Elephant Rock  Photos:  Recent | Best | Popular Page Views:  7,849. Good page?    Administrators:  M.Morley, Sam Vanderhyden, Tom Erickson Submitted By:  Josh Janes on Sep 30, 2006 Make this area a Favorite What's New   Print a Mini-Guide with routes Add Route  Add Photo  Add Comment  Add Event  Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun 63° | 30° 59° | 30° 64° | 36° 64° | 32° 68° | 30°

Fifi Buttress To Close! MORE INFO >>> The following areas are closed to all visitor use to protect peregrine falcon aeries from March 1 until August 1 of each year or until the young falcons of the current year have fledged: Fifi Buttress Immediately west of Leaning Tower. Closure includes all routes on Fifi Buttress. This information is a public crowdsourcing effort between the Access Fund, and Mountain Project. You should confirm closures, restrictions, and/or related dates. Keeping climbing areas open and conserving the climbing environment

BETA PHOTO: The Worst Error-Elephant Rock.
Photo by Blitzo.

Description 

Elephant Rock is a great shady destination similar to the Rostrum. The lower reaches are home to some great climbs such as Hotline, Pink Dream, and Fatal Mistake (all on the Worst Error Pinnacle), whereas the upper wall (the Killer Pillar -- approached via HW 41) has a few wild sport climbs. Fatal Mistake is the insanely good-looking splitter visible from the road, and commonly confused to be Hotline (also clearly visible from the road if one knows what to look for).

Getting There 

For the Worst Error Pinnacle and routes at the base: From the intersection of HW 120 and 140, head just over 2 miles west on 140. Park at the long, paved pullout by the stone wall (commonly used to approach Cookie Cliff). Walk downstream and descend (in the vicinity of the retaining wall) down to the river and cross opposite a giant boulder (the Monster Boulder) on the far shore. Pick up a trail up to the base of the wall. You may end up doing a bit of bushwacking as this trail is difficult to locate on the way up. This trail cuts back upstream towards the Worst Error Pinnacle. In any case, be careful of Poison Oak.

For the Killer Pillar: Drive 41 out of the park through the Wawona tunnel. One mile after the tunnel is a long stone wall, followed by a roomy dirt pulloff that is the Rostrum parking. Do not park here, but continue on the road for a quarter mile or less past some sharp bends and park in the first small gravel pulloff you come to. On the left there is a small rockcut in the road, and on the right is an open, rocky area. Hike from this rocky area towards the top of the cliff following an obvious trail. The Killer Pillar is a sloping ramp with large knobs down from the NW side of the summit of Elephant Rock. Bolts allow easy rapping into the climbs.

The Classics

Featured Route For Elephant Rock

Crack of Doom 5.10a  CA : Yosemite National Park : ... : Elephant Rock

The Crack of Doom was one of the first 5.10's done in the Valley and has a lot of history and lore surrounding it. To this day it remains something of a feared testpiece. It certainly takes a very imposing line up a steep chimney system. Most of the wide climbing however is in the 5.8-5.9 range, with just a short section of 10a at the end. Overall, this is an excellent climb on clean rock that protects well with modern big cams and deserves much more traffic than it receives.The best approach is...[more]   Browse More Classics in CA

Photos of Elephant Rock Slideshow

Add Photo

Me on the third pitch of Hotline. Arguably the bes...	Elephant Rock Fall. Photo by Blitzo.	BETA PHOTO: Crack of Doom and Crack of Despair as seen from the a...