Torres del Paine South African Route repeated team-free by Imanol Amundarain, Cedar Christensen, Tyler Karow

Over a 10-day period in early January a small international team of climbers comprised of Imanol Amundarain from Basque Country and the Americans Cedar Christensen and Tyler Karow completed a team free ascent of the South African Route on the striking East Face of Central Tower in the Torres del Paine National Park, Chile. Established by Paul Fatti, Roger Fuggle, Art McGarr, Mervyn Prior, Mike Scott and Richard Smithers during the 1973/1974 season, the route was originally graded A4/5.10. It was repeated by a South African team in 2003, and then freed at 7b+/5.12c in 2009 by Ben Ditto, Nicolas Favresse and Sean Villanueva who described the 1200m, 30-pitch outing as containing some of the most amazing free climbing they had ever encountered. Christensen provides the details of the recent repeat.

How did this route come about Cedar?
Tyler has been infatuated with remote big wall climbing since he first started climbing, and has spent a lot of time researching and dreaming. If you spend any time scouring the internet for the most impressive big walls in the world, you will inevitably come across the Torres Del Paine. The South African Route is the first route that was established on the east face of the central tower, and the first route to be free climbed as well, so the choice seemed obvious to us. The history of the wall, and the quality of the route only add to the appeal.

So when did you arrive?
We flew down to Puerto Natales on the 22nd of December, and immediately after arriving there was a 3-day weather window, which allowed us to hike a load of gear to the base and actually climb and fix the first 9 pitches of the route. After that we spent a week in town awaiting the next spell of good weather, sport climbing to pass the time. On January 4th we hiked the rest of our gear out, and on the 5th we blasted off for 10 days.

How did things go?
The weather was pretty unbelievable for Patagonia. We were able to climb every day we spent on the wall except the very last. It would rain almost every night, but clear up enough to climb a few pitches in the day.

Patagonia is famous for its extreme weather
A big advantage in our favor was the fact that the South African Route climbs a huge dihedral that does a really good job of sheltering you from the wind. We would watch clouds race by the summit at 200 mph but be reasonably untouched in our bivis. That doesn't mean we couldn't hear it though; Camp 2 is on Boeing Ledge, and we believe it was named so because the wind sounds like a jet engine roaring past.

Style of ascent?
Our chosen style was a team free ascent, which means only one member of our team sent each pitch on lead. Tyler sent the .12c enduro corner and .11+ offwidth. I sent the .12c face crux and the .12b finger crack. And Ima sent some gnarly icy waterfall pitches that may be harder than all of those.

Ditto, Favresse and Villanueva said the route contained some of the most amazing free climbing they had ever encountered.
The quality of the climbing was indeed amazing. There were definitely a few horrifically loose or runout pitches, but the money pitches blew us away. Tyler says the enduro corner may be the best pitch he has ever climbed.

When did you summit?
On January 11. The next day was spent retroactively sending a couple pitches that needed to be ticked off, and after waiting out some weather we rappelled on the 14th.

There are some cool photos of you guys enjoying life in the portaledge
Despite our vigilance for staying light and bringing only the minimum required gear, we are quite enthusiastic about splurging for the unnecessary luxuries that take life on the wall to the next level.

Such as…
We brought a tiny jetboil sized cast iron dutch oven, which we used to bake muffins, empanadas, and pizza almost every night. We brought 3 liters of wine, an amount which was hotly contested over for days (not enough!), multi-colored string lights, a flute and harmonica. Classic alpinism at it finest.

Was this your first time in the Paine area?
Tyler and I actually tried to come down here for the same route 2 years ago, but COVID restrictions shut us down, so we have been dreaming of this for a while. Ima had climbed the Bonington route years ago, but it was Tyler and my first route in the range. Definitely not our last though, we are already frothing for more