What is the Greatest 5.6 in the World?

Doctor Drakewrote:

I’ve heard that rock quality is kinda crappy in the area, but never climbed there myself. Also heard that protection can be poor to nonexistent. Any truth to that?

Doc, that reference was to the Kain Route on Bugaboo Spire. I called the climbing so-so because there is a long hike and scramble approach up the ridge to 3 or 4 good roped pitches. Just not consistent and not a lot of technical rock time. Rock quality in the Bugaboos is generally excellent. 

ddriverwrote:

Doc, that reference was to the Kain Route on Bugaboo Spire. I called the climbing so-so because there is a long hike and scramble approach up the ridge to 3 or 4 good roped pitches. Just not consistent and not a lot of technical rock time. Rock quality in the Bugaboos is generally excellent. 

Yes, I’m pretty familiar with the bugs. I was referring the Italian routes you suggested. Epic 5.6 ridge climbing up a limestone tower—sounds like a recipe for choss.

Some of those Dolomite routes, including Falzarego, were some of the most fun I’ve had on choss. Not always the best rock quality, but hard to beat the scene, access, and ability to be back in a refugio bar by early afternoon. I was not impressed with Moon Goddess and Venusian Blind, both were pretty loose by Sierra standards. But Sun Ribbon was good.

The Comici on Falzarego is clean by most standards. Variable rock quality there to be sure but as the grades get harder the rock seems to get cleaner. I don't complain.

So, relative to climbing history, there is this picture of Cathedral that appears in the first edition of JD Whitney's "The Yosemite Book" of 1868.  According to the credits it was taken in 1867, and is one of four picures in that book taken by a "W. Harris" (the other 24 therein were taken by famous photographer Carlton Watkins, all in the Valley).  Thus, two years before Muir.  As far as I'm aware the only way into the Cathedral Range at the time was via the Mono Trail, which with the huge, large-format cameras and glass plates used at the time, was an expedition, requiring mules.  I've never heard of W. Harris before, or since, but if he was any kind of mountaineer, he would not likely have expended so much effort to get that close, and then not made an attempt on it.

Another note is that RJ Secor seems to be mistaken in his account of Muir's climb.  He says Muir climbed the W face, but according to Muir's account he approached from the north and then went along the E side and climbed from somewhere over there.  It's thus not inconceivable that he went up the SE buttress, because it is well known that he did some very hairball things that could have killed him (Mt Ritter, lip of Yosemite Falls, tree climbing in storms, etc), and that he understated what he did, climbing-wise.

It's also very interesting that the famed CA Geological Survey party members, especially Clarence King, apparently made no attempt on it, even though Mt. Hoffman was climbed early on.  How did that happen?

I'm not buying the notion that Muir could have done the SE Face. I've read his account - so inconsequential was his climbing on this peak he failed to mention sending a long exposed rock face? Not in keeping with his other adventures at all. He spent his prose dallying on flowers and the soulful tomes of the day. He likened the hike to a walk into a Cathedral. 

Fairview Dome is directly north of Cathedral Peak. He came up from the meadows and likely followed the line of the modern, John (ahem) Muir Trail. Not likely to have approached via Budd Creek. If he came up the long north ridge line of Cathedral that would put him at the shoulder where modern climbers who are descending back to the base of the SE Face would drop down onto the steep slopes leading back to the base. 

From that shoulder Muir would doubtlessly have done as so many have done since - wandered up the back side till be found that little gap and popped through to the east side of the mountian, two moves from the top. It would have made no sense at all to drop down to the base of SE Face in order to climb the peak the top of which he was separated by only a couple hundred feet of mild scrambling.

One day a partner and I topped the Reg Route on Fairview early and thought, what the hell, and walked down the south side of Fairview and went over and did this imagined line of Muir's route. Good fun!

Cherokee Nuneswrote:

I'm not buying the notion that Muir could have done the SE Face...

I'm not saying that he did, I'm saying it's not out of the question, given his other escapades at the time, and the fact that he was an under-stater of his exploits.  Here's his exact description, from My First Summer in the Sierra:

"September 7. —Left camp at daybreak and made direct for Cathedral Peak, intending to strike eastward and southward from that point among the peaks and ridges at the heads of the Tuolumne, Merced, and San Joaquin rivers. Down through the pine woods I made my way, across the Tuolumne River and meadows, and up the heavily timbered slope forming the south boundary of the upper Tuolumne basin, along the east side of Cathedral Peak, and up to its topmost spire, which I reached at noon, having loitered by the way to study the fine trees..."

So he and the flock were in or near the meadows, N of the river, and he came across the two and then through the woods E of Fairview Dome to reach Cathedral.  I think he probably came up the NE ridge.  I see no evidence that he came up the "West Face".

Muir was a solo scrambler with huge balls that generally took the easiest and most obvious route to the summit like others of his generation.

This idea that he chose to put up a far more technical and continuous route for fun is not credible as he had never done anything like it before or since and scarcely made mention of his route.

I've descended the NE Ridge a fair number of times. Its fun and a different descent obviously, one cannot simply leave one's pack at the base of the climb. So I know that terrain reasonably well. It would be a simple matter to walk up the ridge all the way to that shoulder where us modern climbers drop back down into the Budd Creek drainage along the foot of the northern aspects of Cathedral. Standing at that shoulder it is possible to sort of climb up from there. Many a modern climber had rapped from the summit straight down over like a 50 foot slab to get to an unroping spot. So I know Muir could have (and likely did) walk that far. That leaves the penultimate summit. He could have scrambled straight up that slab or, more likely, traversed right to the point he hit the weakness us modern climbers exploit on our modern descent. But all of that final bit takes place on the western aspect of the summit.

