Thursday July 3 - Cathedral Peak The long weekend was upon us, and Rod and I decided to pull on both ends, making it even longer. We left Thursday morning, and headed for the high country, avoiding the horrific weekend traffic. We ran into Ed and Vivian at the gas station in Oakdale, the site of many a fine meeting. They were off to the eastern Sierras, to traipse on Mt. Humphery and whatnot. Rod and I were planning on camping in our secret spot, as we were sure all the sites would be full, but amazingly enough we found a few open ones at Porcupine Flats. We set up some tents, then made for the Cathedral trail head, communicating our lovely find to the oncoming hordes. We weren't sure who was coming with who, so we just called everybody. Rod and I had decided to run up Cathedral, as we only had half a day, and it would make a good warm up for what we had planned for Friday - Matthes Crest. On the way to the spire, we ran into Matt O., John, and I-can't-remember-his-name. Turns out they had found a couple of camp sites at Tuolumne Meadows, and were also expecting hordes. Oh, the popularity contest - who would stay with us, and who would choose Matt! We continued on to the crag, and Rod and I simuled up it in no time flat. Rod led, and chose one of the routes on the right side of the face. We hung out at the top for a while, taking in the view, and scoping out the trail past Budd lake to the Echo pass. As unfolding events will reveal, we should have scoped it out better! When we got back to the car, we called up the hordes again, informing them of the alternate camping, but ended up only speaking with voicemail. Since we weren't sure who was going where, we arranged a rendezvous for the following morning at 6AM - not quite an alpine start, but we figured that Matthes shouldn't really require one. (2048x1536 at 988 kb) Cathedral Peak Friday July 4 - Matthes Crest We went to sleep fairly early that evening, and when we awoke the next morning at 5, we found that only Matt D (henceforth called MAD), Matt A, and Lisa were there. Dan, Lynsey and Jack had stopped by in the middle of the night, but had proceeded on to the Meadows - now I know who my friends are. After rousing the troops, we broke camp and made for the trail head. At the last minute, Lisa decided to join us, so we were a party of 5 - Rod, MAD, Matt, Lisa and I. We finally managed to get everyone moving in the same direction at 6:30, and started up the trail to Budd Lake. Unfortunately, after crossing the stream, we headed too far east, and after going up the slabs, ended up on the eastern edge of Budd Lake. So we had to drop down, and cut back west before climbing the steep talus slopes below Echo pass. When we gained the col, wheezing and panting, we were finally treated to the imposing sight of Matthes Crest. What an amazing looking piece of rock! We were also treated to the sight of another descent involving scree, and more slab climbing on the other side of the valley before reaching the southern end of the crest. Despite the somewhat circuitous route that we had taken, we made it to the base of the climb by around 10AM, and roped up. Or at least the others did - since we were five, I decided it would be better to have two parties of two, and I would solo. MAD and Matt paired up, as did Rod and Lisa.

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Budd Lake

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Our first view of Matthes Crest
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Echo Peak	Rod descending from the pass

The first pitch was an easy 5.6, with lots of knobs, features and cracks. It made for an easy solo, or simul as the people on ropes did. Once the top of the crest was gained, the climbing became mostly 4th class, with beautiful exposure on both sides.

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The snapshackling begins

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(1536x2048 at 1020 kb)	(2048x1536 at 1036 kb) For kicks, I went over the central spire, the others went around.

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Lunchtime

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naptime

At lunch, Matt announced that he had run out of water, despite bringing 3 liters. This didn't worry us too much, as there was lots of snowmelt available down below, we just had to get to it. We had enough water between us to last until we got down, but at that point we weren't sure whether we would rap down at the north summit, or go all the way to the end of the crest. We gave him some of our water, and pushed on.

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We were at the notch between the north and south summits by 3 PM. At that point, I decided that it would be wiser to rap down than to continue along the crest. For a long while I considered having the others rap down, and finishing the crest by myself, but in the end managed to convince myself that this wouldn't be wise - without my expert guidance and leadership, I'm sure they would have all gotten lost and eaten by marmots. I'll have to go back to finish it off sometime. However, we couldn't pass up the summit itself, so we did the last pitch to the north summit. This is probably the hardest pitch of the climb, running at a pleasant 5.7. After summiting, we did two double rope raps down to the slabs below. It took us an amazingly long time for this last pitch - I think it was around 5 when the harnesses came off. Then we had the long slog back. Instead of descending to the valley floor, as we did on the way in, we contoured around, trying to save altitude. We filled up water bottles with snowmelt, but Matt was definitely feeling the effects of the dehydration and the long walk. It took us another hour to reach the pass again, as the pace was generally slow.

