T2

This is probably my favorite route in Eldo. It is long, exciting, has beautiful climbing, better than The Yellow Spur, and the upper half sees little traffic.

The first pitch is the crux - a pumpy overhang that will be quite dangerous if you are not solid on it. Climb up fifteen feet to the lip, clip a good drilled angle, and crank onto lower angle rock. If you feel iffy on this section before beginning, you could probably stickclip the pin. The 5.8 above is pretty runout.

Take Jules Verne as the second pitch, a 5.8+ crack. The original second pitch of T2 sucks as it is covered in bird crap. Per Doug Haller: from the top of the 1st pitch of Touch and Go, move up the ramp (left) passing the two bolt anchor with chains at the top of the fist pitch of T2. Build an anchor in the alcove beneath a pine tree. From here, make moves up the face to gain a thin hand to hand crack and flakes. Climb this system to a second alcove. Place some wide gear, and crack climb the wide hands to hands crack to reach the upper ramp.

Follow the ramp up and left to behind several trees. There, locate the base of the next pitch (5.9) of T2. Look for a crack starting about 10 feet off the ramp and leading to an open book. Use the ramp stance to scope out the traverse and crack for the next pitch.

The pitch above the upper ramp is one of the most beautiful 5.9 pitches in Eldo, and it is not done too often. Per Doug Haller: make challenging face moves to gain a crack. Continue up this for about 30-40 feet. Look left for a bent pin. Step up, clip the pin, and step down or left traverse to the start of the crack system. The traverse, about 10 to 15 feet leads to an ever increasingly wide crack. It starts with tips and requires small gear. It ends wide requiring several fist-size pieces. You may break this pitch into two by belaying on a small ledge about halfway up the face. Otherwise, continue along the crack until it joins a up and right-trending ramp. Build a belay here if you or continue until rope drag or lack gear requires stopping.

Follow the wide ramp with crack upward for about 30 feet on solid rock at about the 5.7 level. Save some wide gear as the crack expands to fist size before the pins.  Look for several pins on the left side of the crack.  Clip the first, reach up and around the block to clip the second.  The rock is solid at first before becoming the dark red shale.  As of 2025, the majority of the rock was solid on this pitch.  Place two or three pieces of finger to thin hand gear as you climb up and then left to gain the next ledge/ramp system and solid rock.  Take the ramp as far as rope drag allows. Look for a tree to to set the belay. The last pitch is short, .9- but definitely dangerous. It consists of overhanging talus protected by bad pins, of course if you can do the first pitch, this pitch won't be a problem.

Choose your adventure. From the tree, trend up and left climbing the line of least resistance. Place protection where you can as there are several long runouts on 5.5 to 5.7 ground. Eventually the summit of the cliff appears. Climb straight up to gain the top. 

Originally, the last pitch is short .9- but definitely dangerous. It consists of overhanging talus protected by bad pins, of course if you can do the first pitch, this pitch won't be a problem.

To get off, scramble a long ledge to join up with the last pitch of Ruper.

Alternately, per Doug Haller: to descend: either scramble and rap to the Vertigo wrap stations (3 raps and some scrambling) or hike off the East Slabs.

Find the start to the route by approaching the Roof Routes area. You park at the lower parking lot, hike the trail around the West side of The Whale's Tail. Follow the trail across the concrete pad, take the switchbacks, take the right fork. When you get to the rock, you head left what feels like about 100 feet. The start is identified by finding an angling roof about 20 feet off the ground with a jug & pin just past the lip.

Standard rack.