Regular Route

The climbing isn't that spectacular, but it's a long route and well worth doing. Sep 12, 2006

You can link 1&2 with a 60m rope and about 20' of simul climbing. Climb past the tree on your left at the 200' mark and have your second start climbing as you continue up a handcrack to a stance on a nice ledge below the awesome finger crack of P3. The belay requires thin finger to finger sized pieces as I recall. From here you can make it to Crescent Ledge in two pitches and avoid the crappy hanging belay. Sep 19, 2006

Best photo Jun 23, 2007

Climbed it this weekend. Great fun, ~5 hours car-to-car.

Some beta on P4. Do the Hollow Flake variation on the crescent arch pitch. Easy, exposed, and fun! Aug 12, 2007

Free Super Topo: supertopo.com/topos/yosemit… Nov 29, 2007

fun and accessible. Aug 2, 2008

Tremendous. P1 is climbable by bridging, sorry I mean stemming, even when there is a wet streak down the groove. May 8, 2009

Agree with Blitzo, the climbing isnt spectacular but certainly fun. Lots more enjoyable stuff to do if there is a line. There was a little water seepage in the crack on the first pitch 9/7/09, not a problem at all. The first 4 pitches as we did it (up to pitch 6 in ST) were enjoyable. After that its a 4th class romp to the top with one or two moves of very easy 5th mixed in. We linked pitches 3 and 4 as well as 5 and 6 with a 70m. Simul-climbed to the top from the end of pitch 6 in the ST guide. If you are a fast party and you arent behind a slow party it is certainly possible to do this car to car in under 3 even belaying out the first half of the climb. Sep 8, 2009

outstanding route- good quality and interesting climbing the entire way. if you're crafty, you can get to the top of the interesting climbing in 4 70m rope lengths (or 5 if you dont like that upper traverse), then two more long lengths to the top.

take the supertaco rack if you do it this way for enough gear. Sep 12, 2009

Topped out with some dudes from Mazama who were road-tripping with Fred Beckey! They showed us some vid clips on their nice camera of Fred rambling about all kinds of whacky shit. Tramped down to find Fred in the parking lot! Holy Shit! What a day!!! Jan 1, 2010

This route can actually be climbed in one long pitch, but you'll need an 800 foot rope. Jul 3, 2010

Perhaps the biggest surpise to me on this route was that most of the gear was small, not hand-size like I assumed from the grade. Bring nuts and doubles of tcu's/master cams. I think I placed the #3 C4 once on the whole route. A little disappointed at the quality, but it is a beautiful line up a big piece of rock. West Crack is better. Sep 13, 2010

Great route, the crux is low on P1. Partner and I did the route in 8-9 pitches, you'd really have to try hard to do in it more pitches than that. The last 2-3 pitches can be simulclimbed or made into a scramble. One of the best routes in Tuolumne hands down. Feb 28, 2011

This thing goes super quick. We did five roped pitches, then put it on our back and soloed the rest. Was our second route of our first day in the Meadows. Super fun time! Jun 19, 2011

First 400 feet are very fun and the rest is just getting to the top. Still interesting though, and a good time. If you're OK on easy 5th, you can put the ropes on your backs and solo the top 400 feet or so.

We showed up at 8am and were fourth in line. We took a bottle of wine along to make the waiting a little more fun. If you and your partner are fast you should just wait until a clear afternoon, make sure there are no epics going on and then start late. Sep 13, 2011

climbed this on monday the 17th of october. and the first three pitches were soaking wet. 1/2 into all cracks was a stream of water. once we got up to the crecent ledge it was covered in snow. pitches 8-10 had snow all over them. the 10th pitch which claims to be a lot of 4th class is not , or we were to far left and it was solid 5-6. above that was correct. we walked of the back in the dark. stay more south then you think if you go to far right it gets scary and super unsafe at night follow the cairns and stay left and more south till you get to the ground. hard to find the signs at the bottom of lucky streaks. we just walked all the way to the base of the climb were we could see the reflective trail signs on the left.. i dont know if anybody has climbed this route this late.. but i dont recomennd it at all in october. it was freezing cold most of the day even though the forecast was 68 degrees in the high country this thing does not warm up well. Oct 19, 2011

Send me message if you climbed this route on Saturday June 16th. I might have a picture if you. Parties 1 and 4 especially, later ones may appear small in the picture.

