Welcome to the world's best kept secret climbing area. Welsford has several fine quality cliffs with many classic climbs of all grades.
Welsford is located in Eastern Canada within the province of New Brunswick on highway 7, between the cities of Fredericton and Saint John. For more directions, stop at the Esso station in Welsford and ask them for directions to either Cochrane lane or Bald Peak.
There are a few editions of the guide book to climbs in Welsford and one may be available at the Esso station, otherwise you can try the Radical Edge in Fredericton.
Climbers in New Brunswick are very friendly. If you wander along the cliff and talk to any climbers you meet they will be happy to help you out. Below are a few selected routes to the area. These are my picks.
Over the next while I will try to add an online climbing guide to the area. I hope to have a CD version of the guide to the area available in the near future. In the meantime, if you plan on visiting the area e-mail me for info. My e-mail is steve_adamson@hotmail.com
The following are my picks of the best traditional, the scariest, and the most awesome sport climbs.
These climbs are chosen assuming that you are climbing at the level of the climb, and that you are making an on sight or relatively unrehearsed lead..
Take a group of frozen climbers just defrosting from a night out on porta ledges, and throw a rope across the back of the Amphitheater, and what you have is a high, scary Tyrolean traverse. Stay tuned for pictures coming soon!
The route was wet, and visibility was down to about 40'. But nearby was Reppy's crack. A beautiful 5.8 crack, which we aided up. Above this we paralleled our route, hoping to sneak onto it up higher. However, the day wore on and no path appeared, so we decided to find a good ledge to Bivy on hoping that the weather would improve the next day.
Shortly after we were established on various sloping 2' wide ledges it started to rain in earnest. Suddenly our nice little ledge turned into a cold wet swimming pool. We each retreated into our own little world. Some time in the middle of a sleepless night I noticed a roaring sound. I found my headlamp and peered out to see a waterfall entering the top of Pete's Bivy bag and exiting the bottom. Suddenly my little indoor pool at the base on my Bivy bag didn't seem so bad.
Needless to say we survived and retreated the next day. Unfortunately,
some nice soul had broken into Norm's car and stolen all his goodies,
including his wallet.
