Eternal Sunshine
5.12a,
Sport, 350 ft (106 m), 4 pitches, Grade III,
Avg: 3.1 from 19
votes
FA: Mark Tarrant, Richard Wright, P1--10/04, Route--7/07
Colorado
> Empire
> Ra
Description
This route now goes all the way to the top in four pitches. It's the second bolted route coming up the boulder field. Between WOW and EOA is an obvious right-facing dihedral starting about 30' off the talus. The route begins on a slab 25' down from EOA, just left of an overhang close to the ground. The line is independent except for the last 50' where it joins WOW on the amazing arete.
Pitch 1: 5.11d, 13 bolts, 105', 3-bolt anchor. Climb the slab to the dihedral and then move on to a clean vertical wall. The last move in the dihedral is hard (.11), followed by a sit-down rest and then the edging crux on the wall above at bolt 10 (.11d straight up or .11c moving right). There is now a lowering anchor at the end of the pitch (90' to the ground), or move up to the ledge to belay.
Pitch 2: 5.10a, 5 bolts, 60', 2-bolt anchor. Mantle directly above the belay and then move left to a corner. Go up the corner for 20' and move left (crux) then up 20' to the anchor. (Midway up this pitch it is possible to traverse right, 5.7, linking to the big plate on WOW).
Pitch 3: 5.12a, 10 bolts, 80', 3-bolt anchor. Climb the steep face to the first crux (.12a lite) through the X on a steep prow, ending at a huge, incut jug. Move up the corner for 40' to the second crux through the last two clips. Rest up before the end to improve your chances with the slick, "no way", full-on .12a moves to the anchor.
Pitch 4: 5.11a, 13 bolts, 100', 2-bolt anchor. The final pitch is very fun with great position. Move left off the belay then up a steep face to a ledge. Continue with more steep face climbing to another big ledge where it joins WOW below the exposed arete. Climbing off each of the big ledges delivers the two cruxes.
Apart from the second pitch, this route rates 3+ stars. All the other pitches have engaging movement and are on good stone.
Descent: Walk down the descent ramp to the north.
Protection
About 15 draws plus anchors after each pitch. 60m rope.
[Hide Photo] Finishing the crux.
[Hide Photo] Bob R. at the first pitch crux of Eternal Sunshine. EOA is in the big dihedral to his left.
Just R of 'Empire of Air', which is the route with the red 1st hanger, there is a licheny slab with a roof/overlap sort of thing. This leads up to a small, but pronounced, R-facing dihedral. Up the dihedral you go, culminating in the first crux. At first, this looks desperate, but similar to other routes up here, keep groping desperately and you will find something. Cool bit of climbing here.
Pull out of the dihedral onto the face, using small but good holds. Again, it takes a bit of looking and planning, but once you find everything it goes pretty well. There is a bit of lichen here to add to the difficulty, but it eases up quite a bit after a few moves.
Nice bolted anchor to rap from. Be careful with a 60m as it just gets you to the ground, and the ground slopes downhill pretty quickly. Aug 3, 2009
Morrison, CO
Around Boulder, CO
Mark told me that he "redpoint" graded these, meaning once you have the moves down, that is how it will feel.
Some similar discussion w/input from Mark and Richard appears here:
Touch Gold ratings Jun 29, 2015