(I'll delete this comment at some point.) Jun 19, 2012

Simul climbed in three pitches. Anchor at pitch two, trade off above cresent and then to the top, 2 hours to climb. Jul 18, 2012

Signs That This May Be A Popular Climb (all seen in one day):

• a pair of climbers on a racing jog up the approach trail;
• someone trying to find the owner of a Volvo key which had been dropped on the approach trail;
• leader at top of P1 calling down instructions about how to clean gear;
• two new-ish stuck nuts left by second with no experience cleaning gear and with no nut tool;
• dropped sling;
• dropped #1 Black Diamond C4 caught by party below;
• dropped helmet camera scattered in pieces at the base;
• climber indicating while queued up that he may have left a set of alien cams back at the parking lot on the ground;
• another key found near parking lot while looking for aliens;
• twelve cars in/near the parking lot late in the morning.

Aug 5, 2012

Great route.

DO the flake variation on the pitch above crescent ledge, it's awesome!

Be prepared for the first pitch crux to be soaking wet and have lots of gooey chalk oozing out of the crux finger locks, it's not uncommon and will make the move feel like 5.10. A leader below us found out the hard way, fell, popped a cam, scraped himself up and bailed. Nov 18, 2012

My first good-sized route at the Meadows. Rack was single wires, single rack to 4 with some extra small cams to .75ish, don't forget the med-lg offset wires, they go in everywhere. Crux is short-maybe 3 moves of legit .9, look for feet on your left, don't stress the wet locks-there are a lot more coming when it goes to hands just above, but easier by far. 2nd pitch was most sustained and nerve-wracking; very greasy, smarmy feel. A lot of .8 move to .8 move to .8 move, more actual rock climbing on this pitch than the rest of the route for my money, more incentive to protect often with your feet sliming around on 10,000 people's hand grease, though there are a few good rests and it's OVER after the roof. Route above goes quickly, linking and simuling definitely work well on this route with smart runnering and a 70. Walkoff is climber's right from the summit, no one seems to mention descents in the comments. Mellow but if you're flip flopping it you'll regret it, slabby steepness on the walkdown will wear on your toes.

Don't be afraid to get up before the sun to get on this one, it's easily combined with other routes if you get an early start, but people will be lined up by 6 or 7 a.m. to begin the gumby conga line, so don't be party #15 on this one+c-block those of us who've placed gear before. Or, just dip in the river and get yo drank on. Beautiful place, enjoyable route. Jul 30, 2013

Per the MP pitch breakdown, I thought P1-6 all offered great climbing.
Really fun and more sustained through P6 than I thought it would be after reading everyone's comments.
Had 3 other parties, and apparently that was an uncrowded day. Sep 8, 2013

Did this on this past Monday, with only one other team higher up on the route. One of the funnest climbs I've done in Tuolumne; lived up to the hype. Didn't see the fixed pin at the 5.9 roof, maybe it was hidden? It was easy to find pro there anyways. Aug 20, 2014

the pin is to the right, protecting the 5.7 lb variation

70m rope links 1+2, 2 to big ledge (7x10' on supertaco), and 6+7;

p1-wet and slick Aug 19, 2015

Since the climbing on the route isn't worth being on there for hours, I would recommend pitching out pitch 1, then simul-climbing to the top after that. Doing it in this fashion allowed my friend and I to do this route in 2 hours on-sight. Sep 18, 2015

Beta alert: Get there early! Oct 10, 2015

Dave, we got your cam that you dropped on Regular Route on June 10th! Jun 12, 2016

We started late in the afternoon, did the first 4 pitches in 3 with a 60M, then rapped off with 2 60's. Casual day of 5 star crack climbing. The rap stations are old school, so bring some webbing and rings if you want to beef them up. Jul 21, 2016

Just a casual 5-star post about your bail, NBD. Jul 21, 2016

Great exposure! Aug 26, 2016

Fuck the Haters!

