7/10  Guy gets off work, we load his car, and depart Ithaca just before 7pm.  The passenger seat is semi-cama, and we don't have to pay extra.

7/11  Driving continuously.  In the evening we reach Vedauwoo, WY.  We consider running up some easy climb, but are deterred by thunderstorms.

7/12  After driving for nearly 45 continuous hours (we both sleep for 2 hours around 4am) we reach South Lake Tahoe where we meet Melissa at the Amtrak station.  We are about 15 minutes late, an error of 0.55%.  We will endeavor to be more accurate next road trip.

The three of us drive to Lover's Leap where we climb Bear's Reach (5.7).  I lead p1 and Guy leads p2 and p3.  I'm so tired that retying to swing leads (party of three and double ropes) confuses me.  Dan Osman famously free soloed this climb in 4 minutes, 25 seconds.  As we start pitch three, Guy says, "we are 1.5 hours off the record pace, but I think we can make it up on this last pitch."

We have the option of driving to Phantom Spires for free camping, but camping at Lover's Leap is only $10/site which is just $5 more than a day pass.  So we save gas and driving time by staying at the developed campground.

7/13  Awake early to climb Traveler Buttress (5.9).  Guy leads p1 and finds it strenuous.  I get the heinous offwidth on p2 and it shuts me down.  Luckily with our #4 and #5 cams, I can aid the worst part.  At least I get the fantastic hand crack which finishes the pitch.  Melissa can nearly chimney the offwidth, but needs a shoulder stand to get past the crux.  Guy breaks out the prussiks.  5.9 C1?  After that I lead p3 which is stellar.  Guy finishes the climb by leading p4 and p5 which consist of mellow dike hiking.

7/14  Awake very early to drive to Yosemite.  It takes 4.5 hours to reach the valley from Lover's Leap, and we want to be sure to get space at camp 4.  Arriving before 9am, it is no problem to get tent space for the three of us (site 19... decent shade).  Then we head off to climb The Grack (5.6).  After a bit of searching to find the start of the climb (which is improbably low angle), Guy leads the uninspiring first pitch.  I definitely get the better end of this trade... I lead p2 and p3 which are exceptionally sweet.  We rappel to the ground (leaving a carabiner to provide some redundancy at the final rap anchor) and then go for a swim in the Merced.  It is 102F in the valley today, a high temperature which will be reached every day we are in the valley.

7/15  We say goodbye to Melissa at 4:30am and head off to climb Royal Arches (Melissa will go back to sleep for a few hours, then take the bus home).  We are climbing by 5:30am with the goal of moving as fast as possible to beat the heat on this south facing wall.  I lead the first chimney, then we simul the easy terrain for the next few pitches.  Guy takes p2 & p3 then I take p4.  Even simulclimbing, we end up matching the belays in supertopo (which call for relocating belays beyond easy terrain).  Our simul pitches are fairly short due to rope drag.  If I were to do it again, I'd double the rope, pitch out the first chimney, then do one long simul pitch to the 4th belay at which point we could retie with two full length ropes.  Even so, the approach we take is perfectly reasonable.  Guy heads up p5 and we swing leads from there.  That means I get the offwidth on p8 and Guy leads the pendulum on p9.  I accidentally link p12 and p13 with about 10' of simulclimbing.  Not recommended, but it did get me to a shaded belay.  Guy leads p14, and I lead p15 to the rap anchors.  From there it is 11 double rope rappels to the ground.  Our rope gets stuck on the 10th rappel and I have to climb some very hot rock to get it unstuck.  Otherwise the rappels are uneventful.  Once on the ground, we pound more water and head to the Merced for a swim.

