belay, follow a right-trending, right-facing corner to where the crack disappears in an overlap. Here you will find two bolts. Aid through (still not easy) to regain a few crack moves and another belay ledge. Belay on bolts just beneath a wide flake.
P7: 5.11-, ~35m: Some will complain this pitch is a wee bit sandbagged. Go straight off the ledge and into the gaping flake above. Do not blow the opening moves to avoid giving your belayer an 'ass-hat.' Insecure liebacking and the occasional desperate wide jam will bring you to a rest beneath a slightly overhung crack corner. Continue up the crack until the flake continues again and forces you out of the crack. Turn the last flake feature to gain easier terrain and a short hand crack feature. Follow the hand crack up and left into a small v-slot to a bolted belay beneath the final pitch.
P8 (Turtles in Space!): 5.10a, PG-13, ~35m: The glory pitch of this climb is world-class for top-outs. You climb on the iconic tortoise shell formations that make Liming a famous national park above hundreds of meters of air down to the valley floor! From the belay. Step left around the rounded arête, following the cleanest line. Follow discontinuous flared cracks and pods over turtles to a few focused moves up the slabs--don't forget to enjoy the exposure! A few more committed, slopey slab moves will put you on lower-angle terrain. Follow the cleanest, cruiser terrain to the top of the wall and belay from a tree and take in the amazing panorama of the valley and Laojunshan (mountain)!
Descent (Spearhead Gully): Make sure you do this with plenty of daylight. From the top out on the cliff, follow a faint climbers trail into the bushes to the climber's right. Follow it uphill until you join a fairly well-worn path that traverses the crest of the sandstone formation. Be careful, it is easy to follow one of the many native trails that crisscross the tops of the cliffs. If you traverse too low, just avoid dropping down too early and continue traversing until you meet the trail The cave that has the boardwalk inside should be firmly at your 3-o'clock position before you start looking for the descent trail. Follow this trail into a gully marked with a big spearhead-looking block ahead of you and a tall, (very) black wall on your left. Follow the faint trail (increasingly foliage-covered) to its bottom and traverse on trails until you link up with the boardwalk staircase. Follow the staircase back down to the road.
Gear Recommendations:
- One 00 TCU, double TCUs from 0-1 (or equivalent X4s), doubles from .3-1, triple 2, doubles 3-5
- Eight to Ten 60cm runners (alpine); two double length slings or cordelettes for the belay anchors. Using quad anchors are awesome for organization on this route.
The Guardian
Probably the most Indian Creek-looking crag in Liming. The steep nature of the crag has protected many of these splitter cracks from erosion. Most of the routes here are pretty hard: there is one 5.8, one 5.9, and one 5.10; the rest are 5.11s and harder. If you can spend at the grade, this is one of the best crags to test your gear limits. The routes here range in everything from skinny, TCU-sized fingertip cracks to beastly .11+ offwidths.
Brazen Hussie (5.10b)
Brazen Hussie is a full-value climb for the very affordable price of 5.10b. Begin on the splitter crack capped by an overhanging bulge to the right of Wing and a Prayer Project and left of Flight of the Locusts. Scramble up some blocks embedded in the sand and transition into the crack on some wide finger and skinny hand jams. The crack will widen and get more secure as you approach the bulge. Protect beneath the bulge and extend your pieces well. Commit all the way through the bulge on secure jams before you place any gear; placing gear in the bulge will end up with that gear getting sucked deep into the crack. Above the bulge, gain a stance and continue on hand jams (complemented with the occasional wide move) up the the chains. This pitch can be extended to a higher anchor if you have plenty of wide gear (3s, 4s, and 5s).
Gear: .3-.75, double 1, single 2, double 3, single 4 (optional)
Wing and a Prayer Project (5.11-)
A great route that will get you to try some acrobatic movement. Begin up the huge right-facing corner to the right of Sahara. Some thin slab and stem moves off the deck will get you to your first gear and a step left underneath the roof. You can rest if you stuff yourself in the slot beneath the roof. Reach out behind your head into the roof to find some thin holds and hand jams to get through the roof. Some exposed, strenuous moves will deposit you in a stance below a thin crack. Surmount the thin crack and the terrain will become increasingly moderate as you approach the chains.
