What to Climb In Yosemite

I am starting to plan my first trip to Yosemite for the beginning of next season and would love some advice on how to maximize my time and effort over the 4-5 days I will be there. We all know El Cap and Half Dome, but what is the best climbing in the Valley for us 'Normal Climbers'. I lead in the mid .11s and have some but not a ton of multi-pitch experience. Is there any noteworthy sport climbing to consider?

If only there was a website where you could search for routes by grades and stars... 

C Archibolt wrote: If only there was a website where you could search for routes by grades and stars... 

Yeah you're right, the Yosemite page is tiny and easy to navigate. The Yosemite page has like 35 subsections, each with their own subsections before you actually get to any specific routes. Let's assuming that if your response is sarcastic and doesn't include any actual information than rather than posting it you can just shut up instead. Deal? 

Tony Baum wrote: I am starting to plan my first trip to Yosemite for the beginning of next season and would love some advice on how to maximize my time and effort over the 4-5 days I will be there. We all know El Cap and Half Dome, but what is the best climbing in the Valley for us 'Normal Climbers'. I lead in the mid .11s and have some but not a ton of multi-pitch experience. Is there any noteworthy sport climbing to consider?

Let us know what you mean by "best" and any style preferences or avoidances - friction slab, off-width or other wideness, crack size, etc. Free or aid?

Tony Baum wrote:

•  The Yosemite page has like 35 subsections, each with their own subsections before you actually get to any specific routes. 

If only there was a search engine that allowed one to search out a specific route...

Jplotz wrote:

If only there was a search engine that allowed one to search out a specific route...

I don't know the specific routes... that's the whole point of my post. Is this somehow confusing? 

Thank you to anyone who posted a serious/helpful response. Marc, I don't have a huge preference for climbing style, not very experienced with off-widths but up for trying anything. Free climbing definitely preferred to aid. 

Super Slacker Highway and Absolutely Free are great moderate multipitches. Nutcracker is famous for a reason.
Tons of great 10-11 single-pitch cracks at Cookie Cliff, and also at Reed's Pinnacle. Cookie has some 2 or 3 pitch routes, too. Waverly Wafer and Outer Limits are awesome.
Note that in early spring a lot of stuff seeps - e.g. Serenity Crack is wonderful but the first pitch is kind of exciting when wet. And the EB of El Cap is literally a waterfall.
On the sport climbing front, Chapel Wall and Killer Pillar come to mind, but that's mostly 12's. Cookie monster at the Cookie is a great 12a, not too tough for the grade, but it's a lonely sport climb at a mostly trad crag. The Valley's definitely mostly a trad destination.

Step 1: select your criteria. Do you like choss? 1-2 star routes. Do you like mega crowded classics? choose 3+ stars. I have provided a screen shot below for ease.


Step 2: go through the route descriptions and find out what sounds fun to you

Step 3: Travel to yosemite for your trip

Step 4: rock climb

Step 5: spray to everyone about how you climbed in the valley and post comments on all of the cliimbs you did.

Mecca on Lower Cathedral is a concentrated sport climbing area. It might be kinda wet and dirty if you're there in the spring. Chapel Wall has bolted routes to climb that are cool. 

Church Bowl area has some nice single pitch 10s. Good place to get acquainted with 5.10 crack. You can also take the bus there. We would find a bear box in Curry Village to claim, and then use the bus as much as possible. Parking and driving is a drag, and they hammer you about food in your car. Take it all out, claim a bear box in some far off corner and you make that your dinner spot. We found the bus super convenient. And speaking of bus, take it to Manure Pile, near the base of El Cap, and climb Nutcracker. It's 'only' 5.9 and has some amazing climbing and comfortable belays. And Serenity Crack is awesome, even if you can only get the first pitch in.  And it will be seeping. Offset cams are nice here. There is also a 5.10 face climb just next to it while you wait for it to open up. And check out Penelope's Problem and Jam Crack, both great cracks and 5.9m, i believe. The other climbs I mentioned, like Cookie Cliff area, are outside of the Valley floor, proper. The ones I've mentioned are all very close to Camp 4 and easily accessible with a bus trip, or walking. We drove a lot our first trip and have since learned to embrace the bus.