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Tired faces at the pass

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Our last view of Matthes Crest

With only minor mishaps and the occasional snowball fight (good thing everyone threw like a girl, including Lisa), we made it back to the car around 8PM. A long day! I still felt pretty good, but this was obviously not a feeling shared by all.... We drove to the Meadows campground, to join the rest of the hordes for dinner. And hordes it was indeed - Matt, John, What's-his-name, Jack, Dan, Lynsey, Michelle, Steve, Heather, and more! Lisa once again came through with the food, and brought out salmon steaks. Yum! Saturday July 5 - Rock Creek The following morning, we got up at a decent hour, then had a leisurely breakfast at the Mobil station in Lee Vining. The menu wasn't to Lisa's liking, but she made good use of her sad, puppy-dog expression and feminine wiles, to convince the chef to make some Freedom toast for her. His name was Matt too. We drove to Rock Creek, and after gearing up, headed for the Main Wall. Matt walked up with us, but decided not to climb as he was still recovering from the previous day. We were all going to start on Main Line (5.8), but I wanted to do DMZ (5.10a) for the third pitch. I started up first with Rod, then belayed him up the second pitch. Meanwhile, MAD and Lisa came up, took a look at the finger crack that starts the second pitch, and offered to exchange partners. So I switched ropes with Lisa, and sent her up to Rod, who was rather surprised when she came up instead of me. I then led the second pitch, and when MAD came up, he was cursing the fact that he had not attempted it himself, as it was easily within his means. It really is a beautiful finger crack, with good stances for placing pro. We switched ropes again, and I headed up DMZ while MAD finished off Main Line. I kept on hearing shouts of encouragement from Rod and Lisa, but they were all for MAD and not me - it was very hurtful, and I contemplating taking a big whipper just to get their attention. But DMZ was too much fun, especially if you don't use the big features off to the side and only use the crack! A pity it wasn't longer.

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Matt on Main Line P3, and Charles on DMZ

We walked/rapped off the side, and MAD, Rod and I headed back to the base of the climb for lunch. Lisa, for some reason started walking all the way down the scree field to the river. After a while we started wondering where she was, so we went looking for her. I found her half way up the scree, wandering around - she had lost one of her climbing shoes! So we spent the next while scrambling around, sending rocks sliding down the hill, looking for one black shoe. I climbed all the way back up to the top of Main Line, just in case, but it was nowhere to be found. Suddenly, we hear screams of joy, and see Lisa jumping up and down, shouting that she had found it! Amazing. We went back to the base of Main Line to retrieve our gear, and I contemplated the prospect of doing another climb, but decided against as it was getting late-ish, and we still had to decide what to do on Sunday. So we packed up, and headed down to the camping area. MAD pulled his truck around and we took over an empty camp site, to debate the plans for the next day. MAD, Rod and I had originally thought to do the Matterhorn or Bear Creek Spire. However, neither Lisa nor Matt wanted to do anything too long, so we contemplated giving them one of the cars so that they could head back to Tuolumne. We decided to say on the east side, but both the Matterhorn and Bear Creek Spire were long days, which would result in a very late return for those who had to be at work on Monday. After much discussion, we settled on Crystal Crag (5.6), near Mammoth, who's short hike and short climb fit the bill.

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We also decided to camp right there, and had another protracted dinner. Intriguing things were done with a honeydew melon and rum. Actually, intriguing things were done with rum in general. After dinner, we drove to the Green Church hot springs, and spent quite a while trying to find the big one. Both Lisa and I remembered it being after the 3rd cattle guard, though she thought it was on the left, whereas I thought it was on the right. Much driving over dirt road, and off road ensued. We gave up, and were driving back toward the small one, when Rod informed us that the one we were looking for was in fact after the 2nd cattle guard, not the 3rd. Argh! It was on the right side of the road, so at least I was correct in that regard. When we got there, we had the whole thing to ourselves, and boy, did that hot water feel good! Unfortunately our splendid isolation didn't last long. A large party of kids came by, but were scared off by all the nekkid people in the water. As time went by, more people trickled in, including a bunch of climbers that we had seen at the Main Wall. We left after about an hour, though it was rather difficult to drag Lisa out of the water. Sunday July 6 - Crystal Crag (1536x2048 at 992 kb) Crystal Crag, with an obvious line up a right facing dihedral We didn't get up early enough the next day to avoid the ranger, so had to cough up the $16 camping fee. Outrageous! Though I have to say, that site had some of the nicest bathrooms I've ever seen in a campground. MAD passed me on the way down to 395, but that didn't last long as he got confused at the last intersection, and we had to honk to prevent him from taking the wrong road. We drove up to Mammoth, and parked by Mary Lake. After racking up, we headed for the trail, where we were immediately confused by the guide book. The guide says to take the Deer Lake trail, whereas the big map by the side of the road shows that Crystal Lake trail is the one to take. We chose not to listen to Peter Croft, and followed the map. Lo and behold, it led us faithfully to Crystal Lake, where we were confronted by a forbidding sign: it warned us that climbing Crystal Crag should not be undertaken unless one had registered at the ranger station. I was about to send MAD back down the 1.5 mile trail to register for us while we hung around the lake, but then realized that I hadn't broken any laws yet that day (speed laws don't count), and needed to live a little dangerously. So with much trepidation, we ignored the sign and hiked up to the base of the crag. (2048x1536 at 996 kb) The scary sign. When we got there, MAD and I had a violent argument about where the route started. He kept pointing to a dotted line on a picture of the route, whereas I stood by the text description, which spoke of a right facing dihedral. I placed my faith in the words of Peter Croft, not some lousy photographer. I chose not to think about the fact that he had already lied to us about the trail to take. Tempers flared, heated words exchanged, large rocks were thrown, and in the end there was a schism in the ranks. He started climbing a chossy, loose, crumbly, boring line, with Rod in tow, while I followed the aesthetically pure line of the dihedral, with Lisa feeding out the rope. Matt had decided not to climb, but stayed around at the base to keep the belayers company. After ascending the beautiful dihedral, I set up a belay, and started to pull the rope up, only to be met by screams of dismay from below. It turned out that Lisa hadn't tied in, and I pulled the rope up off the ground, which forced her to solo the first few yards. She made it up without a problem though, and I passed on the lead to her. The rock became more broken the higher we progressed, with many loose blocks. At one point, an incredible band of quartz runs through the granite, giving the crag its name. Quartz may be beautiful to look at, but it sucks to climb - it's heavily fractured, and slick as mongoose snot. After pausing to admire, Lisa wisely chose to climb around that section. A few more pitches of easy 5th class led us to the top, where we hung out for a while, drinking in the gorgeous view and eating Lisa's sandwich.