Gear: Single TCUs (0-2), doubles .3-2, single 3
Akhum-Rah (5.11+)
This is possibly the most aesthetic line currently open at The Guardian. Akhum-Rah fires up a pump-inspiringly skinny corner crack. Begin to the right of Flight of the Locusts and to the left of the Sphinx. Climb to a pedestal and protect from a great stance with some small cams. Make some committing moves off the pedestal and transition to some stemming. Gain a small rest where a small, inconsistent, pod-like crack appears on your left. The corner crack will thin ever so slightly as you pass another small pod. From here, make some very thin, cruxy moves into the steepening corner (crux) up to a rest. From there, the crack continues, slightly wider, for a ways before hitting a larger pod feature. Surmount the pod to find a thin hands crack leading to ledges and the chains above.
Gear: TCUs 0-2, single .2 X4 (or equivalent), double or triple .3, double .4, triple .5, double .75-1
The Sphinx (5.11+)
A powerful, burly route for almost the entirety of its upper half, The Sphinx rates high on the scale of “brawl” factor. Start up a slab and flake feature to the right of Akhum-Rah. The terrain will quickly steepen into a flake and rejoin the cliff as a crack corner before rearing back into a large overhang. Powerful, slopey liebacking moves will lead to a full-on #6-sized offwidth. Bash your way up (guess which side in) with some knee-barring until the crack narrows again. Gain better jams as you reach an overhung block feature. Clamber over the overhanging block to a flat stance where you will find the bolts.
Gear: Single .5, triple .75s, double 1-3, single 4-6
Flight of the Locusts (5.12)
A hybrid crack and face climb, Flight of the Locusts is a short but techy route that will require a bit more sport-climbing-esque sequencing than most routes in Liming. Start on the right leaning crack 8 feet left of Akhum-Rah and around 20 feet right of Brazen Hussie. Awkwardly stem your way off the ground (groin stretches beforehand might help) until you are forced into the crack. Powerful locking yields a small stance on the left face. Combo face-crack climb your way up until the crack forms a corner. Crank out the hard moves into the corner and continue to the chains, being aware of the face to your left. The bolts will be at a pedestal just above.
FA-er Mike Dobie has also put a bolted extension above this finish, and is currently thought to be about .13a.
Gear: single .2 X4 or TCU equivalent, doubles .3-1, 2 (optional; replaces a 1)
The Dinner Wall
Simply put, this is THE iconic formation of Liming. Casting a huge shadow over the village of Liming, the Dinner Wall is home to these sandstone wall’s very first route: Soul’s Awakening. This wall has everything from classic routes to Liming’s cutting-edge trad routes, including Flying Buttress, recently freed by Australian Logan Barber at 5.13d/5.14a.
Ding Dong’s Crack (5.12)
This is the go-to route on the Dinner Wall for honing your ring lock skills. Begin in a triangular offwidth beneath a huge black streak that comes down from a cleft at the wall’s top. Chimney and arm bar your way up the first 2/3 of the route before the crack abruptly constricts. From here, the crack will lean further right as you are forced out of the offwidth and out onto the face. Powerful ring locking through the opening sequence will give way to some rattly finger jams; lack of feet here make this sequence especially hard. The crux does not end, as the ring locks come back with a vengeance one last time. Power through these last ring locks to find a key face hold. A few more insecure moves will lead to the chains on the face to your left. If you stem out left during the ring lock crux (rather awkward to do…), the guidebook says the route becomes 5.11.
Gear: Double .4, triple .5, triple .75, single 1 (very optional), single 5 (very optional)
Soul’s Awakening (5.10, 3-4 pitches [half], 7 pitches [complete]): Liming’s first multipitch. This route, especially the first pitch (5.9), is a great pitch for learning endurance through jamming. The routes 3rd pitch (or 4th, depending on how you split the pitches) is clean, bomber and incredibly aesthetic, climbing some of the intricate, honeycomb sandstone face formations high off the deck!
