My friend did Cathedral last weekend and said the descent was horrific. And he's done a ton of big alpine routes, so I believe it.

Excellent! I'm headed up there weekend after next and I'm looking forward to that.

Just hoping it hasn't melt out too much by then, I may be too late. I like it good and sloppy!

Tom Fralich wrote:My friend did Cathedral last weekend and said the descent was horrific. And he's done a ton of big alpine routes, so I believe it.

I'd love to learn why it was horrific. I've done Cathedral early in the season. Snow covered slabs on the descent can be a bit dicey but IMHO rappel can solve it rather easily

Tom Fralich wrote:My friend did Cathedral last weekend and said the descent was horrific. And he's done a ton of big alpine routes, so I believe it.

Please expound!

Snow and ice covered slabs. They didn't have 2 ropes to rappel.

I had to go and check it out for myself on Sunday. Here's the latest beta:
The approach trail still has a lot of snow and water. It is often hard to follow the trail. It challenged me somewhat, and I've been up and in down this drainage at least 30 times over the last 7 years. Budd Creek is RAGING and crossing it now would be treacherous. I don't think I've seen it that busy ever. Thankfully, on the last section of the approach (where it gets steeper), there isn't much snow anymore so crampons/axes aren't necessary.

The climb itself is completely free of snow and people . Descent is fair and I certainly would not call it horrific. If you have two ropes, you can rap past all the snow. If you don't, you can climb down the ridge towards Eichorn Pinnacle, cross a small snowfield/west slab area and voila! Three soloists made that descent in their approach shoes without much trouble. There will be another small snowfield as you drop back down into Budd Creek drainage; in the afternoon, you can easily kick steps. All in all, very manageable.

The approach to Matthes Crest from Budd Creek is 100% under snow right now. Lots of suncups = slow going. Hope this helps!

Thirdclassed the SE butt yesterday. First half of trail is pretty dry now, but patchy snow on the second half makes finding the best way more challenging than normal. Took little over an hour to reach the base. For me the crux of the day was the descent. If you have a rope, getting down the wet and snowy slabs should not be a problem. Otherwise you have to pick your way high across the ridge (not obvious where to go in a place or two) to gain the notch. Pretty straight forward from there. Edit: Getting crowded. I had to pass three parties.

We found the same conditions that Micheal mentioned on the Budd Creek approach. The suncups on the last part of the approach are tedious. Bring gaiters if you don't want snow in your shoes. For the descent, we rapped due south off of the summit block (to the left of the person).


It took two full-length rappels (two ropes) to reach the bottom. Fast and easy. You'll see a piece of green webbing tied around a chockstone between the SE buttress and the summit block. For the second rap, downclimb 60 feet from the first rappel and you'll see a cordelette tied around a chockstone.


The snow was tedious enough to discourage us from hiking back to Matthes Crest later. We spent our time on snow-free approaches in Tuolumne and in Yosemite Valley.
click for large photo

Oh yeah, I forgot about this thread. I was out there last weekend, it was awesome. I was looking forward to all the snow.

I put up a little trip report with photos here:

http://www.supertopo.com/climbers-forum ... -right-now

More shots and higher-res here; over the next few days I'll be adding to the album:

http://www.qitnl.com/v/062510/