A mixed sport and trad climb towards the left end of Mecca. This will be the first climb you encounter after walking downhill to the left of Scrubby Corner and Meccaphobia. Look for bolts up a black waterstreak. Aside from the final 60ft of p3, the rock is solid and the climbing is good quality. Like the rest of the climbs at Mecca, this route gets afternoon shade in summer and all-day shade when the days are shorter.

Pitch 1 (11b) Climb the bolts up the waterstreak, trending left after about 50ft. The bolts end at the base of a shallow corner. Climb the corner past a couple more tricky sections, and then traverse left past one more bolt to the anchor. A long and full-value pitch.

Pitch 2 (11b) Traverse left from the anchor and follow bolts up. At the second bolt is a difficult traverse right, and then at the final bolt is a huge reach (or small jump) to a crimp dish.

Pitch 3 (10c) Immediately traverse right into the dirty crack then climb straight up to a ledge system. Angle up and left across ledges to a stem box with a big hanging flake which forms a roof. Handjam out the left side of the roof and then climb up a short chimney with loose stacked flakes. This bring you to another bolted anchor at the top of a tower called "The Crow's Nest".

The New North Face (V, 5.11 A3+) continues from here to the top of Lower Cathedral. See the Sloan/Putnam "Yosemite Bigwalls" book for a topo.

Descend Pilgrimage by rapping the route with two 60m ropes.

Pilgrimage (New North Face)

Velvet Elvis

Counterparts

Empire

Superstition

King for a Day

Meccaphobia

Beggar's Buttress

Mechanical Advantage

Geek For A Week

Last of the Mohicans

King and I

Jungle Boogie

Trick of the Tail

Scrubby Corner

Giblit

Survivor

Rock Monkey Rebellion

Eye of the Hurricane

Peasant

Shock the Monkey

Mecca Lite

Climb the vertical slab and make man friction moves through holds that can best be defined as sloping crimpers. The hardest section is at the top before you get to the anchors.

Stellar climbing through the first ~8 bolts at around 11a brings you to a very thin crux section before you get to the last bolt. After that the route takes some finger to medium sized gear for 20 feet through some heavily lichened flakes to an anchor with a red sling (visible from the ground). The route changes its character a lot after the 11a part with a hard slab crux and I think would be a lot better if it had an intermediate anchor. Retro anchor anyone?

This seemingly neglected line is a quality 5 pitch sport route on the left side of Mecca. The climbing a bit gritty in the middle, but the first and last pitches are great. I suspect with traffic it would clean up, and become truly excellent. It gets you off the ground, and is perpetually shaded, so with a quick approach, it's good plan B, when you cannot face more sunny slab paddling, or widget wrangling.

It ends somewhat abruptly in a short headwall. It might be worth exploring options to push the route further up the wall. Extending the crux might make for a very hard pitch, or working out right from atop P4 might be an easier option.

P1: 12c Two distinct, technical cruxes. The second can be wet in the spring.

P2: 11A Short pitch up to a belay on top of a small tree.

P3: 11B Up a gritty corner, and through some fun, juggy climbing on the left side of the long roof.

P4: 12A/B Short pitch up and right, with a tricky long move, and short technical corner.

(Linking P3 and P4 would avid the route's least comfortable belay.)

P5: 13C Another shorty. Cool technical climbing up a corner leads to some excellent rock, and pumpy lock-offs. Lower back to the belay.

Rap easily with a 70 meter.

2 pitches:

1. Up easy climbing left of a left facing corner to a 2 bolt belay.

2. Traverse right on white rock past bolts, then up a left facing corner, and maybe takes a cam or two, then goes up and left into vertical, parallel 3" corners that involves palming and stemming.

This route is absolutely brilliant.

From the cave atop Jungle Boogie, this is the far left route. Clip bolts out the left side of the cave. Difficult boulder problems for 4 or 5 bolts, then easy liebacking to the anchor.

Lower off with a 60m.

200' to the ground.

Best Sport line at the Mecca!

Requires balance, footwork, and critical thinking skills.

Mostly follows a right facing flake system with a few good rest.

Hardest move (IMO) is the first 2 bolts. Seems like a hold might have come off the start.

Two more cruxes, one at 6th bolt and one at the end, guard the chains.

Climbs the rounded buttress to the right of Scrubby Corner to share the same anchor. Feels a bit contrived and it's dirty in spots. The bolts are spaced a bit further than many of the other sport routes at Mecca.

The crux is in the upper section and is mainly a route finding problem. Moves aren't too hard once you figure out where the holds are.

Here's a bit more beta:

To find the route, park in one of the pullouts below and east of Lower Cathedral rock. Hike up from the road to the nice wide hiking trail. Follow it west past Lower Cathedral until you reach the toe of the buttress, and then scramble up the talus to reach it. Go up and left along the base of the cliff for maybe 100 yards to the start of the route. The beautiful left facing corner on the top of the first pitch is barely visible 100' off the ground. You can start on the left (5.7), or up bolts to the right (5.10). Both options meet up at the base of the corner, which features fingers, then fists (11a).

From here, trend up and right for the next 3-4 pitches. Along the way you will pass the really cool 5.10d cave/alcove/roof with a burly handcrack. There's much 5.8-5.9 crack climbing on these pitches, along with a good amount of loose rock. Around pitch 4 or 5, you'll reach a big ledge about halfway up the route.

