Another sweet trad challenge along the base of Voyager.

Head up the chimney with an awkward move around a chockstone. Get in some good gear then fire the layback moves around the roof and into the hanging corner above. The corner offers excellent and casual climbing until thinning and steepening. Again, get some good (and thin) gear and bust a big move to get past a blank section and then romp up to the anchor.

Orangutan Roof

Battle Apple

The Gold Standard

Searching for Ascention

End of Summer

Smoke for Face

Eve of Destruction

Outward Bound Corner

Seam Stress

Phasers Set On Stun (Reunion)

By Jupiter, There are Rings Around Uranus

Marmot Crack

Start off the ledge into the crack (5.9). Them move onto the fun arete. Engaging and interesting climbing leads on the edge of the formation. Pass through the short lived crux then head up to the bolted anchor above (~32 meters).

Pitch 1 (easy 5th): A short approach pitch gets you up to a ledge just beneath the big, right-facing corner. Gear anchor. (If you're comfortable with very limited or no protection on this pitch, it can be easily linked into pitch 2, but any protection on this pitch will result in rope drag when you get near the top of pitch 2.)

Pitch 2 (10b): Climb the right-facing book. As it starts to curve to the right and become a roof, escape over the roof to a bolt, then to a three-bolt anchor (historical note: one of these is the original anchor bolt from the FA of Space Probe, the other two are 1/2" stainless steel Powers bolts added October 2019).

Pitch 3 (10d?): Climb the thin slab to the right through two bolts to the right side of a small roof that takes a small-medium cam. Turn the roof and follow four more bolts to a bolted anchor.

Pitch 4 (9): Follow features up the left-facing corner to a large horizontal ledge (bring your brass nuts if you want to feel safe here). Follow the ledge left to a two bolt anchor (intermediate - a new "final" bolted anchor with rap rings was added at the summit in June 2021). Easy 5th from this intermediate anchor to the summit.

Walk off, or rappel

By Jupiter

**using two ropes**).

Detailed topo, route beta, and area info in the guide to the Courtright area by

Dwight Kroll

.

The

Gold Standard

and

Seamstress

stand as bookends to the main face of Voyager Rock, the first being at the far right end and the latter at the far left.

The Gold Standard climbs one pitch up a steep face with patches of gold patina. For the most part the holds are the edges of the patina. It will remind you of the road side of Pywiak Dome in Tuolumne Meadows, but it's steeper and harder than anything on that face.

About a half dozen bolts lead up progressively harder moves to a two bolt anchor. This is the only route I've done that doesn't go to the top of something. We simply pushed it as far as we could go. Obviously the crux lies above.

This would be a four star climb if it had a little more variety. But if you like crimping thin holds on a steep face in idyllic surroundings this one's for you.

Best done in the afternoon shade. The FA was done on crisp September days.

Thin seam and features leads to a small tree and bulge near the top; crack continues up and around the bulge, then easy slab to a gear anchor. Guidebook rates 11b likely if doing slab start to gain the first ledge and seam; however, one can do the crack start 2 feet to the right, making the climb about 10a. Rated 3 stars due to its potential with more traffic and some cleaning.

This is a great slab route, probably the best one on Voyager Rock?

If you think you got what it takes to climb 11a slab this is a great testpeice.

1st Pitch: Sustained 10+ slab, 8 bolts to a 3 bolt anchor. AWESOME!

Start from a small pine tree up on a ledge.

From the pine tree head up and right to a flake traverse the flake back left to gain another ledge just below your first bolt. The small ledge is 15ft above the small pine.

From the ledge pull onto a slanting rail/flake that you can protect with small nuts, and clip the first bolt.

Its all slab from here to the summit, A preaty straight forward route, just find the path of least resistance to the next bolt.

The crux: A very thin 11a section between the 2nd and 3rd bolts, Friction moves on dime edges, OH YA!

2nd Pitch: Sustained 10a slab, 8 bolts to a 3 bolt anchor. SICK!

The Bolts on this pitch are more spread out, but the climbing is easier.

This pitch is a Super Rad sustained 10a slab as good as it gets. A Mind blowing foot to hand match on a small knob was super cool.

3rd Pitch: One bolt protects this pitch. DONT BE SCARED!

From the anchor at the top of pitch 2 look up and left and you will see a bolt about 30 feet away.

It is 5.9 climbing to this bolt. If you have made it this far it should'nt be a problem.

