North By Northeast

North By Northeast is a reasonable climb that is pretty scruffy, in part due to neglect. It is a shame nobody seems to climb it, as it's not bad, but it could use a good brushing. Still, it is not a bad climb.

Locate the climb by looking for that initial mossy, left-leaning, left-facing flake. Climb the mellow (5.5?) face to the left of this to intercept the flake where it goes more directly upwards. Place a few cams along its length heading up to a few overlapping bulges in the wall. Place gear in these in a few horizontal cracks, and step up to the first bolt. Head right below the first bolt, and step up (crux) onto the headwall on very thin holds. This felt more like 9+ than 8+ to me, but then again, I'm a lousy slab climber. Continue up the wall on decreasing angle with decreasing difficulty to reach a large ledge with a 2-bolt anchor.

Rap or lower on a 60m rope. A 50m rope may or may not make it.

On the far left side of Area 51, there is a left-facing flake that ends 40' up the wall. The bottom is mossy and clearly holds water much of the time. The upper half of the flake is much more solid and dry. From the top of the flake, a part of 4 bolts goes up and right to a ledge with a 2-bolt and link anchor. This is North By Northeast.

Gear from 0.5" to 3" and a few longer slings.