Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Yosemite April 09

Kitty and I decided to zip over to the Valley Sunday night and squeeze in a day of climbing before a late spring storm came through. Rolled into the Wawona about 10pm. The new climbing-mobile worked great. 48mpg from Santa Cruz to the Valley. Quick warm up at the Swan Slab boulders.









Then off to do Munginella. Last time I was there was 1978 with Frances. Heard it had gotten cleaned up since then.




The approach












Looking up at the first pitch of Munge







First pitch was nice! Little bit of face climbing, some hand-sized crack and some liebacking. We ran out to the third tree to be able to do the route in two pitches.









There is a great view of the Lost Arrow Spire from the route. Second pitch was also nice. Up a corner, a couple of spicy moves getting out from under a roof, then up a steep dihedral. The 4th class downclimb was a running stream, but someone kindly has added some bolts with rings for rapping off the last bit. We did that.












Next stop, El Cap meadows and a hike up to the base of The Capitan. Right at the base of the Nose is a little 80' finger crack called Pine Line. There was a party of two on it -- you can see the leader lower right on the left photo).













Up we go. This is a very thin intermittent crack! If not for the face holds and ledges on either side it would be considerably harder than 5.7. Very nice.




Kitty cranking Pine Line








Walking back to the car, we saw a mother bear and her cub. Lighting was perfect for beautiful shots of the Southwest Face of el Cap and Middle Rock plus the Cathedral Spires.

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