August 25-28, 2006
This was a great trip, though Tuolumne was actually Plan B. Plan A was to climb Whitney. However,
due to the unorganized rangers and the most asinine permit system known to man, we were not allowed
into the hallowed Whitney backcountry, so we reverted to Plan B - we kept driving North.
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| Above the route on Lembert. |
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| Dad on the first pitch. |
As far as backup plans go, however, this was nothing to complain about. The Whitney stuff killed some
time, but Tuolumne was as spectacular as ever, and we had three days of great climbing.
We rolled into the park (in a laughable rented Chevy HHR - the subject of many derogatory comments)
around 2 pm. We scrambed to find a campsite and still climb something. Luckily, Porcupine Flats was
nearly deserted, so we stuffed our food into the bear locker and drove back to Lembert Dome.
After the five minute approach hike we headed up the familiar Northwest Books route. Dad took the
first, slabby, stemmy, chimney-y 5.6 pitch. I followed, and went up the corner for the second pitch,
providing 30 feet of 5.9. My no longer being a climber showed, as I sewed that corner up like a
blind paranoid seamstress sewing her only son's parachute harness. I did get up it, though. After that it was a fun
moderate romp to the third class slabs. We ran to the top of the dome, took some photos, and descended
off the back side.
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| Me, sewing up the crack on Lembert. |
Cathedral from the approach. |
I lead our second pitch on Cathedral. |
It gets dark early in late August, and as we were equipped for alpine rock, not car camping, we didn't have any options
other than going to bed at 8. That evening the local bear showed up to say hello. During the night he was clearly
making his evening rounds,
and stopped by again to pound on our bear locker, making sure that it was, in fact, locked. We poked our heads out
the tent to return his welcome.
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| The Meadows from Lembert. |
We got up with the sun the next morning, threw our stuff in the HHR, and drove to the meadows proper. We packed and
started hiking up the trail toward Cathedral Peak. After an hour and a half we were at the base of the Southeast Buttress.
There were already four climbers on it, but we figured that would be fine. More on that later.
Dad took the first pitch, which the guidebook calls the first two pitches. I only had to simulclimb a few feet.
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| Dad on the first pitch. |
The rock is fantastic; the climbing really fun on knobs and flakes (lots of flakes). I headed up the next pitch,
with some finger locks, smears, knobs, and generally fun climbing. At the top I made a long traverse left,
putting us below a 5.7 crack, avoiding the 5.6 chimney that is supposedly the standard route. I brought Dad up,
and after waiting for the party ahead of us to move, he led the exposed crux. I followed; the climbing was spectacular!
I led through, finding easy scrambling. After running out of rope, I set up a nice belay on a comfortable ledge. We
sat here for a while, waiting for the other party to finish. After a long time we figured it would be ok, so Dad went up.
Then he stopped, and told me it would be a bit of a wait. During the hour I spent on the ledge I heard some big commotion
above. Somehow the histrionic guy from the previous party threw a hissy fit. At long last I was allowed to follow. What a
cool summit! We downclimbed the last twenty feet, then moved toward Eichorn Pinnacle. Dad wanted to skip the Pinnacle
and make it to the Tuolumne store before closing time, but I countered that we were already here, the approach to the
Pinnacle sucks, and we still had beer, so we should be ok. We did still have beer, so this was a convincing argument,
and we climbed the Pinnacle, which is the coolest steep juggy 5.4 on the planet. We rapped off to the notch and followed the
tedious slabs to the trail, which we followed to the car.
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| I belay at the top of the second pitch. |
Dad leads the crux crack on Cathedral. |
Selt-portrait on Cathedral's summit. |
We were disappointed that evening; the bear didn't come by again. He must have decided that we were too diligent about closing
our bear locker. Unlike last year, when he stole our crackers.
Flipping through the SuperTopo guide, Dad thought that Tenaya Peak would be a good route. The book said it was 14 pitches
of runout 5.5 slabs; that the route is way longer than it looks; that it takes a typical party five to seven hours. This made me wonder
since we last year on Half Dome we discovered that 5.7 Yosemite slabs are completely devoid of holds and crossover Smith Rock
sport climbers (us) fare poorly. Well, we went up there, and it turned out to be a joke. The approach was short but stout;
we roped up and started walking (yes, walking) up slabs. Dad took the first block and we simulclimbed 600 feet. Then I took the
rack and we simulclimbed another 400 feet. Then we caught up behind another, slower party.
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| Eichorn Pinnacle from Cathedral. Oh man that looks cool. |
Dad on Eichorn's summit. |
Simulclimbing low on Tenaya. |
We got to a big ledge and argued about
how high we were. Adding distances climbed and comparing to pitch lengths, I figured we had a pitch or three left. Dad though we
had six or seven. Well, I led a fun but easy 200 feet, then Dad took another 200, and we were clearly 100' below the summit.
He took the last bit, and after an inelegant belly flop we were on the plateau. Total time elapsed: 3:30 or so, and we never
found the runout 5.5 slabs. It's a great climb, but next time I'd take a short rope and small rack and solo most of it. We hiked
down the west ridge, and headed down some obvious slabs right to Tenaya Lake. We stopped for a swim before walking the short distance
to the beach where we lounged for a while. It was still very early; we easily got back to the store to get some groceries and a
hamburger from the grill. We stopped and took a run up Pothole Dome on the way back to the campground, which offered a spectacular
view of the meadows.
Back in camp, it was nice to have some daylight left. The bear still didn't stop by; as this was our last night in Tuolumne, we
were disappointed. We shouldn't have been, though; around 2am some coyotes started howling at the moon. Or at each other, I
didn't quite understand them. Maybe they were comparing their respective marmot kills for the day.
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| Tenaya summit. |
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| Yosemite from North Dome. |
In the morning it became clear that we had left Dad's camera on the shores of Tenaya Lake. We hurridly drove back to the lake
and were relieved to find the camera next to the boulder where we had gone swimming. With the camera in our possession, we drove
back and started out on our original plan for the day: a quick hike to North Dome before starting the long drive back to San Diego.
I'm a wimp; I if there's no skiing or climbing involved I dislike hiking. The views of Half Dome and Yosemite Valley were well worth it.
We ate lunch below Lembert Dome and drove back to San Diego, which took only seven hours! What a great trip.
On Tuesday we drove to LA and visited the Huntington Museum and Gardens.
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