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Darth Slaydar

5.12a, Sport, 90 ft (27 m),  Avg: 3.6 from 40 votes
FA: Lee Terveen
S Dakota > Spearfish Canyon > Dark Side > Dark Side Wall

Description

A delicate and nearly miserable start leads to insanely fun climbing on big holds that just don't seem to be in the right place.

If you feel like doing battle with a big, bad-ass route, this climb is an excellent adversary. The torture lets up at about the sixth or seventh bolt and a swath of big, fun, five-elevenish moves leads to a nice rest. Take advantage! The next moves are over a killer roof with a boulder problem finish that will surely be your doom!

Location

Middle of the Dark Side Wall. Easily recognizable by a rock ledge you can sit on before you boot up. Try to stay out of the crack to the left of the bolt line.

Protection

Take a dozen draws. Open shunt anchors.

Comments [Hide ALL Comments]

Gneiss Yeti
Denver, Colorado
 
[Hide Comment] FYI. There are currently no anchors for this route only the screws. Great climbing, upper Crux climbs a lot like granite. Jul 21, 2015
Lee Terveen
Spearfish, SD
[Hide Comment] They are there yeti. Those screws your talking about are an original anchor before they were raised to extend the top crux they are just hard to see from the last bolt. Unless they were taken out by rock fall but I dought it. You just need to climb a little further. Jul 21, 2015
SCherry
Boulder, CO
 
[Hide Comment] This could be a really great route if a bolt was added where the old anchor is. There's currently a large runout above the final roof/bulge that is uncharacteristic of the rest of the climb. Plus when onsighting, its easy to think the anchor is missing because the old anchor Lee refers to is in plain sight (2 bolts without hangers) and the new anchor is out of sight. I would vote for adding a hanger to one of the old anchor bolts (and removing the second bolt so there is no confusion). Jul 6, 2020
Travis Bieber
Fort Collins
  5.12b
[Hide Comment] A bit of a two-move wonder, with a 1 move crux down low and a completely different 2 move crux up high. This route is fully bolted with the anchors above the black bulge/roof. Sep 6, 2021