Gumby the White wrote: Step 1: select your criteria. Do you like choss? 1-2 star routes. Do you like mega crowded classics? choose 3+ stars. I have provided a screen shot below for ease.

Step 2: go through the route descriptions and find out what sounds fun to you

Step 3: Travel to yosemite for your trip

Step 4: rock climb

Step 5: spray to everyone about how you climbed in the valley and post comments on all of the cliimbs you did.

Enabler

Tony Baum wrote:

Yeah you're right, the Yosemite page is tiny and easy to navigate. The Yosemite page has like 35 subsections, each with their own subsections before you actually get to any specific routes. Let's assuming that if your response is sarcastic and doesn't include any actual information than rather than posting it you can just shut up instead. Deal? 

Deal. Start with these. If none of these appeal to you, click "More Classic Climbs."

The normal advice when visiting a new area with somewhat different rock type and climbing techniques than what you are used to:
"Start on some easier climbs and see how the ratings feel."
So you could do an easier crack climb like Jamcrack or Grack Center, then if that is friendly, do Bishop's Terrace,
progress to Commitment, Reed's Direct, Central Pillar of Frenzy, Serenity / Sons, Outer Limits, etc.
If Karate Crack at Smith Rock is already no problem for you, you can warmup on Bishop's Terrace.

In general, the best climbs in Yosemite Valley are not the sport climbs, because the rock tends to be less featured for face climbing.
So I'd advise doing the crack climbs.

Here's the route finder on all of Yosemite, narrowed down to the 5.6 to 5.11a range, 3 or more stars:
https://tinyurl.com/uk38qr4
(478 routes in the list)
If you are there in April/May, Tuolumne will not be open yet.

The filters on the route finder are not ideal.
For example, if visiting in April / May, you want to include Yosemite Valley and Lower Merced Canyon, but not Tuolumne Meadows.
It would help if the Lower Merced Canyon areas were simply moved to the Yosemite Valley area.

Another thing that would help would be if you could filter by date or month of visit, to remove climbs that are inaccessible, too hot, too cold, etc.

And it would be good if you could exclude aid climbs, and start at 3.5 stars.  (I worked around that by sorting on stars).
Filtering is slightly tricky, because the East Buttress of Middle Cathedral is currently listed as 5.10c A0, when it can be climbed at 5.9 A0 or 5.10a via a variation,
so filtering out aid climbs would drop it out.  (A solution is to allow A0 routes as free climbs in the filter).

Thanks for the input everyone, very much appreciated. We're not looking for sport routes necessarily, I was just curious if there are any noteworthy sport routes to consider since it generally opens up some harder grades if protection is less of a concern.

In any case thanks for the recommendations!

A lot of areas within YNP.. great climbing everywhere. I'm either chasing sun or shade, depending on time of day and time of year

"The beginning of the season" - is that March or April?  If so, and depending on what kind of winter it's been, the stuff on the north-facing side can be wet.  In those months I usually spent most of my Valley time on the sunny south-facing side of the Valley proper and in Lower Merced Canyon (MPs's distinction).
As to efficiency:

You could easily spend an entire day at Church Bowl, which has zero approach and is on the sunny side of the Valley proper.  There are three good sport routes in the 11 range (wander a bit to the right to find 700 club), and a slightly runout 10a sport route, Pole Position.  There is a nice 5.10 which has a few bolts to start and then gear.  Lots of nice crack routes.  There is the classic Bishop's Terrace.  Etc.  Plenty to do there.  Two ropes.

Another good area for efficiency is Pat & Jack Pinnacle, Lower Merced Canyon.  Also very short approach.  That should be warm and sunny.  There are a variety of sport routes there from easy to harder, and some great cracks.  

Edited for clarity...