Double Helix Climbing Blog

One of my New Year's resolutions was to plan the group trip for 2026, so I started planning this trip back in January. I ran multiple polls for dates and location. The winning dates ended up being the second half of August, which also happened to coincide with Dan's, Madeline's, and my birthdays. Yosemite also won the location poll.

Since I suspected that the valley would still be too hot, I opted for Tuolumne instead. With this also being a semi-birthday trip, I was hoping it would be a fun way to celebrate together. Unfortunately, both Dan and Madeline ended up not being able to make the trip.

After spending multiple hours on Recreation.gov, I was finally able to link enough campsites together for the entire trip from August 21–30, and the trip was officially on!

Days 1-2 By Sam and Andrew
Day 1 — Aug 21 Sam and Andrew's part of the blog TBD

Day 2 — Aug 22 Sam and Andrew's part of the blog TBD

Days 3-5 By Dominic
Day 3 — Aug 23 Sunday rolls around and we are committed to a chill day without climbing. Well Jacky, Sam, and Andrew are committed to a chill day without climbing but I wasn't. I didnt know what exactly I was going to do but I was going to think of something. We decided on hiking to Dog Lake out past Lembert Dome. When we strolled into the parking lot of the dome I knew what I wanted to do that evening. The dome is steep on its west side, but closer to the highway more towards its east side it is much lower angle. I knew I could come back and find a nice 4th class route to solo later in the day

We had a nice time walking to Dog lake and getting our feet wet in the shallow lake. After walking back we said goodbye to Sam and Andrew, and Jacky and I made our plan for the next few days, one more day to rest then Cathedral Peak. Now it became time to venture up Lembert Dome just to get some exercise. Jacky needed to rest so I went alone. Armed with a small backpack of essentials and climbing shoes and chalk I made my way 600ft up the dome to its summit in about 45 minutes. I stopped several times at ledges to take in the view and enjoy the adventure. It was easy climbing but more fun than I expected - I hope to come back and do it again someday, maybe with another friend.

It was a long walk back to my car in the parking lot, nearly double the time it took to climb up! But it was absolutely worth it. The views were amazing and none of the climbing was too difficult or scary. The rock of Lembert Dome has a wave-like topography, where every 50 feet is an easier section, followed by a harder section, which is what I enjoy - climbs that are very sustained are much more mentally draining. And mentally draining is not fun. Resting on every lower angle section however is very fun. When I made it back to camp it was dinner time followed by a long calm evening since we had another day of low energy activities in preparation for climbing Cathedral Peak the subsequent day.

Day 4 - Aug 24 We were committed to another day of rest, so we woke up late, had a long breakfast, and went to Tenaya Lake in the late morning to get a nice swim in. The water was of course freezing but it's always worth going for a dip. We were eyeing people climbing on Stately Pleasure Dome, and glad we were not doing anything too stressful. In the afternoon we took a walk to the Visitors center to further stretch our legs, but this was the extent of our activity for the day. A big dinner was in order to prepare for the full day of adventuring tomorrow, then it was off to bed as early as possible.

Day 5 — Aug 25 We woke up very early. Too early for me but that's the name of the game when climbing big peaks. After a quick breakfast we drove to the trailhead. We had two hours of hiking uphill in front of us. It was a nice trail though, and the weather was absolutely perfect for hiking, a little cold and a little sunny. The early start is key not just for having a longer day but for good temps on the approach.

We got to the base in a couple hours of casual hiking and surveyed the rock. The descriptions we had read were true, you could definitely climb anywhere on this rock. There were a couple parties already on the wall on the most obvious lines so we took our time. We found a line, geared up, and got ready. While we did this we met Greg the climbing influencer - A true bucket list climbing experience. I started on the first pitch and ran it out 50 feet before the first piece of gear. At around 150' up it got a little steeper and less featured and I had to pull off some harder moves with some good old rope drag. Above this, resting on a ledge I knew I needed more than the rope length to get to the belay station that I wanted, so I told Jacky to start simul climbing. He got 40 feet up the easy terrain and that gave me just enough to get to where I wanted to go. My pitch was now done, a big 240 foot adventure. Jacky went up the second pitch, an awkward short face climbing section with some crack climbing once or twice. I got pitch 3, up the left side of a weird corner with some interesting moves on less than perfect rock. This got us to a huge ledge for staging pitch 4. The views were spectacular and we didn't feel rushed so we were able to really enjoy everything about the climb. Pitch 4 Jacky opted for a runout 5.7 face climb on wonderful knobs to a low angle stemmy corner. Pitches 5 and 6 we traded off for some wandery, weird face climbing with sparse protection. We made it to the summit after about 4 hours of climbing and took in the views. Since we did this on a Monday we had the summit to ourselves for a while after waiting for the party in front of us to leave. A soloist came up after us but quickly moved on. It was very nice to reach the summit and have such a world class experience without the crowds. I don't think I'm particularly interested in backcountry climbing, but this was a fun and rewarding experience and I'm glad I did it.

