Hemingway Buttress walkoff

In the Miramontes book he says you can walk off Hemingway main wall in the White Lightning area to the left (east) end. Anybody done it? Is it sketch? Yes, I know you can rap just wondering what that walkoff is like.

When you can rap it with a single 60, why would anyone want to know how to walk off? I suppose you could want to know to walk up and set up a toprope, eh?

There's a fairly quick down-climb which passes through an easy chimney located between Death in the Afternoon and Poodle Jive.

This photo from Blitzo points the way:

Thanks CMiller

It's a walk off. How hard could it be? (It's not). That used to be the standard way to get down if you didn't do the downclimb that Chris pointed out. Keep in mind that the downclimb is exposed, though easy 5th class. It looks REALLY sketch when you first drop into it, but once you scope it out and get into it, the holds start to appear. I wouldn't take a noob or someone skitish on it though.

Thanks Fat Dad that's just the kind of info I was looking for.

There are several possible downclimbs off Hemingway.

The one Chris shows used to be a bit easier, but a large chockstone now makes this more exposed and technical than it used to be (now maybe 5.6 or so).

You can downclimb off toward the south-east (left) end via several variations, but it takes a bit of time. You end up going to the base left of Roadrunner, et al.

You can also, head over to the right (northwest) end, past Scary Poodles into a 4th Class gully left of The Old Man and The Poodle, et al.

Thanks Randy, that's good to know. The reason I asked is because I climbed White Lightning with my 14 year old daughter on Sunday and she is just learning how to rap and I wanted to know all of my options. BTW - we did rap.

Excellent. Starting her out correctly with a burly (for its grade) crack. It was probably a fist crack the entire way for her. I get out there with my 12 yr. daughter, though I have yet to drag her up a long crack line. I would not take my daughter down the downclimb, though if she could follow White Lightning, then the walk off would be mellow, as long as her shoes aren't too tight.

Yeah, she got a little worked on the opening crack crux moves but figured it out eventually. We did the shorter rap over to climbers right a ways. She's rapped before and what I do is put her on rap before I descend so she's already checked out. I tie a figure eight on a big bight of rope and clip each loop into carabiners on the bolts and rap. When I get to the bottom and go off rappel, she unclips and unties the figure eight and raps with me giving her a fireman's backup. Works out well. We also did Sail Away which was sweet!