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Pitch 1 (5.9): Climb the huge left-facing corner into vertical terrain. This pitch will remain pretty much vertical without much break for about 27 meters, so jamming to save energy is key. Continue on hands, wide hands, and fist-sized terrain up to 2 bolts (where there was once an unprotectable flake that has since fallen away). The route stays steep essentially until a nice sloping ledge, where the bolts can be found on the right wall. Leaders often link the first pitch with the very short, bolted second pitch out and left.
Pitch 2 (5.10): From the anchors on the first pitch, scramble left on a ledge to a well-protected bolted face. A 5-meter series of face moves will bring you to another set of bolts on a smooth face.
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Dane Schellenberg on P3 of Soul's Awakening
Pitch 3 (5.8 or 5.9+ A0): You have two options from the P2 belay. Go left up the fairly blank face (5.9+ A0, the “slip and slide”) until you can gain the right-leaning corner crack to the top of the pedestal, or head up and right on a massive, detached block (though it seems about to peel from the wall, it appears fairly stuck on the far wall/opposite wall of the corner). From the big block, wedge yourself in the slot behind it and the buttress. Follow the crack at the back of the slot up to the belay at the top of the pedestal.
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P4 of Soul's Awakening: a beautiful, dead-vertical crack that expands from hands all the way to offwidth.
Pitch 4 (5.9+): Money, money, money pitch! This pitch is dead vertical for its entire length. Start in the corner crack and marvel at the splitter crack that appears on your right. The crack will begin as thin hands and slowly expand over the course of 20m+ until you are in offwidth territory. At this point, the crazy honeycomb face holds will begin appearing and save you from full-on groveling. Bolts will be on your right.
Pitches 5-7 (5.10+/5.11-, 5.10d R, 5.7 R): Most people start rappelling form here (a 60m rope will require 3 rappels to the top of the 3rd pitch, the top of the 1st pitch, and down to the ground). If you continue up, make sure you are prepared for adventure climbing. P5 goes up the Cretaceous Crack, a #6-sized offwidth that crosses a sea of caked bird poop (measurable thickness) halfway up the pitch. P6 goes out a massive roof on a right leaning crack (5.10 R). P7 is grungy, run-out 5.7 dirt and rock climbing to the very top of the Dinner Wall formation. Make sure you have brought enough supplies if you elect to continue into the unknown! Going to the top of the formation necessitates a scramble back down to the bottom of the Dinner Wall (moving to the climber’s left to some farmhouses that sit atop the formation and beneath a limestone cliff, there you will find a dirt track down) or dropping off of the back side of the formation into the far valley and following the dirt track until it passes underneath the par gondola and deposits you back in Liming village.
Gear: Single .75, double 1, triple 2-3, double 4, single 5. Bring runners for the short bolted face section of P2 (can also be climbed as an extension to P1)
Wind of the Valley (5.10+)
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Ryder Stroud at the chains of Wind of the Valley. The spindly rest tree is just below.
The most aesthetic enduro-corner in Liming, Wind of the Valley will test your pump endurance!. To access this route, walk 5 minutes left from Soul's Awakening until you seen a bushy outcropping of rock left of a big, undeveloped chimney. There should be a fixed line tied to one of the trees. Scramble up the fixed line until it deposits you on a nice, flat ledge. The start is to the climber's right, marked by a big tree. Start by jamming up the base of the corner on steep hands.The crack will thin as you forge higher towards a spindly tree. Lieback fast and rest where you can on jams. Surmount the skinny tree (surprisingly tricky) and collect yourself to continue. The crack will continue thinning to wide fingers up ever-steepening terrain. Clip the chains on your left before you pump out.
Gear: Double .5, double .75, double or triple 1, triple 2
Pineapple Upside-down Cake (5.9+)
To the left of Ding Dong’s crack is a big, right-facing flake. This route has very basic beta: OFFWIDTH YOUR FACE OFF. Fight through the wide crack and place all of the big gear you have. ¾ of the way up, a few key face holds will appear to take you to the chains on something other than wide movement.