The descent off the top was way too long and arduous, down the backside of Cathedral Peak. It took us about the same amount of time to climb it as it did to get back to the car. These types of hikes truly make me love small approach crags even more. When we got back to the car it was pretty late in the day, we went back to the campsite to get some food and a quick rest, then it was time for a cold plunge in Tenaya Lake. The water didn't feel as cold as it did the previous day, I think we just needed a rinse so badly and felt so exhausted by the hike that the water was a blessing and not a shock to the system. Then we got back to camp, ate dinner, and slept. For a long time...

Day 6 — Aug 26 After chilling in the morning following our Day 5 adventure, Dom took off back to the Bay for work. My college friends Norman, his fiancée Caroline, and Jomar arrived in the evening.

As an extrovert, I enjoy trying to bring together my multiple friend groups, and this trip was no exception. Unfortunately, for most of Days 6–8, it was just my college friends at camp with me. Since it rained for most of Days 7 and 8, we mostly stayed around camp and ate.

Norman and Caroline embodied the spirit of Korean camping: food, food, and more food outdoors. They brought KBBQ and an army stew kit for another dinner, so we had KBBQ for our first night.

I also didn't know we could eat rice in the wilderness using instant rice! So that was a new experience for me.

Day 7 — Aug 27 Since this was the only day Brad could make an appearance, I asked for forgiveness from my Cal friends and ran off with him for some cragging. We went to Wind Tunnel, which is an area he hadn't been to before.

We finally added enough routes to my Tuolumne total to cross into the double digits in good style. He literally made me unclip a prerigged draw from his lead, take the draw off the bolt, clip it onto my harness, then reclip it back onto the wall, and finally clip my rope into it just so it would count!

We climbed Eddie Muenster 5.7, Pasture-ized 5.8, and String Cheese 5.6.

Unfortunately, our day was cut short with storm clouds looming on the horizon. We didn't want to be 30 minutes out from the car if the rain hit, so we started hiking back out.

By the time we got to Daffy Hill, which is only about five minutes from the cars, we decided to rack up for one more climb. But alas, the sky decided to open up right when we were tied in. We decided that we probably shouldn't climb a slab next to a water streak while it was raining, so we bailed and headed back to the car.

Caroline had made some onigiri for us for lunch, so we split them and got back into the car to head back to camp.

For the rest of the day, we had to stay under the Easy Up and just chat and chill instead of really being able to explore the area.

Norman started feeling ill that day and had to mostly stay in the tent until dinner. Unfortunately, their ground tarp didn't work too well and their tent flooded for a bit. Luckily, we caught it early enough that it was mostly dried out by nightfall.

For dinner, we had the army stew kit that Norman and Caroline brought from H Mart. It was a very easy camping dinner, and I might be inclined to add it to my car-camping meal list!

Hilariously, we tried to use a temporary foil pot liner as the actual pot because we didn't want to go back to the other campsite to pick up the real pot and potentially have to clean it afterward. We ended up burning through the foil pot, but luckily we found it before the hole went all the way through. We were able to add another temporary pot underneath it and kept the spill at bay.

Day 8 — Aug 28 This was the day Norman and Caroline were set to leave, and Brian was supposed to arrive.

In the morning, we had some breakfast and then went to the visitor center to check out the merch. Caroline bought a National Park Passport, and I commented that it's perfect for millennials who grew up watching Pokémon because we need to catch 'em all — meaning getting a stamp at every national park in the passport.

