The 2006 Softbody Classic: Tenaya Peak, 10,266 ft, 3110 m
Sep, 2006

by John Lohr

Each year the Alpinistas Softbody Classic brings a new dimension of thrills and chills to the otherwise sedentary and boring lives of some Alpinistas. Many times the chills have been due to unplanned bivouacs and the thrills have been due to aimless wandering through trackless wastelands in search of an open bar. Compared to the usual, this year’s mass ascent of Yosemite’s Tenaya Peak was a model of smooth disorganization and comfort, made slightly more interesting by the passage of a wicked cold front during the psych up period.

The familiar ground rules for selecting the venue are that the climb has to be multi-pitch, providing a challenge and change of pace from the usual Wednesday evening toproping and bouldering, easy enough that nobody shits in his or her pants, simple access and close to a bar. Previous Softbody’s, not all of which have met all of these criteria to the letter, have included Mt. Starr King, Snake Dike on Half Dome (twice), The Royal Arches (twice), Cathedral Peak and the hike in to Unicorn Peak (once, thankfully) in the Tuolumne area, Mt. Conness, just outside Yosemite and Bear Creek Spire in the Eastern Sierra.

Although the usual date for the Classic is the weekend after Labor Day, this year the climb was scheduled for two weekends later, around the 16th of September. A number of carfulls of Alpinistas met, through the miracle of cell phones, in Bishop late on the night of the 14th and caravanned to Mammoth’s Hot Creek area and a secret camping spot. Howard Sheckter said it was blowing 100 mph on the ridgetops that night, but at the campground it couldn’t have been more than 50 mph. It was fun trying to get some sleep while the canvas slapped and crap bombarded the tiny camp. Unlike after the last night out spent by Robert Falcon Scott with similar breezes, the next morning we all popped up cheerily and had fresh squeezed scurvy medicine, addictive brown stimulant and cherry turnovers at Schaat’s in Mammoth.

Besides excessive wisdom and lack of respect for the government, old age will also get you the federal Golden Geezer Pass, which admits you and your carfull of buddies into Yosemite for free and provides a hefty discount on campground spots. Be kind to the elderly, buy them beers and carry their racks and they will let you ride along to share in these twilight of life perks.

So, on Friday there was plenty going on. Most of the climbers who had been lost at one time or another on previous SBCs opted to scope out the approach to the climb. These scouts got way too high off to the left about 4 pitches above the starting point, but they got to watch a party of two make their way slowly to the top in what must have been a pretty strong breeze and chilly in the shade. At least the route seemed obvious, for once.

The other group headed for Lembert Dome and the very pleasant Northwest Books climb, upon which they proceeded to freeze their collective butts while claiming to be having fun. The walkoff on Lembert is scary unless you’ve seen grannies and kids doing it. Since it was too cold for the sensible denizens of Tuolumne to be up there, there were no examples to watch and our troops whined their way down on modified all fours. Actually, the winds had wiped out all the electrical service in the Meadows, plunging everyone back in time to a state of Muirian deprivation rarely seen in Yosemite any more. You couldn’t buy beer or wood and at Tuolumne Lodge they were reduced to serving turkey sandwiches for dinner.

Despite the cold weather, the Alpinistas, actually, were fairly warm that evening thanks to a large pile of nicely cut firewood piled up outside the mule skinners’ cabins and a commando raid led by an anonymous recent PhD with excellent hair and an innocent look.

Saturday dauned and by 11:00 everyone was somewhere on the climb, which goes up about 1,500 feet from the start. Surprisingly, the wind had died down, the sun was out and it was simply perfect weather for climbing. In the group there were two parties, the third and the last, in which the leader trailed two ropes, one of which was a belay rope and one of which protected an additional climber staggered about 10 feet below the belayer. The other 4 parties of two each started out simulclimbing or at least going fast with limited pro until the 4th or 5th pitch. Tenaya is a completely honest climb with no surprises. Start out walking and when you think you should rope up, you probably should rope up. In this respect it’s just the opposite of Snake Dike, where at some point, which depends somewhat on the size of your balls, you unrope and begin hiking.

There are a lot of descriptions of the route, all of which are pretty much right on. Chris McNamara’s Supertopo of the route really is difficult to follow exactly, since there are many ways to go which all lead to the same place eventually. After the low down flats give way to steeper sections, you just stay close to the left side of the climb all the way to the end. For the first four pitches or so, you can easily bail out to the left. After this, you will be above a huge alcove and bailing out will require some raps and lost gear. Near the top there are a few tenacious little trees that could serve as rap anchors, but lower down you are climbing slopy dihedrals devoid of horns and the like. In reality, if you feel the need to bail, from most of the upper half of the climb it is probably faster just to continue on and top out, unless you are getting pounded by bad weather. On Tenaya Peak, both for the ascent and the descent, the photograph of the route in the Supertopo provides everything you need for route finding.

The climbing is easy 5th class as advertised, but also is great fun on clean rock with solid placements. As you ascend, the view of the whole Tuolumne area opens up and it just gets more and more spectacular.

Near the summit, the supertopo really shines as it indicates an area of large blocks that you pass before the exit stage left onto 4th class climbing to a notch and the finish. In particular, the two trees at the exit are perfectly shown. Pass the first and then look for the second at the notch. None of our group claims to have located the 5.8 hand crack exit for sure, but it’s clear that you can take the left exit or look for something more challenging and, as it was down lower, there are plenty of possibilities. Our slowest group, one with three climbers, took about 5.5 hours to top out. We were passed by one pair of Kiwis who probably had done the whole climb in less than three hours, judging by their speed when they blew by us.

Although we all had completed the climb at the low end of the 5-7 hours suggested by McNamara, the walkoff, on the other hand, took about an hour longer than predicted. You get to the forested area behind the summit and then head parallel to the summit ridge that takes you clockwise around the mountain, descending and aiming generally for Half Dome off in the distance. You are looking for a bunch of blocks that break up the ridge. These are much lower and farther from the summit than you might think. By mid-September there was a pretty well beaten down trail, so look for that. We first tried crossing the ridge too high, but had we just followed the trail, we would have gone to the right place directly. Again, you are looking for the main ledge, which is quite clear from the photograph in the description. Although none of us did this, it might have been more fun to descend early to Tenaya Lake and follow the trail around on the opposite side of the lake from the road. Most of our group took 2-2.5 hours to get to the parking lot and the last bunch arrived right at dark, about 9 hours after starting out. This was OK, since we would get to bivvy this year in our tents and sleeping bags after a couple of beers.

By Saturday evening the electricity in Tuolumne Meadows had been restored, but we enjoyed another fine campfire and basked both in its warmth and in the nice feeling you get when you’ve just had a great time. Another part of the Alpinistas group had hiked in to the Snake Dike route on Half Dome from Tenaya Lake. About the time we were sipping beers in Tuolumne, they were moaning and groaning about how long a day that can be.

The next morning we voted to head for the hot springs at Mammoth, rather than the Valley, so off we went. It turned out that Hot Creek was closed to swimming due to “increased geological activity,” whatever that means. Two Alpinista scofflaws went swimming anyway and were neither parboiled nor busted by the rangers, to the great disappointment of the others with cameras at the ready. But there is more than one way to parboil an Alpinista, so we went over to one of the little hot pools that dot the valley and all crammed in.

So, the 2006 Los Alpinistas Softbody Classic is history. Whereto next is anybody’s guess, but we’ll be looking for climbs that meet the SBC criteria and wondering if we’ll ever be able to top this one for just plain old fashioned good times.

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