About 200' of easy climbing (there's a fixed rope here for some reason...) takes you up to another ledge with a small tree. Directly above the tree is a clean crack/corner system. This is not the route, but a variation called "Going Nowhere" (11b). Beggar's Buttress starts up this for about 8' before stepping right to a steep, loose handcrack (10b). The routefinding is tricky here, but generally stay right and end up at a belay on a ledge/block with a fixed pin and slung horn.

The next pitch is the business, starting out with some stout face moves right to gain a thin crack with fixed pin (11b), and then a stellar steep corner that widens from fingers to OW/Squeeze. (Also 11b). We built a hanging belay at the top of the chimney, just below a roof. There's some small gear here for the belay, but it's pretty nice to have a bigger piece (#2-#4 Camalot) to make it really bomber.

Next, lie-back around the roof via a flake on the left wall of the dihedral. Continue up the handcrack to an optional belay at a small tree. The last bit of the corner is the crux, featuring steep finger jamming and liebacking with some lichen-ous rock. (11c)

The Descent: The route does not end on top of Lower Cathedral, but rather on a big ledge atop a buttress. From here, walk Southwest, past some cairns, to find the first of two bolted raps (60m rope required). From the base of the raps, I can't really give too much beta because it was dark and we got off route (ended up doing 5 raps off trees down a steep, very loose cliff). I'm thinking you stay west, contouring around the rock and follow 3rd class ledges down.

As for gear: a full single rack from Small to #4 Camalot (new style works fine) with doubles from thin fingers to wide hands. A single set of wires, and many long slings. Helmets.

Beta By Scott Bennett

Sporty thin face leads through 4 bolts of not-too-hard climbing to a baffling boulder problem at the 5th bolt. This sideways press move on tiny footholds feels quite height-dependent and very hard for the grade. An old hangerless bolt stud is in the crux area, but I think is not necessary.

A classic, burly, borderline-slab route starting in an open, left facing dihedral then going through some small roof features and into an open, right facing dihedral. 1st bolt is ~6 meters off the ground. FA Steve Gerberding, Al Swanson, Conrad Anker , 1999

Fun hard 5.11 to the right of Peasant. Starts up the left side of a little arch, sometimes wet and dirty getting to the high first bolt. There's several hard parts but the crux is up high, moving up and right to the final bolt. You could maybe skip the crux by bailing out left to the anchor on Peasant.

Sport climb to the right of Mecca Lite. Starts off relatively easy, then a reachy crux on some slopers. Higher up step right to small corner, then up cool flakes to a big reach left for an undercling under a small roof. The final bit before the anchor looks really hard but there's a pretty good hold to mantel off of. High quality.

As you follow the talus to the center of Mecca you will see giant white overhanging roofs above you.

First pitch:

Follow easy slabs to sloping holds and good feet this culminates with a right facing corner that leads to the anchors on a comfortable ledge. 80 feet, 10a.

Second pitch:

Follow more bolts directly off of the anchor that lead to a pseudo chimney with a layback. Pick your poison on how to approach this problem. It finishes off to the left on a not so comfortable belay slope. 80 feet, 11c.

Third pitch

Take the 5.8 up potentially wet terrain, this will take you to a large cave with trees everywhere.

On the left side of the cave. This is the right of the 2 routes.

Heads up the black and white overlaps directly above the anchor.

This route is very textured, sustained, and really so good!

Scrubby Corner (also sometimes called "Waterworld") is located at the left end of the flat area with the water-streak and Mecca Lite, just before the base drops downhill a bit to Pilgrimage. Look for the shallow corner which leads up to a big arching roof system.

Mostly easy climbing with a crux near the top. You can either stay in the corner and stem or face climb the right wall on some features. The crack is a little dirty in spots. Very tightly bolted.

Down low on the route is a couple bolts which split off to the left (the top bolt has a rap ring). This is a project and doesn't lead anywhere.

Fun face moves lead up to a finger crack and a small roof.

This route has no anchor, contrary to 'select book'.  Traverse left to tree on Beggars Buttress to lower off.

An engaging face climb that follows a cool, grainy flake feature for several bolts.  The Van Leuven guidebook lists this as 10b (!).  Sloan gives it 10d, which is closer to the mark--but don't be surprised if you find yourself putting in some 5.11 effort on the tricky and insecure crux.

A cool face climb with a few delicate cruxes getting up to, and then pulling, a small roof.  The start is dirty and forgettable--but patience will be rewarded with fun and engaging sequences all the way to the anchors.  The Sloan and Van Leuven guidebooks both list this as 11a, but I thought it was a touch harder than others of that grade.

This is one of the better "easy" climbs at Mecca. It's located between the Scrubby Corner (obvious right-facing corner leading into a roof) and the water streak to the right. Look for flakes and good features in orange rock. This route is longer and has more bolts than shown in the Supertopo. The crux is a short traverse right at about 2/3rds height.

From the top of the second pitch of Jungle Boogie break out right under a tree and follow the bolts from the right wall into the left face. Delicate stemming and sidepulls are the crux of this climb.

This is a very nice sport climb, located at "Mecca" - to the left of the huge rockfall zone on the North Face. At a flat area along the base is an obvious water streak with super polished rock. The bolt line to the right of this water streak (with cold-shuts for anchors) is Mechanical Advantage (12a); the next climb to the right of that is Mecca Lite. Looking at the new Supertopo "Sport Climbs and Topropes" is probably the easiest way to get oriented in this area.

Follow the bolts past a small roof at about mid-height. Most of the difficult moves come in the form of mantels. Excellent rock.

Description

Protection

Routes in Mecca