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Lisa amidst the crystal, and on the final stretch
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The party at the top (with celery)

We stopped off at Crystal lake on the way down for a dip. We put on a good show for the onlookers, scaring small children and large dogs with the sight and sounds of four naked people jumping into water not far removed from snow. On the way back down the trail, we somehow lost the 10 foot wide, heavily traveled trail, and ended up following a stream down 3rd class scree and crap down to the lake. It was a shorter path though, even if heavily infested with mosquitoes.

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Old man MAD in fighting form at Crystal Lake
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When we made it back to the car, there were tearful farewells, and promises to keep in touch, as MAD, Matt and Lisa had to drive back to be at work on Monday. Rod and I were going to tough it out one more day, and see where the fates led us. Since we had some time to kill, we drove to Mono Lake, as Rod had never been to the shore before. We parked at the visitor center, and started walking down toward the shore, about a mile away. After sliding down a steep sand hill, and walking for about 15 minutes, we were confronted by impenetrable sage brush, and said "Bugger this for a lark!" So we walked back up that bloody sand hill, got back in the car, and drove to the next parking area which put us within spitting distance of the shore. So much for the hardened, intrepid explorers. After calling Erin for a lesson in geology, we drove up to Tioga Lake for dinner.

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Monday July 7 - Tuolumne again The next morning, we got up fairly early, and had breakfast at Lembert Dome. It was still a bit chilly, as the frost on the picnic tables attested. Once again it was grapenuts and soy milk - though this time I played it dangerously and had the coffee flavoured type. Could it be that the days of bagels and Nutella are over? Rod did his part and finished off the jar of that tasty chocolate/love substitute. Hmmm, maybe I'll try mixing the Nutella into the grape nuts next time... It was still cold when we finished breakfast, and we were feeling a little under-enthused. We discussed options, and decided on short hard stuff instead of anything long. There was a bunch of stuff by Tenaya Lake that I wanted to work on, so we headed there. On the way we stopped by Galen's Crack and checked it out. That thing looks bloody painful. I'm sure it would be good off-width practice though. By the time we had driven to Tenaya Lake, it had warmed up, and we started on Black Angel (5.11a). I rigged a TR, and we played on it for a while. I'm definitely ready to lead it - next time! Then we wandered over to Death Crack (5.11d) and set up a TR on that. Overhanging, hands to loose fists, topped off with an off-width, it definitely deserves its name! It's more of a flake than a splitter crack, so it's hard to get both feet in the crack, and when it gets bigger than hands, it's hard to get a good jam, requiring a lot of effort to stay in there. The off-width section at the top is a piece of cake in comparison. I went up it twice, and hung once each time.

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Rod on Black Angel
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Rod and Charles on Death Crack

We paused for lunch at Olmstead point, laughing at the tourons, then headed for Olmstead canyon. There we played on Tideline (5.11a), and Lord Caffeine (5.10d++++), my nemesis from the week before. Lord Caffeine felt much better than last week. The key is to not freak out and place gear at waist level, or the few finger jams become inaccessible. It is definitely much harder than Tideline, which is a beautiful hand/finger crack, with a few powerful moves getting over bulges.

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Rod on Tideline, and Charles in Lord Caffeine

At around 3PM we called it a day, and started the drive back. We had planned on stopping in Oakdale at the brew pub for a large piece of meat, but it was closed - it had gone out of business! If they hadn't turned us away a few weeks ago when we stopped there five minutes before closing, perhaps they would still have been in operation. So we went across the street to The House of Beef, only to find that it too was closed on Mondays! Bastards! What a lame town - we had really been looking forward to a big steak. So we drove down to Riverbank, and stopped at the Taqueria - they at least have the decency to be open all week long until 10PM. Once again an amazing long weekend. Lots of hiking, a good bit of climbing, unusually thunderstorm-free weather, and passable company. Ok, so the company was great too.... Now what to do next weekend?