Traverse from South to North 5.7

Inspired by an Ed Hartouni post, I made an attempt at linking up all the Cathedral peaks from Tenaya to Unicorn on Saturday. Ran out of daylight before I could get to Cathedral and Eichorn but all in all, a fantastic day in the mountains, and my biggest solo day ever.

Some of the highlights:

Tenaya quiet in the morning light!
Beautiful view from North Tressider.
Exciting 4th class route on South Tressider (my best recollection of my route - don't take this one to the bank).
Delightful 3rd class on the east side of the north ridge of Columbia Finger - cuddly class 3.
Met several more Oakland climbers, at the base of Matthes and on the crest.
Found some soloing companions and someone to take my picture without a timer.
Kristin and Zach showed up at just the right time. I was getting lonely! Company does wonders for the nerves.

Seeing all the sign-ins from old friends in the Echo Peaks summit registers. Lots of people doing the Cathedral-Matthes-Tenaya link-up these days!
I recently discovered the music of Nicki Bluhm and the Gramblers - Nicki is married to Tim Bluhm, familiar to some as the lead singer for Mother Hips and to others as a prolific climber in the the Valley and Tuolumne in the late 1980s. Tim grew up in the house behind me in Manhattan Beach, and I'm always tickled to see crumbs from his trail. Tim was signed in at the Echo #4 summit log.

I used Mark Thomas & Steph Abegg's Echo peak sequence from just a few days ago. This was my third trip to the Echo Peaks and I thought this was a pretty solid outline. Thanks for putting it up Mark!

The always outstanding view at the deceptively tame 3rd class of Echo #3, as seen from Echo #4.
Trying to keep track of the Echo Peaks. Wasn't up to doing #9 alone - maybe next time.
Buddha on the first Echo Ridge summit.
Found a new, better route onto either Echo Ridge North or Cockscomb (things starting to blur together...) up and right with a good left foot and a right hand mantle. Unlocked the 4th class that had felt 5th on a previous visit.
The beautiful sunset from Unicorn.

Looking back up the gully that accesses the notch between the north and middle summits of Unicorn. I might call this one a questionable downclimb. Would recommend rappelling.

Traversed around the south side of Budd Lake back to the base of Cathedral Peak to catch the trail, due to dim memories of bushwhackiness going around the much shorter route, north of Budd Lake. Longer mileage but easy terrain.

Summary:
Tenaya Peak->Tressider North Arete-> Tressider South Arete-> Columbia Finger-> full Matthes Crest-> Echo Peaks 5/7/6/0/4/3/2/1/8 (no #9) -> Echo Ridge -> Cockscomb-> Unicorn Peak
Between 18-20 summits, depending on how you count Matthes and the Echos.

http://goldenincalescent.blogspot.com/2013/07/cathedral-traverse-minus-cathedral.html