Superpedro's Logbook (17 ascents)

I took over Nico who stopped at the Nailbox Crack belay. It is all trad, good placements, but it is always good sometimes to put 2 pieces together to make a solid point once in a while.
Not as easy at is seems. It is a great climb so, and you go to the top, so you have an awesome view!

Nico lead Pillow crack up to the middle, then decided to bail out using the Nailbox Crack belay. I did this one top roping.
I found it hard, a French guide did it after us, and the good way to do it is to keep your feet in friction on the face, and not to try to squeeze them in the crack (as I did...).

Good climb all the way through, the difficulty stays about the same all the way through. The bolts are a tiny bit spaced but less so than usually in Pinnacles. I used a cam and a nut before the 1st bolt, then all on the bolts only.

I did it in 1 pitch, and at the end, the drag was crazy, needed my hand to pull hard for some slacks, and then do a move - probably because of my cam&nut early on... (and I even only put 1 rope in those protection specifically to avoid this!)

There is a belay anchor at the top, but for rappel, walk about 20m to the right to the prominent rock with the obvious rappel station.

Approach: Just after the reservoir there is a climb trail: do NOT take it, it leads to another area. 20m after, there is another climbing trail indicated that even says: Sister climbing this way. :D Continue the trail up to the end of it, passing all the sisters, leaving them on your left. Just before that, check out the large crack: this is it!

Climb: 5.3 very easy up to the tree, with no pro up to 2m before the tree, then nuts + then sling the tree possible.
3 bolts are on the face climb, which makes it well protected. However, I couldn't see the 2nd bolt (which would make that part of the climb R or X) so I was hesitant to go. I did go and only saw the 2nd bolt when I had my hand on it (almost literally). The 3rd bolt was obvious from the 1st one.
Then it is easy, walk around the bulky rock/notch to climb it from behind to belay from the large dead tree very comfortably (Didn't see any of the belay bolts mentioned in the topo).

Descent: Walk back to the large ground area, then take right, as close as possible to the climbing route, you can enter a sort of horizontal chimney and downclimb/scramble through it easily.

Nico lead, I followed. (Route n° 225-226 in the topo)

Starting by climbing from the right side of the pillar, leaving the 2 bolts of the "variation" on our right side. Put a nut in the rock on top of the pillar. Then climb up to the "possible belay" made of 2 bolts. (very run out, a fall would bring you back to ground - although this is not very hard, like 5.4).
-- Nico actually did a variation to clip the bolt just at the right of the left route intermediary belay --

After that you have 2 bolts quite close to each other to protect the hardest move (5.5) and then it is easier (5.3 - 5.4) to the summit, but run out again.
The view is nice but I think would be better from the top of the left route.

Overall a great day with very good scenery and exposure, but van become long if you're not good at reading itinerary!

next time I want to finish by adding the 5.5 last pitch to go to the top of the tower, it looks so great!

Somewhat long approach trail (~40min). We started with the variation (1st pitch in 5.4), you have to start climbing about 10ft on easy terrain before finding the downward narrow corridor that leads to the "sounds waterfall" with a bolt to tie the belayer. 1st pitch is great. Second pitch goes on the right, there is a bolt to start just below the belay on the right side. You have to climb up a 2m stuff at the end to go to the tree-belay station (Do NOT follow the ledge below the top on the right side, there is nothing at the end to rappel down...we learnt that the "hard" way, and lost 1h because of this). From there you have to go upward along the ridge to find a bolt and then way later the rappel station. Then it is pretty fun climb, easy to the final rappel station The way down is not obvious, there are existing already slinged trees but you have to look for the slings sometimes. We had to rappel down directly inside the caves at dusk to reach the caves trail.

My first real lead trad climb in the mountain. Bringing Dad as a second. Real great experience. The last pitch is a marvel of route finding along the edge between large boulders, the 4th anchor is a breathtaking tiny platform where you can sit with your legs in the void - great climbing, consistent with the rating, just one pitch where you should not go wrong on routefinding or you will miss the bolts in an otherwise unprotectable slab.
The approach is a long - but beautiful - 2 to 3 hours hike.
Awesome climb overall!

Straightforward and consistent with rating all the way (mostly 5.6 and 5.7 pitches with one 5.8 pitch). The first move of the 5.8 is committing, but once committed it is alright!
I lead all the way with 2 seconds, it took us the full day! The way down is a crumbling walk for a solid half hour, then a long way back to the car!

Woaw! Real solid friction climbing with breathtaking exposure! Yet the bolts are really spaced out and it was a bit too run out to my taste (although the fall is safe, it may be very big). Also our topo suggested a 5.0 to 5.4 grade - which is definitely is not!! - so it also kind of took us by surprise. Finding the first two bolts is really not obvious: we were lucky someone was here to tell us about them. Had to retreat just below the start of the crack as everyone one the rope didn't feel so good, but sounds like a nice one. Do not get in there if you're not comfortable in 5.7 yosemite friction climbing or you may wish you didn't! Otherwise, go ahead, it's real quality climbing!

The not-so-steep mid section is harder than it looks, and the end is ok because protected with bolts (If I remember correctly). Overall a pretty good one