Its a classic passage up one of the most beautiful formations of stone on the planet. Mar 18, 2017

I'm with you there Mr Tut Mar 18, 2017

As of July 22, the crux is still quite wet -- this 10 foot section felt a whole lot harder than 5.9 as a result. Jul 23, 2017

50 crowded for sure. Rolled up at 9:30 on Saturday expecting a bit of a wait. Found one party waiting at the base and at least 3 others on the first 3 pitches. One of the parties on P1 said they'd been there since 7am. Yikes.

Thanks to the party at the base that left to do West Crack instead, and to the guys from SF/Oakland that let us pass on crescent ledge. Hope you guys finished in a timely fashion.

Also, bring your helmets out for this one. Came within 3 feet of whacked by a dropped #11 BD nut (the big gold one) from a pitch above. Aug 28, 2017

An okay climb to an awesome summit.
Waited for roughly 2 hours behind two parties, the lead party of 3 climbing slow and belaying both followers separately. Our party of 4 stayed on their tail without much trouble. Be prepared for crowds and waits.
Crescent Ledge belay options are okay but I was hoping for better. Ended up building my anchor to the far right with all of the larger gear I had left.
Linked P6 and 7 with ease, the belay 'ledge' was crowded with 2 people though.
The upper sections of the climb have easy terrain, you just have to look for it. Sep 10, 2017

My first 50 crowded classic, and it was super fun. The folks saying the climbing is just ok must be used to nothing but world class climbs because this is a really fun and mellow outing. Jun 16, 2018

The route can be done in 6 pitches if you stretch a 70m rope each pitch (in case you don't want to simul).
Belays using Supertopo as reference:
1) at ledge with tree above Supertopo belay 1
2) at 7' x 10' ledge above Supertopo belay 3
3) at Supertopo belay 5 (top of left trending ramp)
4) at Supertopo belay 7 (left side of narrow 4th class ledge)
5) somewhere around Supertopo belay 10 (when rope gets tight) (many stance options, we found one on small ledge above large ledge with tree)
6) top

Leave the nuts and very small cams and bring more finger sized cams to speed things along (triples or quadruples of 0.4 & 0.5).

I think one of the coolest things about this climb is that there are 0 bolts. I like bolts but it's nice to have a classic like this where even all the belays are natural. Now who's going to yank all those old pins?

The view on top was better than Matthes Crest and one of the fairest I've seen. Jun 29, 2018

Did this route 7/3/18

Beta: get there EARLY! We pulled into the parking spot around 6:15 am with 2 cars already there. Luckily for us they were still racking. My partner and I racked the harness the night before. I just slipped on the harness, put my day pack on and took off. We were able to be the first party at the base with the other two parties right behind us. Showing up 2-5 minutes earlier at the base saved us probably 2-3 hours waiting.

I linked pitches 1 and 2 with a 70m. By the time i built my anchor I saw at least 12 people at the base. I'm pretty sure by the time we topped out around 12:30 some of those people were barely starting.

We did the route in 7 pitches with no simul climbing done. Used a 70m
Link 1/2
Link 3 and built belay mid pitch 4 on super topo "205' from belay 2" 7x10 ledge
Link that to top of pitch 5
Link 6/7
Link 8 and built belay at 3rd class ramp on pitch 9
From there built belay to "huge flakes" on super topo guide
Then to the top Jul 5, 2018

The 5.9 section on the first pitch didn't feel like 5.9 when compared to Valley 5.9. Maybe because it was done in August and it was dry making it way easier? Still was wet inside a slightly higher crack. And I certainly don't crush on all 5.9's in the Valley so idk.

Did it quickly in a party of 3, and easily put 2-3 pitches of distance between us and the next party by the time we got to the 7th pitch. So practice your belay change overs kids. Definitely set up your first belay at the ledge with the tree, way better than the slopping ledge on the supertopo. Link 5 and 6, putting the belay at whichever ledge has the pine tree. Yes 8-12 are definitely better simul'd or solo'd, no real reason to make full belay stations. Aug 29, 2018

climbed this route 10/14/18. small pockets of snow and ice in cracks and on upper pitch ledges, but nothing serious. Combined p2 and p3 (sustained!), as well as p4 and p5 with a 70m rope. great climb, not sure why some folks have commented that the climbing is only "okay". started at 7:45am, didn't see another party on the route all morning. Oct 15, 2018