Boola Boola Buttress, Black Velvet. On our fall’s first foray into the obscure and unknown, on August 16 Jens Holsten and I explored the exceedingly featured granite of Boola Boola Buttress. Unable to locate the 1984 Jim Yoder route, due to a vague and confusing description, we just started climbing. We aimed for a large left-facing corner that dominates the right side of the buttress, but deemed this feature too thin and ascended cracks to its right, just west of Michael Layton’s route, Thank You, Baby Jesus. The first pitch may or may not have been virgin territory, but the rest of our path most certainly was. We found clean rock down low, culminating in a spicy dihedral on the fourth pitch, and then several ropelengths of loose scrambling. Finally we surmounted the upper headwall in two exciting pitches and topped out onto the Dragontail Plateau just as a storm approached. 1,500', IV 5.10+R.

Max Hasson, AAC