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| Raven Crag on Sulfur Mountain viewed from Banff. Plutonian Shores is in the centre of the photo and is the full height of the cliff |
Happy to get to this route, has been on my and LK's radar for a couple of seasons. Great easy day out, short approach, excellent rock quality, well bolt protected and a fun grade. Plutonian Shores is located at Raven Crag, significant place. Raven Crag is home to Canada's current hardest sport route, "Fight Club", 5.15b !
Topo and approach beta here. The routes is about 185 metres tall with 6 pitches of climbing, pitch 3 is just a short fourth class traverse of about 15 metres. The grading is a bit harder than it felt, but not really sandbagged. The first two pitches felt above grade stated, but the crux pitches were properly graded, maybe a tad harder than the grade indicated? LK led pitches 1, 3, 5 and 7, leaving the interest crux pitch (pitch 6) for my enjoyment. This pitch is solid 5.9 (maybe harder, or I am a wimp), but the two cruxes are well protected. I had a tough time finding good hands on the cruxes, but once I got them, the moves were super fun! Overall the rock quality is excellent, only a few pebbles on some of the ledges. The day we did the route it was super cold and windy, maybe with an average temperate of +8? Wind chill was nasty and it was hard to stay warm at the stations. Easy walk off the top. Highly recommend this route.
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| LK leading up pitch 1 (5.5) |
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| OSWB topping out on pitch 1, photo by LK |
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| OSWB leading pitch 2 (5.7), photo by LK. |
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| Traverse to station at base of pitch 4. |
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| LK leading the lower section of pitch 5, "A Murder of Crows". Long (50m) and solid 5.8 for much of the pitch. |
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| LK leading up the last pitch (pitch 7), solid 5.7 moves. |
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| Unstable and cold weather for our climb |
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