'The Fish' onsight by Ben Heason

In 1981 legendary Slovak alpinist Igor Koller, together with Czech climber Jindro Sustr tackled what was regarded as one of the most foreboding walls in European Alpinism at the time – the South Face of the Marmolada in the Italian Dolomites. Over three days, placing no bolts, but using a few points of aid, they opened the first ascent of ‘Via Attraverso il Pesce’, which soon became more widely referred to as ‘Il Pesce’ or ‘The Fish’, due to the large whale-shaped niche towards the top of the wall.

Ben's Topo of The Fish....

Despite attempts from the likes of Manollo Zanolla, Beat Kammerlander, Wolfgang Gullich and Kurt Albert and others it took more than 6 years before the route was first climbed free. These failed attempts, from high-profile climbers of the time, helped elevate the route’s reputation into what has been described as ‘perhaps the most legendary climbing route in the history of alpinism’. The sheer quality of the climbing on the central pitches, which tackle the vast smooth silver slab head on, coupled with the fact that there are no bolts on the route helped make the route an instant yet revered classic.

Whilst the route now sees a few ascents every year a true on-sight is still pretty rare. Nowadays there are clearly many more taxing undertakings in world Alpinism, but over the years the Fish has retained much of its fearsome reputation. I had heard more than enough tales of dangerously loose rock, difficult and technical climbing with nerve testing run-outs…

When I first started climbing I remember reading about the Fish, and wondered whether I would ever climb the route. At that time I thought not (because I thought I would only lead up to about E4 or so), but as the years progressed, my experience and ability improved and my thoughts of attempting the Fish began to turn into more of a reality. For years I had wanted, and intended, to go to the Dolomites, if only to experience the style of climbing in what is regarded as one of the top Alpine rock destinations of the world. But year on year other destinations, often newer and therefore more exotic sounding, came along – continuously bumping the Dolomites down the pecking order. So when I finally booked my flights for a two week trip at the end of August this year I was, needless to say, particularly excited.

On 'The Fish'

Teaming up with Ted Kingsnorth, our main objective was to repeat the Brandler Hasse, the ultra-classic 550m 7a+ (E5) on the North Face of the Cima Grande – one of the Six Classic North Faces of the Alps. But in the back of my mind, I knew what I really wanted to do. After a relatively comfortable on-sight of the Hasse, the weather was still perfect. I knew what we had to go for next.

Before the trip, the vague plan had been to climb an easier route on the South face of the Marmolada first, to acquaint ourselves with the wall and the highly technical and often run-out style of climbing encountered on it. But I wasn’t prepared to risk our window of opportunity - paranoid that we would soon encounter some of the notoriously ferocious Dolomite afternoon thunderstorms - so I politely insisted that we should get straight on the Fish. Fortunately Ted was happy to go for it.

Ben Heason standing beneath the North face of the Cima Grande – the Brandler Hasse goes pretty much straight up the middle of the face

Early morning starts aren’t my strong point but needs must. Whilst wolfing down a quick mug of coffee and a bowl of porridge at the Fallier hut, I was pleasantly surprised that my emotions, even at half-past-four in the morning, were more of excitement rather than apprehension. But how long would that last? The 45 minute slog up to the base of the route did its best to dampen my enthusiasm, but having stashed our kit at the base of the route on our previous days recce. mission, we were able to race up the scree and were on the rock before 6am.

Following our useful topo from the Italian magazine UP (the Mythical Routes section 2004/5), and a chat with my friend Erik Svab who had already climbed the Fish in 2004, we had been advised to avoid the ugly and loose terrain of the first two pitches by making a short and easy (ten foot section of grade III) scramble around to the right. With further help from our topo we were also able to link many of the pitches together, not only giving us some wonderfully satisfying long pitches, but substantially reducing our time by skipping belays.

The first pitch, a scrittly F6a crack, with frozen fingers and dim morning light, was a somewhat rude awakening, but after some ungracious but careful scrabbling we were under way. After a couple more easy but loose pitches we found ourselves at the foot of a long, grey corner on now solid rock, the morning now fully dawned into a spectacularly beautiful day. After following Ted up this it was my turn to embark on the first of the real pitches (F6b+ or E3 5c) of the route, a meandering line weaving its way carefully up the beginning of the enormous smooth slab by way of perfectly formed pockets and smears, with adequate gear.

I was in heaven but, even from this early and relatively easy pitch, I knew we had a brain fryingly technical day ahead of us. And the beautiful morning that had dawned had, in an instant, been enveloped by a thick and swirling white fog which appeared to have engulfed the entire mountain range. The next pitch was a little easier, allowing us to fully relax before the first of the harder pitches, a technical and fingery F7a+. Before setting off on this pitch we were fortunate to have been caught up by a German and Argentinean pair. The Argentinean had previously climbed the Fish about 8 years ago, but had been unable to free the crux pitches, including this next one.

