Birds In a Rut

Area: The Wombat

Route Description

A five-pitch moderate adventure climb offers a little bit of everything with outstanding views of the main park beneath you and Cascade peaks offering an amazing backdrop to remind you why Central Oregon is awesome. The start of the climb is up to the left of the main base area of The Wombat, marked by the only bolted line from ground.

Pitch 1: Climb an easy bolted slab on small pockets and nubbins up to a decent belay station, straightforward climbing.

Pitch 2: Find your first bolt to the left of the belay station and clip it before heading back to up and to the right following a bolt line. You will reach a point where a crack heads directly up after the fourth bolt. Climb the crack and plug a piece or two before gaining a huge ledge with a bolted belay station. Climbing the crack will allow you to bypass a middle belay station and the climbing is easy.

Pitch 3: Once again move left off of the belay to clip your first bolt. Keep traversing left towards a vertical crack and place gear in a horizontal seam if needed. The vertical crack is nice and takes large gear well (#3) before reaching a bolt. Follow a low angle slap up and to the right to another giant ledge with a bolted belay station.

Pitch 4: This is the money dihedral pitch you came up for and gives the climb its 5.8 rating. Walk right along the ledge to the beginning of the dihedral. An optional bolt can be clipped over to the dihedral but isn't necessary. The beginning of the dihedral doesn't offer a lot of good pro options but soon enough you will find a place to slot gear. The climbing isn't always obvious but does offer great stemming positions while you search for huge hand holds that may be out of sight. The dihedral takes cams and nuts well especially as you climb higher until topping out on another small ledge with a bolted belay.

Pitch 5: Walk up from the belay station and bust up a short climbing sequence before romping up a low angle ramp up to the peak of The Wombat.

Descent: Find a rappel station on the backside of the peak and make a short rappel to the ground. Walk north until you reach a notch in the rock that will let you cut back to the front (west) side of The Wombat. Follow the base of the rock and scree field down to the start of the climb.

Route Images

Other The Wombat Routes