We then said goodbye to Norman and Caroline. I took Jomar to Tenaya Lake to check out the climbing area, and we also played a little game of “Where's Waldo?” with the bolt on Zee Tree using my binoculars.

Unfortunately, the sky decided it really wanted to rain, so we headed back to camp and just chilled and hung out, trying to conserve as much battery as possible from our solar chargers.

By the time Brian showed up, it was the heaviest rain of the day. We decided not to pitch his tent or fully set up his campsite until the rain subsided, which was predicted to be around 7 p.m.

Apparently, Brian and Caroline had chatted before the trip and came up with the idea of army stew, so Jomar and I got another army stew dinner. This time, instead of Spam, we added two cuts of steak that Jomar picked up from Safeway on his way in for the manager's special.

After dinner, we stayed up for a bit to enjoy the campfire and some whiskey.

Two more groups were slated to arrive that night.

The first was the Hunt family: Josh, Dina, Emmitt, and Emmitt's friend Alden. They swung by camp around 10 p.m. to say hi and wish me a happy birthday before setting a time to meet up the next morning for breakfast and climbing.

They gave me a bag of coffee and a birthday card that was about Wordle because Josh and I still have a text chain about our Wordle solves that we update daily.

Alex and Lily were also slated to arrive that night, but since they couldn't leave Oakland until late and had to charge on the road, they didn't arrive at camp until midnight. I stayed up and waited for them, making sure they could fit into the campsite and that Alex could charge his truck before finally heading to bed.

Day 9 — Aug 29 We woke up at a reasonable time, had a good breakfast, and got ready to head out for some climbing. Nathan, Alden's dad, had also arrived.

Jomar was heading out that morning, so we said goodbye and headed off to the crag.

Due to some turnouts being full, we ended up on the wrong side of the mountain from our original objective, Guide Cracks. But we didn't let that deter us. We started hiking in and found an area called The Western Front.

This area has some spicy 50-foot slab climbs, with the first and only bolt around 25 feet up. Rather than risk a ground fall and really ruin the trip, we opted to top-rope these climbs instead. So I guess I can't add these to my good-style count. :(

We climbed Deadheads Delight 5.9 and Touch of Grey 5.9. I was definitely glad afterward that we made the decision to TR instead of lead. I was not comfortable on them at all.

Then we tried to see if there was a way to climb over the Daff area to get to Guide Cracks, but we got stuck at a cliff that not all of us were comfortable downclimbing. So we backtracked to the road and then walked along it to the turnout for Guide Cracks.

At Guide Cracks, there were several other groups, but most of them were getting ready to leave the area, so we basically had the crag to ourselves.

But first, we had to retrieve a stuck rope for someone on Guide Crack #2.

I surprisingly slipped off the first move of Guide Crack #3 twice before finally being able to climb it. I also took too few pieces because the guidebook didn't have very clear instructions, and I ended up having to run it out quite a bit on the easy section at the end.

Brian also got a chance to try climbing for the first time today on Guide Crack #4. He wasn't able to make it to the top, as he had some trouble with footwork and, understandably, had no crack-climbing experience.

I ended up climbing all four of the Guide Cracks and got a fun hanging belay from Alden, despite him being only two inches off the ground. Nathan was teaching him big-wall technique, so he was practicing while I was on the other end of the rope.

Nathan and Alden apparently had been on multiple big walls together since Alden was five, but they took a break and Alden had forgotten everything, so Nathan is reteaching him.

Nathan and I chatted about multipitch and big-wall climbing and my long-term goal of doing the NIAD before I turn 40. I have one year left, and I really need to get my jugging and rope management on point before then.

That night's dinner was my signature pasta with red sauce. We added some red wine to the sauce to really spice it up. We also had some turkey tacos from the Hunt family.

A good time around the fire was had by all, and we ended the last night of the trip enjoying great company in front of the fire.

Day 10 — Aug 30 This morning, we packed up and started our drive back to the Bay.

I kept in touch with Alex and Lily's car, and we ended up meeting up at a cheese shop in Oakdale for some cheap and delicious grilled cheese.

It was a lovely place with a petting zoo and a very nice garden area. I would totally make this spot part of my next Tuolumne trip.