Middle Cathedral Rock - East Buttress

Sunday saw an early start, waking up at 5:30, packing up, downing a cup of coffee and a quick breakfast, filling up the water bottles and driving to the Cathedral Rocks pull-out. Racking up took a bit but we left the car at shortly after 7AM. The approach trail brought us to the base of the climb pretty quickly and we started up the first pitch around 8AM. Ben took the first lead which didn't pose any problems. I faced a slight problem in the roof starting of the second pitch, but I managed to figure it out in relatively short time. From here on we swung leads, moving at a pretty good pace. Besides the climbs the day before this was the first climb I really fully enjoyed and was comfortable on at all times. This showed especially on my lead of the 6th pitch, a traversing face pitch. There are two pitons on the pitch, and not too many other places that take protection. The move off the second piton is a 5.8 friction move, where I took a while to figure out how it should be done. But I managed it... I guess on another day I would have wanted to bail...But Sunday it felt really good... On the 8th pitch I got slightly off route, as I traversed to the belay ledge too late. There were plenty of cracks to build an anchor though. It was quite amazing to see a flock of pigeons fly by below me as I belayed Ben up. Another few pitches brought us to the top, which we reached at 1:52. Just about 6 hours after we left the ground. It's a pity that such a great climb ends in an ugly gully! Next time we'll definitely try the 5.10 finger crack variation on the left of the original route.
Another downside of the climb is the rather nasty descent along exposed cliffs and down a nasty gully. At 3:45 we were back at the car, sorting gear, packing up and starting the drive back to the Bay Area. A dinner at Taqueria Algave in Oakdale concluded an amazing weekend of climbing. It really feels as if I got my mojo back. Too bad that I have to go the New Mexico for work again next week, and that I can't make it out to the Valley more often!