Sierra Winter Climbing

Notes from Zach Lovell on a new route: Twu Wuv climbs the southern-most/looker's left buttress of Pyramid's east face. Ian McEleney and I made an attempt on April 4, 2025 but ran out of time to complete the buttress, making it approximately 800 feet up before bailing to the south. The first ascent was made on April 9, 2026 and climbed in 10 pitches over the course of a full day.  While this could become a summer route, a decent amount of loose blocks and chossy (by Sierra standards) gullies makes ice and snow a welcome glue. The steeper climbing is all on excellent rock and is some of the best-protected mixed climbing I've seen. As is often the case with "skatey" granite, rock shoes would likely decrease the difficulty one or two notches, but as a mixed route it's fairly sustained in the M3-M4 range with brief stretches of M5 depending on the conditions found and the exact path climbed. Endless, small variations exist. Mixed grade equivalent (thou...

Grades. Every climber knows that they're subjective and imprecise. However, we still need a way to compare routes by difficulty both to choose appropriate objectives and for spraying. The M grading system was introduced by Jeff Lowe in the 1990's. This open-ended system is relatively simple, but the application of it is not. It's sensible that M grades are fairly consistent at the crag because there are fewer variables. In the mountains consistency is harder to come by. Weather, the availability of protection and your skill at finding and placing it, and your route finding ability are just a few of the factors that effect perceived difficulty. In the winter the presence and absence of snow and ice and the quality of that snow and ice has a profound effect on how hard a climb feels. Rock that is covered in new soft snow is generally going to feel more difficult and be slower to climb, as well as maybe getting your gloves pretty wet. A gully or couloir that's filled with ...

Over two days of effort Mike Pond and a couple of accomplices put up a new multipitch route on the left side of The Narrows in Lee Vining Canyon and named it after a bad yacht rock song. Lawyers, Guns, and Money starts immediately right of a unnamed 5.8 crack, where the ice climb Womp Rat has formed in the past. Photos and topo by Mike Pond

Approaching the Torre. Photo by Jack Cramer. Since we had a good time on the Torre De Mierda last year, Jack invited me to go up and check out the other line he spied on the face in the middle of February. Last year we started the day with fun, fast, and frightening skiing across a frozen Convict Lake. With an even warmer and drier winter that wasn't a realistic option this time, so we started skinning around the lake and up into the hanging valley below Morrison. Questing on Pitch 1. Photo by Jack Cramer. We were aiming for a ramp system left of Jamaican Lager. The system starts a few hundred feet off the ground, and at first it looked like we could traverse in from the left. After screwing around there for a while we found the climbing and protection wasn't to our liking and dropped down a couple hundred feet, closer to the front part of the face.  Jack nearing the pitch 1 belay. Moderate but runout and wandery climbing took us to the snow ledge at the bottom of the ramp. Jac...

Over the last month or so (early 2022) the Wheeler Crest has seen a flurry of winter climbing action. Much of this has been spearheaded by Richard Shore, who may be the the current expert on climbs in this area. He and Joel Kaufmann put up Scottish Astronauts on the Rocketship a few years ago, and an extension/variation to this route was one of the first things to go down this season.  In late January Tad McCrea, Jack Cramer, and myself hiked in to have a look at the route. On the first ascent of that route Richard and Joel bypassed a not-quite-fully-formed ice strip with some cool looking wide climbing on the third pitch. Richard had shared a photo of the strip looking much longer this year, and Tad had spied more ice above the top of the Rocketship.  Tad climbing the snow blobs, as viewed from inside pitch 1. Photo by Jack Cramer.   The route got off to an interesting start. Instead of the moderate mixed climbing the first ascentionists experienced on pitch 1, we found ...

This is a primer on pitons (or "pins") for a modern climber who has maybe only occasionally clipped one but never placed one. Pitons are heavy and take more time and energy, and a better stance, to place than a nut or cam. They're not necessary on classic summer routes being climbed in the winter. They can be somewhat useful on new winter routes, and they're especially helpful on the rock in the Mount Morrison area and on Blue Crag. Black Diamond is the number one seller of pitons in the US, so I'll reference them a lot here. Camp, Petzl, and Moses pins can be found online and occasionally in shops. Moses and Singing Rock pitons can be found at the Fixe store in Bishop. I've only seen Krukonogi pins for sale online. Camp and Petzl also sell soft iron pins, you can tell these by their more silvery color. They can work better in some non-granite rock types, but don't have quite as long of a life as the chrome-moly options. They're also better for fixing....

This list is totally subjective and (hopefully) evolving. You might disagree with the order, which is fine. What do Californians know about M-climbing anyway. If you think there's a major error please contact me! Routes are sorted by overall difficulty, not just the hardest technical move (kinda like the French Alpine Grades or IFAS), and are fairly close in difficulty with their neighbors on the list. Here's a grade reference from Alpinist Magazine . Ian McEleney on Justification. If you climb to the top of the chimney this is your exit onto the summit slabs. Photo by Kevin McGarity. Crystal Crag - West Face (3rd) or South Ridge (low 5th). A "mini-alpine" winter day (though it could be long if you're a slow hiker/skier. In the winter park at the end of Main Street where Tamarack Cross Country ski area begins. Both of these routes are good for figuring out how to be in the backcountry in the winter but don't need to be very technical. Mammoth Rock - Justifica...