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September 30, 2015 – Sam Bendroth and Bayard Russell have climbed a 12-pitch new route on Blow Me Down, a nearly 1,300-foot granite cliff rising directly out of Devil Bay on Newfoundland’s southern coast. Also known as Jabo, this south-facing wall was first climbed in 1994 by Jeff Butterfield, Chris Kane, and Joe Terravecchia (Central Pillar of Aestheticism, IV 5.10 A2), and now has about 20 established routes.
Bendroth and Russell started their new route last fall, free climbing the first four pitches ground-up. This year they decided to go top-down to figure out the best line through the roofs guarding the top. “After a few days of work we had it put together and cleaned the fixed lines,” Russell said.
The two then freed the entire route, with a crux at 5.12a. “It’s got one 5.12 pitch and six 5.11 pitches, all 11c or harder, with the exception of one 5.11a pitch,” Russell said. “It feels pretty stacked by the end of it.”
The new route, which climbs just to the right of Lucifer’s Lighthouse (Sjong-Weidner, 2006), was named The Betrayer of Hope after a character in the “Wheel of Time” fantasy novels.