Gear: Single or double 4, double 5, single or double 6
Die Sternwarte
This crag is next door to The Guardian. While it does not have as many routes as other crags (currently five), it has some of the most gear-intensive, full-value routes in all of Liming. Every route is a full 30 meters and features multiple cruxes. This crag has also yet to see heavy development, so you can most certainly expand on the work that has been done at the crag without looking too far!
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Die Sternwarte (dome-shaped crag on left) and The Guardian on the right as seen from the road in the South Valley.
Total Eclipse (5.11a/b)
This route gives you two choices with two variations. Both are about equally as hard, and both will get you pumped for a full 30m! Both routes begin on a huge flake to the right of Captain Spaceman Spiff. Lieback your way up the increasingly slopey flake, jamming wherever you can to save energy. The flake will eventually terminate and turn into a splitter crack. From here, you have the option of stepping left to the left variation (similar difficulty, though the transition is harder the lower you do it) or continue straight up. If continuing straight up, climb to a bulge, where the crack will begin squeezing into tight hands and wide fingers territory. Pull this bulge to gain a mediocre, slightly licheny stance above the foliage of a nearby tree and continue cruxing up into another pod. Here, a stance will yield a small bulge that will again thin into tight hands and rattly fingers. Surmount this crux to an expansion in the crack and yet another pod. Above, the crack will form a shallow corner with a few ledges interspersed towards the top. Fight off the ever-increasing pump on hands to fist-sized jams to the long-awaited chains.
Gear: Triple .3-4
Captain Spaceman Spiff (5.10-)
Another full-value climb for the grade, this route has a finale that will remind some of Hospital Corner in Lake Tahoe. To the left of Total Eclipse, there is a flaring, thin-hands crack. Follow this slightly awkward, flaring crack (bring plenty of #1 cams) up a ways until it brings to a large ledge with a tree (you can sling it, if you want). From here, the crack restarts in a corner that will take you to a short overhang. Traverse it to the left and into a pod capped with a small bulge. By now, you should have some terrain left to cover and very little gear left to protect it! Fear not! The jams are easy and secure! Surmount the pod’s bulge and enjoy the outrageous exposure beneath you. A few more moves on bomber hand jams will bring you to the chains on your right.
Doubles .3-.5, triple .75, quadruple 1, double 2-3
Other areas (that could use more development!)
Pandora: The crag opposite the Dinner Wall that also overlooks Liming village. This crag features the steepest approach out of all of the established Liming crags.
Bull Crag: The north-facing crag on the opposite side of the valley from The Guardian and Die Sternwarte. It is a shaded crag best visited when the weather is hot. There are actually two crags, Upper and Lower Bull Crag.
Indy Wall: Another new crag with very few routes.
Angel Crag: This crag only has one established route, though it is an aesthetic, difficult multipitch.
Gorilla Face: Across the cirque on the same side of the valley as The Guardian. Gorilla Face is known for having stout and/or sandbagged routes. It also houses a 5.14 project.
The Holidays: A beautiful, easy-to-access cliff just next to the Dinner Wall. This cliff has tons of climbable cracks yet has seen little development.
Space Mountain: Between the Holidays and the Dinner Wall. Much like the Holidays, it is an easy-to-access cliff that has seen disproportionately little development.
Orange Sky: The northern extension of the Dinner Wall.
The Watchtower: Liming’s youngest crag as of spring 2015. It currently has only a single multipitch route under development, “Chinese Construction Job” (5.11, 3 pitches).
One Dragon Buttress: The more established crag adjacent to the Watchtower. Has a few very aesthetic splitter cracks that climb high up the formation.
The Diamond Wall: This wall overlooks Liming Village from the entrance to the South Valley. It is also called "The Coffin Wall" by the Lisu locals. Word has it that it has great potential but few routes, including a multipitch to the top of a freestanding buttress on the wall which has yet to be freed!
Liming in Motion!
Catch a few moments from our first trip to Liming back in December 2014.
A short video I slung together with some footage a few friends and I took back during a Liming trip in December. Plenty of whippers. Hopefully, we'll be back for plenty of sendage now that we have plenty of uninterrupted climbing time. Check out the website in the near future, too!