Aguja de la Silla - Northwest face


2. Destreza Criolla

Luciano Fiorenza, Jonathan Jorzuk and Diego Simari (Argentina), 03/2012.

500m 6b+

Description. Climbs a beautiful line up the NW arete. The quality of the rock in the approach pitches is questionable, but once on the route itself the quality of the rock is excellent.

To get to the base go south from the base of Supercanaleta to the lowest point of Filo del Hombre Sentado, then rope up to traverse right to a diagonal line just left of a double-crack system. Because the climbing is almost always diagonal there is not danger of dropping rocks on your partners, but the climbing in spite of being easy (3 and 4 mostly, with some short bits to 5+) is serious. The first two pitches of the route can be avoided by scrambling up on the left.

History. Crystal Davis Robbins and Nico Gutierrez tried this line around 2009. They did the tricky approach and climbed two pitches on Silla proper before retreating. Because they thought that descending to the west, the way they had come up, was too dangerous due to the quality of the rock, they "failed upwards", climbing the couloir to the "Brecha Americana", the col between Silla and Fitz, to the traverse over to La Brecha de los Italianos.

Diego, Jony and Luciano bivied at the base of the arete (good bivy ledge), completing the climb in one day up and down.

Approach. Paso Cuadrado to Glaciar Fitz Roy Norte.

Descent. The first ascent party left their bivy gear at the base of the route rappelling back down to it, to then rappel west, the way they had come up, traversing back to the Filo del Hombre Sentado. The raps from the base to the scrambling traverse that leads to the Filo del Hombre Sentado are diagonal, so there is little chance of pulling rocks onto oneself when pulling the ropes. One might also consider rapping the East ridge and descending east to La Brecha de los Italianos (steel crampons and one icetool per person plus three icescrews are needed).

Photos (click to enlarge)

Aguja de la Silla northwest face

Aguja de la Silla approach.