The following cliffs will be closed to climbing beginning March 1, 2009: Mount Kinesava, Streaked Wall, Sentinel, Mountain of the Sun, Great White Throne (beyond single and double-pitched climbs), Cable Mountain, Isaac (in Court of the Patriarchs), North Twin Brother, Middle Fork of Taylor Creek, the northeast buttress of Angel’s Landing and Tunnel West. All other cliffs are open to climbing.
Moonlight Buttress is the obvious buttress on the left just after Angel's Landing. It resembles a huge pillar resting against the wall. The wall faces almost due east.
The most common route on the wall is the Lowe / Weiss Route that takes a line straight up the middle (the Grand Dihedral is obvious from the road).
At the base, be careful as the 3rd class ledges are easy to climb on but a tumble down could be serious.
There is a ledge after P5 of the Lowe/Weiss route that makes a great bivy if you have a portaledge. The descent is a casual hike down a paved path. Once you top out, hike straight back and you cannot miss the path. The path is most exciting (yes, seriously) path I have ever been on. Try to save some daylight to enjoy the hike down. It would be worthy of hiking by itself. The descent is about 3 miles down.
—Casey Bernal
Getting There
You can take the shuttle to the Big Bend stop (same as Prodigal Sun), or if you have a cool driver they will drop you off right in front of the trailhead. From the shuttle stop, jog up the road about 100 yards to the trailhead. There are trail markers posted to follow. To cross the creek, look for a wide area with islands, and you can cross with only getting your ankles wet. The approach takes maybe 30 minutes.
This route is great. The line can be spotted from the road as a distinct dihedral with a roof/chimney at the top that runs up just past half way. The rock looks blank above that but a beautiful, direct, crack system runs almost the whole way up. This is a great easy aid route or a hardcore free climb on beautiful crack systems.The belays are all bolted and the bolts are in great condition (thanks to the ASCA, I thi...[more]
I wrote a trip report from this route 5 years ago that can be found at http://naclassics.com/climbs/moonlite/tb_598.pdf The facts stated therein hold. The opinions expressed about certain things may have expired.
Moonlight Buttress
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