North Ridge 5.6

This past weekend, Jeremy, Ryan, Matt and I headed up to the high country for another, yet typical, amazing Tuolumne weekend. Late Friday after driving from Berkeley and listening to the Giants, I was left in Ranger Camp. I woke up and met my good buddy Matt and his new home, ready to climb the N. Ridge of Conness.
Everything ready, we hiked on the W. side of Saddlebag Lake and headed up.

We ascend through the Hall Research Area past the Conness Lakes.
Now we go for the first tower. No need to rope up here. Easy 3rd and a few 4th class moves. Definitely not old school Clyde 4th.


We make a few moves and downclimb to start heading up to the second tower and rapp. We didn't pull out the ropes until we reached the raps.


Cool view of the summit push after rapping.


We made quick work of the route after the rapps by simuling. I think if I went back, I'd solo the route. Everything was super solid all the way to the summit.


I couldn't get enough of the beauty of the Conness Lakes area, so Sunday Ryan, Jeremy and I met up and decided to take a nice stroll up North Peak. It's September and the Giants are gunning for 1st, so if not talking about climbing, we were talking about Giants baseball.


Coming from Saddlebag Lake, the approach to gain the ridge was similar to that of Conness' N. Ridge. We scrambled up scree and made a few 4th class moves, then got on a broad plateau. Once there, we hugged the ridge to the right so we could do some easy scrambling and enjoy the views out to the North and East.


Hurrah! We bagged another one!


We scrambled down some 3rd class ledges to the East to shorten our return to Saddlebag. After some scree skiing, we kicked it at the lake for a bit with the hacky sack, then headed to Tuolumne for beers in the meadows.


And, per usual, Olmsted Point was lookin' fine when we drove by on the way back to the Bay.



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