The Quest for Punani

Along the gentle flow of Cherry Creek, nestled between willows and small mud-cliffs sits Punani. Over time the forces of nature have created this unique chunk of rock that contains one of the most aggressive boulder problems in Castlewood.

Simply put Punani is the first real badass boulder problem that I laid my eyes (and hands) on; it sits far from any other climbing in the area and contains a couple real smooth lines. The first time I saw this boulder it was Fall of 2005 and I was just really starting getting into climbing and bouldering; Chris had found it just a little before then and at that time all we could do was look and stare.

Flash ahead to the next summer (2006): Chris begins to really project the boulder (I still can’t get my fat-ass off the start holds), and here are a few photos from spending the day out there.

Here is what Punani looks like from below:

That day alone Chris threw himself at this problem countless times and was literally being spit off each time:

Towards the end of the day the most minor of progress was made:

Then there was a huge hiatus for 2007 bouldering in that I never once visited the boulder. I was focused on exploring new parts of Castlewood such as the 9 Live Boulder and began exploring new areas such as Three Sisters near Evergreen. On Jan 5th, 2008 I took Steve to the boulder for his first time to see the problems; even though we didn’t climb it there was the feeling that we would focus on this boulder over the next few months.

Finally the Main Event:
On a cool late evening last week (Thursday 3/13/2008) I joined Chris and Steve in the wilds of Castlewood to descend on this boulder in a evening that was eerily beautiful:

Five days prior Chris and I spent the whole afternoon sessioning the boulder with him sending Gerbil in a Chute and me finally making progress on that problem. However this night we had an intense focus on Punani and as it began to get pitch black the action really started to heat-up.

Steve at the beginning of the climb:

Next thing I know Chris stuck the crux, threw his second hand up and moved up on the top-out. Meanwhile it was 7:45pm well over an hour since we have seen any sunlight, it was completely pitch-black, and somehow Chris finished off this problem (unfortunately I have all this camera gear and still learning off camera flash so the pics are not as good as I was hoping they would be..)

Chris Storms on the Crux move of Punani V7/8 (for you sport climbers: ~5.13a); congrats!

Finally we see that it is possible…

Fully photo gallery can be found here: http://andylibrande.com/pictures/photos/album36