I don't really recommend climbing Royal Arches when the forecast is for temperatures of 102F.  However, it worked out well for us.  The wall was in the shade until 9am and we were climbing p8 by that time.  Even after the climbing was in the sun, almost all of the belays had shade.  Only the belays at the top of p9, p14 and p15 were in the sun (probably p12 too, but I skipped it).  The rappels were in full sun the whole way.  We finished climbing at 1:25pm (eight hours of climbing) and it took us another two hours to rappel.  We both brought 2.5L of water and were totally out by the time we hit the ground, but not excessively dehydrated.  We brought small cams, doubles of 1" to 3", and a set of nuts.  We could have placed nuts, but never did simply because we were trying to move fast.  The offwidth on p8 was completely unprotected with that gear.  I could have reached in to sling two chockstones, but that seemed awkward and slow.  We could have brought a #5 cam to protect the offwidth, but that would have meant carrying the cam for 1600' just to place it once.  The route could be done with a single rope (our supertopo doesn't show one intermediate rappel anchor around rappel #10, but it is there), but that would have added an hour to our rappels.  Overall our strategy was quite successful.  The only other party we saw on the climb had started at 9am, ran out of water, dropped a shoe, and never got past p7 before spending hours bailing to the ground.

7/16  Rest day!  We poach showers at Curry Village, get backcountry permits for Matthes Crest, hang out at the library, and chat with our companions in camp 4 (a very nice mother daughter pair from the Netherlands, and three German climbers).

7/17  We depart camp 4 and drive to Tuolumne.  At the trailhead we pack our bear canister and hike part of the way to Matthes crest.  We bivy near Budd lake and have a beautiful view of Cathedral Peak... where we see huge numbers of climbers making minimal progress throughout the afternoon.  In my bivy sack -- protected from the voracious skeeters -- I can see what looks like a party of a dozen identically dressed climbers all moving like molasses toward the summit.  At least two other parties are caught in the bottleneck.  I have no idea what they are doing, but counted many climbers still visible as the sun set.  Luckily the night is warm and the two huge thunderstorms move north and east of Cathedral.  We see people descending early the next morning.

7/18  Awake at 5am to climb Matthes.  We reach the south end of the crest and start climbing around 7:45am.  Our plan is to double one rope and simul the entire climb.  Guy is carrying a second rope in case we have to make full length rappels.  This is a sensible precaution especially since supertopo says that double rope rappels are mandatory (but there are intermediate stations... we didn't need the second rope).  I lead the first pitch, 500' of 5.4 climbing to get us to the ridge.  Then Guy leads 1000' of 3rd class.  I lead the next 1000' of 3rd class.  A pack of wolves is howling in the valley below the whole time we are climbing.  No kidding.  Guy takes the next pitch for about 200' to get us to the base of the north summit.  Here we retie and belay the final pitch.  I lead 120' of 5.7 to reach the summit.  From there it is two double rope rappels to get off the mountain.  We finish rappelling before noon.  In fact, we have hiked all the way back to our bivy site by the time the hail starts.  Ahhh mountain weather!  The hail stops as quickly as it started and we pack our gear and hike out.

At the trailhead we repack our gear for Charlotte Dome.  Then head to the Mobil station in Lee Vining for dinner.  From here we drive south to Independence, CA where we spend some time looking for Onion Valley Road.  Turns out that it starts as Market Street.  Wish our directions had mentioned that fact.  By the time we drive to the Onion Valley trailhead, it is dark and our plans are in disarray.  The most significant problem is that the trailhead has space for about 100 cars (and is nearly full) but only has eight small bear boxes.  A six person site in camp 4 has four large bear boxes, but a 100 car parking lot only has eight small bear boxes.  WTF!?!  The food storage space is paltry and entirely insufficient.  The park service is ludicrously negligent here.  As a result, cars will be damaged and bears will get food.  We drive back down towards Independence.  Completely exhausted (it has been a long day... re-read the last two paragraphs), we drive 100 yards down a dirt road, throw down our tents, and collapse asleep.

7/19  Our original plans involved three weeks of climbing, but for personal reasons we decide to head back to Ithaca.  We drive through Death Valley and spend the night at Fisher Towers.

7/20  Driving all day.  We listen to most of Scott Westerfeld's Uglies books.  Not sure if I should admit that.  At least I'm not revealing our music choices.

7/21  After way too much driving, we reach Ithaca in the evening.

And then I found $20.