He thought that the free climbing line took a different course to the aid line at the beginning of this pitch, so with some uncertainty I down-climbed and traversed rightwards to join the free version. The climbing was technical and unobvious; classic 6b wall climbing followed by an awkward groove, also English 6b, but the protection was better than I had been expecting, giving either a tough E4 or a soft E5.

Up to the crux

The next pitch was significantly easier, but seemed a bit tough for its F6b rating. Even the easy moves on all the pitches required plenty of thought combined with delicate precision. The following pitch, a long open groove graded F7b, looked beautiful, and by now the sun had burned through the mist and was ferociously beating down on us. Ted teetered up the slab, clipping the odd piece of in-situ gear, and fiddling in one or two pieces of his own before he ground to a temporary halt in the groove itself. There always used to be an aid peg in the tiny seam of the groove at this point, but it snapped recently, making it obligatory to make the move with the protection now a few feet below your feet. The crux of this pitch involved a precariously tenuous smear, with a stretch up to a good pocket followed by easier terrain to an airy hanging belay.

The Argentinian leading pitch 7 of the Fish...

We had been advised to avoid this belay if possible, and combine the F7b pitch into the next F6c+ pitch which takes you into the famous niche which gave the route its name. There were a couple of difficult sections on the F6c+ pitch making the whole pitch in the region of E5 or E6 6b, and what Ted considered his hardest trad lead ever – not a bad place to do it!

I had thought about Hansjörg Auer’s audacious free solo of this route in 2007 on numerous occasions already in the day, but seconding the delicate crux move of this pitch was the first time when it struck me just how impressive his feat had been, surely ranking it as one of the most audacious solos of all time. Whilst sat in the large niche I tried to block thoughts of Auer’s solo from my mind; we had plenty more hard climbing ahead of us so needed to concentrate on our task.

The next pitch, a F7a leaving from the right hand side of the niche before traversing across the length of it, followed a line of wonderful pockets before heading straight upwards by some physical and sequency pocket moves. It was perhaps my most enjoyable pitch of the whole route, a great E4/5 6a/b.

Now for the crux pitch.

Towards the top...

As Ted had lead the F7b pitch it was my turn for the F7b+. I had heard tales of desperate and tenuous climbing with terrifying run outs, so it was with some trepidation that I set off. With good protection placed, I committed to the first of the tricky sections, a steep and physical sequence that landed me in a precarious and mind-blowingly airy position at a small pocket with a decent looking peg. I could see the belay about 6 or 7 metres diagonally up and rightwards, whilst it was obvious there was no possibility of placing more gear, the last couple of metres looked pretty easy.

Ted seconding the crux pitch of The Fish...

With no chalk to follow, and feet tiring in my precarious position, I had to make a decision. Should I go high or low? Both seemed equally unobvious and looked very difficult. After several minutes pondering, my tiring feet forced me to choose. My auto pilot kicked in and, almost in a blur, I found myself at the belay, where I let out a roar of delight. With only a few more pitches to go I was confident that I had it in the bag – I could barely believe that here I was, doing something I’d dreamed about for years – on-sighting the Fish.

The next pitch, a F7a+ famously termed the “pendulum pitch”, was more testing than either of us had been expecting, despite having been told that the Slovenian uber-alpinist Mario Lukic failed on this pitch having on-sighted all the previous pitches. After climbing up to a peg, it is unclear how far down you are supposed to reverse before committing to a tenuous leftwards traverse across the slab to the base of an easier corner. Even having watched Ted find this pitch quite testing on the lead, I was still surprised at how tricky it was; a safe but very fall-off-able E4/5 6b!

The next two pitches (F6c and F6c+) climbed through steeper terrain giving more positive, physical climbing, if a little loose in parts. By around 7pm we were both on the large ledge at the end of all the difficulties, congratulating each other at having on-sighted the whole thing.

Overall, the Fish wasn’t as difficult as I had been expecting, nor was it as mentally demanding as I had been lead to believe. But it is extremely technical and sustained, so to on-sight the whole thing is quite testing, not because it is that difficult (if you on-sight E6), but because there are a number of places where it would be all too easy to fall off by accidentally going the wrong way, or failing on the correct sequence of moves.

After talking to several local activists who had climbed the Fish, we had been strongly advised to abseil from the large ledge, to avoid the top few hundred metres of VS and easier climbing on very loose rock. Completing our last couple of abseils in the dark, we gave each other well deserved pats on the back before racing down to the valley floor, where we gleefully sought out our perfect reward of Pizza and beer!

During the two week trip we also ate many more pizzas, drank plenty of beers (and a delicious White Russian) and climbed the following mountain routes (as well as three days climbing single pitch stuff in the valleys) :-

Fabjan 6b (Punta Frida 350m)

Brandler Hasse 7a+ (Cima Grande 550m)

Compagni Di Merenda 7b (Tofana di Rozes / 3rd Pillar 350m)

Murro Giallo 7a+ (Cima Piccola / South Face 320m)

Spiderman 7b+ (Lastoni di Formin / Left Pillar 350m)

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