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"Arev" Armenian First Ascent Open Festival May 21-31, 2011 - Outcome

Written by Mkhitar Mkitaryan

Thursday, 02 June 2011

"Arev "Armenian First Ascent Open Festival 2011 was successfully and productively completed.
48 traditional, sport and bouldering routes were established as a result of the festival!
The number of the routes in Armenia was almost doubled from the pre-event time. The event was took place in five different rocky areas of Armenia: Hell's Canyon, Chiva Blocks, Noravanq Canyon, Arpa Gorge and Garni Gorge. It provided a nice opportunity to get useful feedback from climbers of different countries with different climbing styles, which enabled the convergence of their opinions and preferences about the aspects of developing climbing on the rock formations of these sites.

Announcements of Armenian First Ascent Open Festival in the different climbing websites also resulted in numerous feedbacks from the climbers from all over the world who plan on visiting Armenia in the future. Organizing this event the second time, our experience in organizational details and rock climbing aspects escalated. We hope that in the future this Festival will become a nice tradition of gathering Armenian and foreign climbers in Armenia.

Once more we express our gratitude to:
- Marine Mkhitaryan and Tatevik Zohrabyan for their donations,
- National Competitiveness Foundation of Armenia to find our event as a useful tool for “Southern Corridor Project” and supporting it,
- “Maple Leaf Company” to putting new sport routes and sharing presents for event participants,
- "HaftGohar" Iranian gear producer company for hangers,
- “Spitak” Rescue Team for providing safety support.

Below is the list of First Ascents done within the scope of Festival
Attention – the routes marked NC* mean "No Chains" (or rappel slings) at the anchor. Due to lack of the resources we could provide only bolts and hangers to the event participants to put an anchors on the pitches they did first ascents. For the rappel, prussics on the anchors were used. Do not use the same prussic on the anchors when you climb those routes, put your own prussic before rappelling! Up The Rocks club will appreciate very much to the organizations or individuals who would donate some chains and rappel slings to attach them on the existing anchors!
New Sport climbs in Hell's Canyon
	Route name	Grade	Height	Route setter	FA
East Sector:
1.	Redemption	5c/5.9	20m	Jared Nielson	Caroline North
2.	Hell's Diamond	7a/5.11d	30m	Mkhitar Mkhitaryan	Will Nazarian
3.	unnamed	6b+/c?	40m	Mkhitar Mkhitaryan	project
West sector
4.	The Maple way of drilling (in the cave)	-	15m	Jared Nielson	project
5.	Cliff Chicken	6c+/5.11c	20m	Jared Nielson	project
6.	Institutionalized	6c,+/5.11b	20m	Jared Nielson	Jared Nielson
7.	Death Spank	6b/5.10c	20m	Jared Nielson	Jared Nielson
8.	Centipede	6a/5.10a	20m	Jared Nielson	Jared Nielson
9.	Side Swipe	5c/5.9	20m	Jared Nielson	Jared Nielson
10.	Frost Bite	6a+/5.10b	20m	Jared Nielson	Jared Nielson
11.	Fire and Brimstone	6b+/5.10d	20m	Jared Nielson	Jared Nielson
12.	Spinal Crack	6b+/5.10d	20m	Jared Nielson	Jared Nielson
13.	Screaming Khorovats	5c/5.9	15m	Jason Stevens	Jason Stevens
14.	Cheese and Wieners	6a/5.10a?	15m	Jason Stevens	Jared Nielson
15.	Ignorance	6a/5.10a	15m	Jason Stevens	Jared Nielson
16.	World Famous Nobody	6b/5.10c	15m	Jason Stevens	Jason Stevens
17.	Estragon and Sissy Bolts	5b/5.8?	15m	Jason Stevens	Jason Stevens

Bouldering problems at Chiva Blocks
Block 1
	Problem	Grade	FA
	18. A	V3	Caroline North
	19. B	V3	Caroline North
	20. C	V2	Nasim Eshqi
Block 2	21. A	V4	Caroline north
Block 3	22. With a Help of Nature	V0	Andrea Poppova
Block 3	23. May 23	V0	Aurelia Schwarzmann

Traditional and Sport climbing routes in Noravanq Canyon
	Route	Grade	Height	Route setter	FA
24.	Nasim and Caro - NC* TG	6a/5.10a	35m	-	Nasim Eshqi and Caroline North
25.	Soviet Nail – Sport	5b/5.8	20m	Jason Stevens	Jason Stevens
26.	CatAlex - NC* TG	R1 6a/5.10a - 45m R2 6a/5.10a - 40m R3 5b/5.8 - 30m	115m	-	Andranik Miribyan and Vahe Tamamyan
27.	Jo.Si.To. Girls Power - NC* TG	R1 5b/5.8 - 35m R2 6a+/5.10b - 40m R3 6b+/5.10d - 40m R4 6a+/5.10b - 50m	165m	-	Caroline North and Nasim Eshqi
28.	Vehicular Homicide - Sport	6b/5.10c	20m	Jason Stevens	Jared Nielson
29.	Eghegnadzor - NC* TG	6a/5.10a	35m	-	Aleksey Antonov and Aleksey Adamov
30.	Marshuka Melee – Sport	6a+/5.10b	25m	Jared Nielson	Jared Nielson
31.	The End - NC* TG	R1 6a/5.10a - 50m R2 6a/5.10a - 32m	82m	-	Caroline North and Nasim Eshqi (after the event)

Clean Climbs in Arpa Gorge
	Route	Grade	Height	FA
32.	Find the Pleasure - NC*	6b/5.10c	20m	Caroline North and Nasim Eshqi
33.	Eagles aren’t Home	6b+/5.10d	28m	FFA by Vladimir Belousov
34.	Short Trip (Natural anchor from webbing)	7a/5.11d	26m	Vladimir Belousov
35.	The Village Hour - NC*	6a/5.10a	30m	Aleksey Antonov and Aleksey Adamov
36.	2 Girls in Dreamland - NC*	6c+/5.11c	32m	Caroline North and Nasim Eshqi
37.	Good Bye Tricam - NC*	6b/5.10c	32m	Caroline North and Nasim Eshqi (after the event)
38.	Gri-gri Guide - NC*	7a+/5.12a	37m	Caroline North and Nasim Eshqi (after the event)

Clean Climbs in Garni Gorge
	Route	Grade	Height	FA
39.	Orphans of Justice	5b/5.8	12m	Jared Nielson
40.	Thongs of Virtue	5b/5.8	12m	Jared Nielson
41.	unnamed	5c/5.9	12m	Aleksey Antonov (hasn’t anchored, but used the anchor of the route on the left, but it’s a bit complicated)
42.	Guano Apes	5b/5.8	12m	Aleksey Adamov
43.	AnDoVenture	5c/5.9	12m	Caroline North and Nasim Eshqi
44.	Snakeskin	5b/5.8	12m	Will Nazarian
45.	Spitak is Rescued	6a/5.10a	12m	Caroline North and Nasim Eshqi
46.	Airivanq	7a/5.11d	35m	Will Nazarian
47.	Knot Doudouk	7a/5.11d	30m	Will Nazarian
48.	Up The Rocks NC*	6b+/5.10d	35m	Caroline North and Nasim Eshqi

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