Royal Arches Conditions?

I’ve heard that Royal Arches can be wet and dirty in the spring. Has anyone been up there recently? I was hoping to climb it for the first time around May 8th. I’m a 5.8 climber, so wet/dirty 5.7 sounds a bit sketchy. Thanks!

Recent ticks talk about some wet cracks. It was looking pretty damp this past weekend. That being said, people are doing it! Go get it!

We went up there today: There is quite some water running before and after the rope swing in the moment, but it can be climbed. Other than that it is mostly dry. The slab pitch in the end is a bit scary due to two wet streaks in the moment if you do not rappell.

Yep - basically 95% dry but it's an 1500 foot climb so that means still some wetness, lol - temps have been so good the Arches has been in good shape for a full sun climb. There have been some posts in the comments about snafus on the rappel route - I will try to summarize:

In 2024 folks were frustrated with missing the rappel station 10, so a new rappel station 10 materialized at a more logical, "down the obvious ramp skier's right" spot 15 - 20 feet below the old rappel 10, which still exists of course. The new station 10 looked like you could reach the ledgey terrain below in one rappel with a 70m, but you came up 12 feet ish short of fairly easy 5.5 with a convenient foot ledge to get off rappel and a perfect small tree to use as hand holds as you frictioned down to the big terrace area. But many people rappelled in the dark and the terrain did not look 5.5, and the stance to get off rappel was not nearly as inviting as it is in broad daylight. A second summary:

In addition to a second rappel 10 anchor there is now a second rappel 11 anchor, basically ensuring that whichever station you use there will be one within a 80 feet that allows you to do two rappels down to the big terraced area.

The Red Herring in all this? 

There has always been a rappel Z, for fast and light or soloist folks who naturally scramble down as low as they can on said ledges, coil your rope early to not pull off small rocks - there is now a bolted rappel below a dying small tree at the bottom of the ramp downclimb that allows you to make just one 35m rappel to a wet trough that leads over to the big ledge. So if you downclimbed from 9, 5.4, you will do Z as rappel 10, and then walk / downclimb all the way to 13 and make two more rappels, your 11th & 12th, and then I just walk back to the top of the first pitch and I slide back down that pitch so easy on the downclimb but also an easy rappel now that I put an anchor there - so only 12 or 13 rappels for fast and light folks, not that I'm promoting that approach at all I have people of all walks of life emailing me all the time asking me questions so trying to break down your options and ensure that you reach the safest rappel route for you and your team. Please do what is best for you team - we have had several people die on the Royal Arches Rappels and it breaks our hearts.

The new 2025 Rock Climbing Yosemite Valley book is at least available by pdf, folks that buy the pdf will get $20 off when I start the presale for the book - just dealing with very minor photo / cover / topo corrections - send over anything you see but I can't guarantee I can fix everything:

https://rockclimbingyosemite.com/product/2025-ebook-rock-climbing-yosemite-valley-750-best-free-routes-downloadable-pdf/

Climbed it last weekend, very wet on pendulum pitch but that’s basically it. I found the rappels to be pretty straight forward, just look around as you go down. At rappel 12 I think, there’s a tree on the ledge with red tat on it right now, just scramble down hill from that tree towards the running water, and then look back the way you came and you will see the next rap station.

Yeah - you don't need to use the tree with the red tat - it's like 20 feet of walking from that tree to rappel station 13 - people just freak out in the dark and I understand, many people have died rappelling the Arches.