After yesterday's adventure on Walker Tower, we had a late breakfast at the Base Camp Cafe before taking a more mellow day - the North Arete on Crystal Crag. This is a classic II 5.6 route outside of Mammoth, featuring three pitches of steady 5.6 and another 600' or so of 4th class ridge scrambling. After the "II 5.6" of the previous day, this was a nice walk in the park for Jay and Haimei.
crystal crag / the north arete follows the right-most corner
for a pitch / pitch 2 follows ramps up and left / and the
final fifth-class pitch climbs a chimney to the crystal band /
about 600' of 4th class ridge climbing gains the summit
smiling on another summit!
In only 5:30 hours we had approached, climbed the North Arete, tagged the summit, descended the SW Ledges (3rd class), and hiked back to the car. Nice day!
