Tuolomne triple crown

[wesweswes]

I've been wanting to do this for ages: it's a linkup of three moderate climbs in the tuolomne meadows area that are relatively easily connected via some cross country hiking. Starts out at tenaya lake, goes up tenaya peak (1400', 5.5), cross country to the south side of matthess crest, then across (2700', 5.8), then cross country to cathedral peak (800', 5.6). All in all people tell me it's around 11mi and 5-6k ft gain, but I didn't have any fancy devices to measure that. Here is the mountain project post for more: https://www.mountainproject.com/route/1 ... l-traverse

Ideally I would have brought a water filter, and/or more than 1L of water, but it worked. We departed the car just before 8am, and made good time, getting to the base of tenaya in about half an hour. Dave and Austin wanted to use a rope, so they simul climbed, while I pranced around them. At one point, though I took a crack up that petered out and turned into some slab, which was pretty spooky and felt harder than 5.5, but I quickly regained some crack and felt secure again. We made great time up the peak, and near the top I did the 5.8 variation which was really cool and not much harder than the rest. We hung out at the summit, took some epic photos, and I ate my first burrito. It was maybe 3 miles to traverse the ridge line, go in the saddle between tressider and columbia finger, then down and around the next canyon to the south edge of matthess crest. We kept up a spicy pace, and so all felt pretty wrecked by the time we got there, and hung out, ate, for a bit. Austin pulled out his "chicken bake" from costco, which looked like a calorie bomb, and a gut bomb too, but he later claimed it was all good. I took a bite, and the calories were welcome. Had half my next burrito at this point, and again went up a dicey crack system, so down climbed to the standard way up, at which point they started up as well. It took them quite a bit longer since they were pitching out the first, more vertical, section to gain the ridge. I hung out up there and looked around at the views for a while, and then they showed up. We made great time across the first half of the ridge, with them simul climbing basically all of it. We ran across a couple gals in their 20s who seemed overwhelmed with the whole thing and were moving pretty slow, and they let us pass. Soon enough we were at the mid way point, in the notch between the south and north summits, and hung out for a bit. The climbing gets quite a bit more technical and sustained on the northern half of the crest, which I had only a vague memory of (having done it last year). At this point I decided to break off from the buds, it being a bit after 3pm, with the goal of doing cathedral peak and getting back to the car before dark. I figured it would take them quite a bit of time to do the harder 2nd half. About an hour later I was done with the technical parts, and converted back into hiking shoes, then did the mile or two to the base of cathedral peak. I was out of water at this point, but happened upon a very slow spring, so gulped up what water had pooled there, and carried on. I ran into a couple guys who were doing the same thing as me, but roped, and chatted a bit before launching up. I was nervous about making good time, but in retrospect, it went very quick, making it to the top in maybe 40 minutes, and passing approximately 5-6 roped parties on the way, mostly converging at the top. I got up on the summit block, chatted with aforementioned climbers for a bit, one of whom offered me some water after I mentioned I had run out quite a while ago. I chugged his 1L of electrolyte water, hung out for a few more seconds, and split, coming down the back side, doing some technical traversing and downclimbing to make it back over to the 2nd class descent trail. Another few minutes and I was back to the base, feeling elated with my victory of having done all three peaks in a day. I cruised the few miles back to the car in an hour or so (approx 7pm), but the adventure was not over. My buds were not back at the car here in tuolomne meadows, near the cathedral lakes trailhead, and we had planned out a car shuttle, leaving my car approx 7 miles away at the tenaya lake trailhead. I figured they had quite a bit more time before they'd get back so set about hitchhiking, and eventually caught a ride from some non-climbing city slicker youth who seemed unimpressed with my achievements, probably because they didn't quite understand I was climbing. Oh well. Anyway, they dropped me off to my car, and I drove back to camp, leaving a note for Dave/Austin on the way back. Much revelry and eating was had around a friend's fire at a neighboring campsite, and by around 10pm they decided to call it for the night, so I came back to the main camp, only to find my buds having just returned! They apparently finished the ridge a bit before sunset, and hung out there, watching the sun go down, then made the hike back to the car via headlamp. Super fun day was had by all. I didn't bring enough calories!!

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[Taco]

Very cool. Been wanting to do that for years. The car shuttle thing is a pain. When I eventually do it, there's a route down some slabs from Cathedral towards Tenaya Lake that I plan to take to make things go a bit faster.

Right on.

[wesweswes]

Yeah, I hear you can hike back to tenaya without that much more mileage. That might be the way to do it.
I went down those slabs last year coming off of eichorn pinnacle, after doing the west pillar, and it's considerably slower and sketchier than descending down the walkoff trail from cathedral peak, but it'll go.

[tekewin]

You free soloed all of those?

That view down to Tenaya Lake is something. Great job.

[dima]

Climbers get all the epic photos. So you only carried a burrito and a 1L water bottle? No wonder the city slicker youth didn't see you as a climber!

[Sean]

Thanks for the report. It sucks when people aren't impressed with your achievements.