Mount Lyell / Mount Maclure
Ascents of Mount Lyell (from Lyell-Maclure Col, class 3) and Mount Maclure (East Arête, class 3), Yosemite National Park, with René Renteria, June 17-19, 2015
Timeline:
June 17, 2015. René and I left the Tuolumne Meadows ranger station at 9:28, hiked up Lyell Canyon and then started up the slopes to Donohue Pass, leaving the trail to camp in the basin northeast of the Lyell Glacier. We reached camp at 16:30 (a 7:02 hour day).
June 18, 2015. We left camp at 6:20 and made our way up the snowy benches to Lyell glacier, which we ascended, reaching the Lyell-Maclure col at 8:30. We roped up for some class 4 climbing up the ridge leading to the summit of Mount Lyell, which we reached at 10:04. We departed the summit at 10:30 and found a 3rd class way down the ridge by staying on its very edge (we did not use the rope on the descent). We were back at the col at 11:00, and had lunch there. We left for the summit of Mount Maclure at 11:45 and reached it at 12:28. We were back at the saddle at 13:11, took a break at a lake at 11,000 ft just north of the Lyell glacier at 14:40, and were back in camp at 15:18 (an 8:58 hour day).
June 19, 2015. We left camp at 8:30 and regained the John Muir trail to hike up Donohue Pass and finish our trip at Silver Lake. We stopped for lunch just below Waugh Lake, near Rush Creek, at 13:00. We were at the trailhead at Silver Lake, where we had left René's rental car three days before, at 17:13 (an 8:43 hour day).
We found motel rooms in Lee Vining and had dinner at Whoa Nellie's – the start of a two day recovery from a bad cold and the recent adventure, ahead of the next one.