If you dont want to run it out to the bolt you can climb straight up 15ft to a flake, stick a good #1 camalot in, back it up with a smaller cam if you want, put runners on them and traverse left and up to the bolt.

After you clip the bolt there is another 25ft of easy slab that brings you to the top of Voyager Rock. Set up a trad anchor and bring your partner up. Walk off south ridge.

A worthwhile pitch. The line is beautiful and obvious. On the left side of big, bad Voyager is a large "Y" with black rock between the two upper arms. Eve goes up the bottom leg.

The bottom half features some sometimes burly liebacking on a rounded flake/edge of the crack. The top half is some wild, technical liebacking and working a sometimes no-crack shallow corner. Pro is generally good except for a relatively easy bit of a liebacking run to a jug on the bottom and a run to the anchors when the crack totally closes shut at the top.

Fun, but this thing was really dirty!

Obvious, clean corner crack/ramp. Great hand crack if you choose to climb it straight in. If only it were longer.

Step off the block at the base onto super thin face following the desperate seam to a right-facing corner. A while after clipping the last bolt there are opportunities for very small wires in the crack that leads to a two bolt anchor. Bolt 1 and the anchor bolts were replaced in August 2019 (bolts 2-5 had been replaced earlier by an unknown party, and seemed to be in good shape).

Amazing finger crack in a right-facing corner. Sustained difficulty with a crux up higher where the crack gets too thin for fingers and stems are delicate.

History

In 1989 Herb Laeger and I were looking for a summit line on Voyager Rock. This large dome is a tough nut to crack, there’s a scarcity of natural lines up the main face. By then Vaino Kodas and Al Swanson had established V'Ger (in the 1979 Star Trek motion picture the Enterprise encounters an ancient American space probe called Voyager, but the O, Y, and A were gone from its name). I climbed this route once; it’s a death-defying stunt. Battle Apple—an excellent outing-- went up around the same time, by Jimmy Gill and Dwight Kroll. Those two climbs were about it for long routes on Voyager.

Herb and I were on a weekend trip. We left Los Angeles on a Friday evening and headed up into the mountains in my ever-eager little sports car. We bivied alongside the road somewhere past Shaver Lake. Saturday morning we were driving early, but when we got to the fork in the road (left goes up to Courtright, right down to Wishon), Herb wanted to go down to the Wishon Store. I was a bit miffed, but down we went. There, Herb saw a sign by the door of the store with a schedule of powerhouse tours. The powerhouse is carved out of solid granite below the level of Wishon Lake. They let water down from Courtright Reservoir, 2000 feet above, under tremendous pressure, to spin turbines generating electricity. They reverse phase on the turbines, and pump water back up at night. Thermodynamically inefficient, but practical. Herb said we should go take the tour. I was flabbergasted, but off we went. The tour was fantastic, like something from a James Bond movie.

It was mid-afternoon by the time we were up at Voyager Rock.

I’ll take credit for By Jupiter. I spied the line. Herb was skeptical. Herb had light years more experience than I at doing FA’s, and had countless great routes to his credit. But on this one occasion he misjudged my proposed line. I pressed the matter.

We did the hard part of the second pitch and called it a day. On Sunday we finished the route and drove home. I can’t believe either of us made it to work the next day.

The Climb

Pitch 1 is easy, basically an approach pitch.

Pitch two: The money pitch. A 5.11+ steep slab (beautiful rock) leads up to a short traverse left. Move up to gain the right leaning finger crack. From the ground this feature looks like a horrendous seam, but it’s perfect fingers. At the top of the crack a 5.11 move protected by a bolt leads to a bolted anchor.

Pitch 3: A short pitch to a nice ledge with a belay on gear. This pitch enables the long 4th pitch.

Pitch 4: IMO the most enjoyable pitch on the route. Follow the bolts to the last belay.

Pitch 5: 5.9 to the top. Belay on gear. Walk off.

Notes: Two 100 ft. raps go to the ground from the top of P4. Its 100 ft. from the top of P2.

The crux is extremely difficult on a hot day in the sun. This is a cloudy day or cool weather climb.

The book calls this route 5.8. I disagree. There are three distinct roof moves that require good jamming skills and technique. "Follow the right facing corner crack to the top of the Orangutan block. The upper section of this climb follows either the main left corner at 5.8 or the right corner at 5.9+. This route can be split into two pitches" to reduce rope drag. This route is pretty dirty and requires attention to not trundle loose blocks.

Description

Location

Protection

Routes in Voyager Rock