Just a few feet right of the aptly named Pleasant Surprise crack, the main bulk of Trail Lake Pinnacle forms a dihedral with the smaller wall that has the majority of the routes. This corner appears much nicer than it is. Awkward moves and layers of dusty sand characterize this route.

Shadow Dihedral

Pleasant Surprise

Larsen Aid Route

Spring Fever

YTP Crack

Technicality

Micro Moses

The Wide One

Clean Cut

Mountaineer's Route

Behemoth

This is a less-than-vertical hand crack. It makes for good jamming practice, but there are plentiful face holds as well.

It goes clean!

No need to bring a hammer, pitons, or hooks.

This is a wonderfully steep, aesthetic, and historic aid line on the west side of Trail Lake Pinnacle. It was first climbed by Joe Larsen in 1971, and you can still read the original entry in the summit register! In those days, it was probably climbed mostly or entirely on piton aid. I made the presumed first clean aid ascent on June 14, 2018. Cam hooks are not exactly clean aid on sandstone, so I did not use any pins or hooks at all. In my opinion, nailing or cam-hooking this route is no longer worth the damage it causes.

To begin the ascent, find the obvious crack/seam on the west face just right of Mini Moses' bolt line. Start aiding this crack, then make some loose free moves through the white band. Beware loose blocks in this section. From a large ledge, aid a right-slanting, extremely thin crack through the molasses-colored face, then aid the wider, drastically left-angling crack below a roof. You will pass a fixed #1 BD cam here. When the crack turns vertical, the terrain eases and offers passage to the summit.

Cleaning the route (if your belayer isn't following) may prove just as tricky as climbing it....the rappel anchors are not positioned to give a good angle to reach your pro.

This is the left of the two short bolted face climbs on the lower tier of Goliath Spire. Crimps and incipient cracks.

This climbs the left off-width crack (plus additional small face holds) on this face. The crux is low. Trevor Bowman lists this as 5.8 in his guidebook, but it seems more consistent with 5.7 to me.

Trevor Bowman says in his guidebook tbat this is a great sequency face to a thin crack.

Climbs the beautiful and obvious vertical sandstone arete.

The summit register gives this route several names: Native Art, Ancient Arete, and Micro Moses. All but the last are crossed out.

This is the very wide off-width crack in the middle of the lower face of Goliath Spire. Trevor Bowman's guidebook rates it 5.9, but there are many face holds on the edges of the crack, and using those it felt like hard 5.7. Ignoring the face holds would feel extremely contrived.

This is the best moderate route at the pinnacle. It climbs the obvious and aesthetic arete that divides the mini-face of Technicality from the face with the Pleasant Surprise crack. It starts with a technical move on small edges below the bolt (soft for 5.9). After getting established on the arete proper, a few committing moves separated by good rests lead to the anchor ledge. The last moves are the hardest, but they can be bypassed with a 5.7 variation of lower quality to the left of the arete.

The route starts with a low bolt to reach a slab. Follow the slab to its top, then follow the arete to the summit. The route is obvious and the cruxes are well-protected.

This line was originally climbed free on gear (original name unknown), then retrobolted in 2001, at which time it was temporarily named "Like Father, Like Son." The name in current use is "Mountaineer's Route," as published in the mini-guidebook for this area and as discussed below. There has been talk of removing the bolts, but that seems unlikely at present.

Follow a left-angling, awkward flaring hand crack up the right side of a small pillar. From the top of the pillar, climb straight up and right on steep, fun pockets to the anchor ledge. The grade, like most at this pinnacle, is fairly soft.

Description

Location

Protection

Routes in Trail Lake Pinnacle