Pt 2258

From Lake Hope, gain the N ridge at a col and follow to summit.

"The North Ridge of pt 22258 climbed well – like a slightly impoverished GT, but against a wilder backdrop
of rugged, lake-bejewelled basins. I thought I caught echoes of Canada, but it may have been
Scotland. The gloves went on, the camera came out, but the rope stayed in the pack." - Stirring Embers, NZAJ (/ CIA) c. 2023

"...but our eyes kept
drifting to a brace of giant corners joining the south ridge. We soon abandoned our preconceived
idea, and escaped off on ledges, down and around to below the left-most corner. Cradled deeply
within it, we palmed off perfect red schist, walking our feet up the crack. As things steepened, the

rope came out, and the ensuing belay was well positioned to watch Owen navigate around a large
block/overlap in the steeper second pitch. A third pitch – mainly block dodging – popped us onto the
south ridge of the days’ adopted peak (pt. 2258). Weaving through a few sharp towers and through a
notch brought us to the base of the precarious-looking headwall. To my complete surprise, it
climbed really well, even offering a pitch or two of good cracks. Care was required at the top, but we
felt no terror, only a piercing Southland wind straight off Foveaux Straight. There, too, was
something I’d often looked for from mountains but never seen. Under a scudding foreground
curtain of grey cloud, a blue range punctuated the southern horizon. Satisfied with our adventure on
Rakiura Ridge (17, ~6p) we toddled down the north basin and back through the mornings’ col,
admiring some polished pink corner cracks exposed by the recent demise of another glacier."

• from Stirring Embers, NZAJ (/CIA) c. 2023

Venture to the to the East aspect of the south ridge and you will be greeted by an abundance of corner and crack systems in generally solid (enough) rock. this route weaves a line up the prominent buttress to the lookers left of Rakiura ridge. first pitch is up splitter crack corner system to a candle stick feature that may not be there for long... once above this first feature head right up broken corners and over the gravel gully up blocky terrain to the right of it,, this will position you under a flaring chimney with a slab on its left, pick your poison and head up this which will reveal a rooflet into a 10 meter hand crack on a wall to you left, follow your nose and the corner system to top out on the ridge. descent was made by down climbing the West aspect of the ridge for 60 meters then one 60 meter rappel off slings back to the scree.

Located up the center of the right most buttress on the east aspect of the south ridge. the route climbed 2 approach pitches where plenty of gravel was wrangled to get to the buttress, then climb splitter corners and flake systems on the left to reach the cave feature in the center of the face, despite all efforts of peer pressure the direct over hanging roof crack was avoided by traversing right over steep slabs to a smaller rooflet in a corner, follow the corner above this until the angle relents and more wrangling is required for 2 pitches. climed in 8 pitches on first ascent, descent was made via one 50m abseil to the left of top out to the lower ridge then one more 50m abseil down the choss gully from hell.