I just don't see the man dropping several hundred feet down to the base of the SE Face and if he had managed that 800 foot expanse of granite he would have mentioned it. It would have been THE American mountaineering achievement of the 1800s, had he done so, free solo the SE Face of Cathedral? He was't that good of a climber.

Hamster Boondogglewrote:

Muir was a scrambler with huge balls that generally took the easiest route to the summit like others of his generation.

This idea that he chose to put up a far more technical and continuous route for fun is not credible as he had never done anything like it before and scarcely made mention of his route.

Yeah, I mean, who would climb to the top of a 200' Douglas-fir in a raging storm just for the experience, or risk slipping unprotected on the smooth apron of Yosemite Falls just to peer over the edge...

Yeah, I mean, who would climb to the top of a 200' Douglas-fir in a raging storm just for the experience, or risk slipping unprotected on the smooth apron of Yosemite Falls just to peer over the edge...

How do you know he did those things?

Jim Bouldinwrote:

Yeah, I mean, who would climb to the top of a 200' Douglas-fir in a raging storm just for the experience, or risk slipping unprotected on the smooth apron of Yosemite Falls just to peer over the edge...

Notice how well publicized these exploits are whereas a first ascent of Cathedral Peak via a technical and sustained mult-pitch rock climb is not ever mentioned. It would have been the most sustained technical rock climb in the USA (if not the world) for the time.

He took the easiest route to the summit without the slightest doubt. C'mon man...that is how ALL FAs of his time were done.

Hamster Boondogglewrote:

. C'mon man...that is how ALL FAs of his time were done.

C'mon, man!

Hamster Boondogglewrote:

Notice how well publicized these exploits are whereas a first ascent of Cathedral Peak via a technical and sustained mult-pitch rock climb is not ever mentioned. It would have been the most sustained technical rock climb in the USA (if not the world) for the time.

He took the easiest route to the summit without the slightest doubt. C'mon man...that is how ALL FAs of his time were done.

Your certainty about what happened that day, based on Muir's description, is impressive.  

I suggest you spend some time reading Muir's writings--he wasn't a self promoter did not give a damn about first ascents and their description*.  If he had, he would have gone into more detail about the exact route he took to the top, and for more evidence of this I refer you to his descriptions of the climbs he made the very next day around Mt Lyell.  Muir was all about the general experience, and the study and veneration of nature.  Note (once again) that I'm not claiming he necessarily took the SE route, whereas you are claiming that he certainly did not--big difference.  And no, all first ascents of the time were not done by taking the easiest route.

* Muir's statement two days later on returning from the Lyell area: "Mr. Delaney has hardly had time to ask me how I enjoyed my trip, though he has facilitated and encouraged my plans all summer, and declares I'll be famous some day, a kind guess that seems strange and incredible to a wandering wilderness-lover with never a thought or dream of fame while humbly trying to trace and learn and enjoy Nature's lessons."

Cherokee Nuneswrote:

How do you know he did those things?

Because he wrote about them and I've read most of what he wrote about California.  

To the brink of Yosemite Falls: The Treasures of the Yosemite: yosemite.ca.us/john_muir_wr…

Tree climb in a windstorm: The Mountains of California, Chapter 10: yosemite.ca.us/john_muir_wr…

Winter avalanche ride, Our National Parks, Chapter 8: yosemite.ca.us/john_muir_wr…

There's also the well known incident on Mt Ritter where he could have fallen to his death on a short class 5 section, but which he had to go up because he was on too steep and sustained of a section to down-climb, which presumably was thus class five also.  So he also had the ability to get himself into trouble.

Thanks Jim. We know he did those things because he wrote about them. And too, of course, we don't know about routes or choices he made if he didn't write about them. Anyway, there is an irony here:

That partner I mentioned, with whom I climbed Fairview and then we randomly wandered over to hike up the back side of Cathedral? The reason we did that hike was because earlier that morning and again on the summit of Fairview, we were talking about Muir. My buddy is a Cal. native, grew up near Yosemite, had worked as both a guide and a SAR member in the Valley and was also a well-read SOB who liked to talk about climbing, climbing history, etc. 

I made a similar enough sort of proposition as you did in this thread - maybe Muir climbed the SE Face? I mean, why not? He was a capable guy after all and it is a romantic notion, to go along with the romantic Victorian writing for which he is so well known. 

My partner scoffed at the notion of Muir climbing that face, literally scoffed. On top of Fairview he said, "Let's just walk over there and see if we can retrace his steps." Which is what we proceeded to try and do. That's why your comment inspired me to discuss... just as my partner and I tried to walk in Muir's shoes, albeit with what we thought was a healthy dose of skepticism, I find you and I also walking in our own set of footprints too, in a manner of speaking.

Thanks again for the discussion.

@JB Get a grip dude. It is 100% certainty that he did not solo the SE face of Cathedral and put up the hardest and most technical rock climb of his life and in the history of the USA for the time and forget to mention it.

100%.

Just because you want to believe its true does not remotely make it so.

Every so often a thread makes sifting through all the chaff worthwhile... thanks for the contributions from all

John Muir bagged the FA of the mountaineer's route on Mt Whitney .....

APPROACHING FROM THE TOWN OF FREAKIN INDEPENDENCE !

with probably a ratty wool blanket and moldy bread for supplies. A real mountain climber.

PS. No one responded to my Mt Conness West Ridge suggestion as the best 5.6. Unsubscribe! hehe .....  

West Ridge of Conness is stellar, jt newgard. I dunno from what about best, though. As a side note TM Herbert loved West Ridge and used to liken it to two SE Face of Cathedrals stacked one on top of the other. He'd work the store parking lot for partners to go up and solo it with him.