Banks Lake

[Mark Hanna]

Climb: Banks Lake-Several @ The Castle (?)

Date of Climb: 2/5/2006

Trip Report:
Friend Stephen and I escaped the seemingly terminal wet zone for some E WA sunshine this weekend. Without much route info, we scoped out many prospective fun climbs in the area on Sat., and returned the next day when the lovely 50 mph winds had a chance to calm.

We climbed several south and west facing routes, some old some new, and all on quite nice rosy granite. It was a very scenic diversion from the gloom.

I would like to encourage the people putting up routes here to think about using standard gear for fixed belays/rap points however. Many shiny new fixed cold shuts (mostly unwelded open) adorn the cliffs, and have been long known by climbers, riggers and the like to be a generally untrustworthy and short lasting option for fixed gear. Unfortunately, availability of alternative gear is sometimes lacking in remote areas. If anyone who FA's out there posts here, please PM me- I would like to donate hangers, galv.chain, and screwlinks to help out.

Great time- Thanks!

Gear Notes:
Draws, gear to 3"

[Andy Fitz]

I think I've probably climbed some of the same routes, because I ran across open shuts on top of some climbs on the Castle too. From what I understand, those routes were put up by a couple of guys from Spokane.