Another popular moderate classic. Hike along the main Donnelly buttress north from Generic, past Binou's, and look for a beautiful thin-hands crack in a dark right-facing corner. Trample (as lightly as possible) up from the trail to the base. Start with #1 Camalot size until it pinches down slightly (#2 Friend), grunt (or panic depending on your style) through the thinness to a nice ledge on the left. Continue up the widening (starts #2 Camalot size, ends #3 Camalot size) crack to the anchors on the right.
If your hands are small this will probably be a cruise. The rest of us probably will say there's a move or two of 9+.
Protection
2-3 #1 Camalots, #2 Friend or #.75 Camalot (Friend is better for the size), a couple #2 to #3 Camalots.
This is a short pitch, but I once saw someone place over 15 pieces on it, thus proving that no matter how big a rack you bring to Indian Creek you can still run out of gear!
By Mike Morley Administrator From: Oakland, CA Nov 14, 2006 rating: 5.8
A fantastic easier route with impeccable rock. Perfect for smaller hands (red camalot size). Short.
The only stemming I've ever done that's close to as hard as the second pitch was on Romantic Warrior, except this was 4x longer than RW's stemming section. That puts it at old school 12a/b or harder. I was told by an old local that it was 12a then some key holds broke off. I thought it was HARD!!
The third pitch wasn't that hard at all. A little scary off the belay then very straight forward and powerful tight hands for a short ways. It's steep but short. Off the ground it'd be 11+/12-, up there with some exposure it feels more. It's very very cool though.
also, re: Ocean Negro, you can get off of it with one 70m rope. It is a bit interesting rapping from the top of pitch 3 to the top of pitch 2; you need some directionals since it is so steep. You can get from the top of pitch two to the ground with one 70m rope, barely. Or you could just do a huge double rope rappel with two 60's or 70's to the ground from the very top.
Donnelly Canyon
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