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Coming back from the depths…

Well first off I have not posted anything for way too long which is a combination of a variety of issues that caused this delay. Regardless of the issues I am going to catch-up as quickly as possible by posting nothing but pics and very short-dialogue.

Chris works hard on Ghost Dance at the Millenium Boulder: http://mountainproject.com/v/colorado/morrisonevergeen/matthewswinters_park/105759288

Ghost Dance

At the very end of a really hot day and after throwing himself at the rock way too many times, Chris sends and I took a real nice butt shot since he needed me as a spotter:

Took some time off from climbing and taking photos in general. Why? you might ask…well August and the beginning of September were way too busy. I bought a house, moved, was healing a tendon injury, and was occupied doing to much other random stuff.

Somewhere in there I made the little sister go to castlewood with me and here is evidence of her attempting to climb with big-ass sneakers:

Anyways that is quick and necessary catch-up over the last few months. We are coming-up to the best time of the year to be outside and I already have lots of photos awaiting their presence on the interweb.

Playing in the Aspens: Kluttergarden Bouldering

Feast on this set of photos I got last weekend at the Kluttergarden Bouldering area near Red Cliff and Minturn. First off any one of any level should go bouldering at this place. It is located in a beautiful forest that is a perfect blend of Aspen trees and lodgepole pines. The boulders are all closely clustered with enough space to let various groups spread out over the area and the approach to all of these climbs are literally minutes from the parking area.

Chris working one of many of the area classics, the Minturn Mile:

Minturn Mile

Me working on one of many problems the area has:

On the drive-up the most apparent thing is how jacked up Colorado forests are due to the Pine Beetle, couldn’t believe how much forest is messed-up around summit county; guess you don’t notice it in the winter. Here is a good article on it: http://www.newsweek.com/id/148297

Also a big thanks to Page and Chris for letting me stay up at the condo that they got for the weekend in Beaver Creek!!! Not much beats waking up to a perfect morning to the sounds of a decent sized creek and then going for a swim in the outdoor pool/hottub.  Follow that up with some fly-fishing along the Eagle River. Perfecto…

We threw ourselves at a bunch of problems with some good sendage; good thing the locals had some benches for us to rest upon:

The benches at the Minturn boulder

Vedauwoo Bouldering at Citadel

Headed up to a place I have been wanting to check out for a long time the other weekend. Vedauwoo is best know for its off-width trad climbing, however I have seen enough photos on the interwebz to know that the bouldering there appears to be pretty amazing.

Falling off of this slabby boulder

Luckily we confirmed that finally and went to the Citadel region which has over 100 problems listed in the guidebook and the majority of them are moderate to hard. Lots of fun stuff, the only issue we had was the heat and the greasy rocks which added some serious difficulties to all of the problems (especially the slab problems). This is definitely a place that I will come back to a lot of continue to check it out; there is a serious abundance of rock and being just outside of Cheyenne, it makes it pretty easy to get to.

Chris approving of the endless amounts of rock

Chris approving of the endless amounts of rock

Anyways check out the pics, I have them in another new gallery format and would like your feedback and if you like this way or if the photos under the previous posts work better.

peace.

Teva Mountain Games 2008

Awesome! Had a lot of fun checking out the teva mountain games this year for the first time.  First off thanks to Ben (and technically his uncle) for a place to crash in Vail; sure made the difference.

Back to the story, the games are a lot like the Winter X-Games which I have attended on several occasions, except everyone here seemed a lot more laid-back and chill. I was able to see several events such as kayaking freestyle, biking slopestyle, biking freeride, speed bouldering, a free Ozomatli concert, and lastly the Bouldering World Championships.

Rarely does something like the Bouldering World Championships happen on US soil and especially in Colorado. This is the second Climbing World Champioship to ever happen in the US and the first bouldering style comp; the last championship in the US was 18 years ago!

Therefore this is a pretty significant event and one that anyone slightly interested in should have attended. The format to the comp was actually a lot of fun as the semi-finals move along at a nice speed with lots of action happening all the time. We were with several people who do not really climb and they all enjoyed the event very much.

The finals were straight-up a very unique experience and quite insane to see. First off the official report was that 7,500 people were there at the finals (which I thought there was a good 4-5K), so just full of people that were all really getting into the show. The massive crowd combined with a beautiful mountain sunset in one of the most beautiful spots there is, made the comp just that much better.

Well enough talking, I am going to post the photos in a new manner. Please let me know if you like this way via the comments sections.

I didn’t really do a good job taking photos as I was more into watching the games and being a snapshooter, however check out these awesome photos from that weekend: http://tevamountaingames.com/ev_photo.cfm

Also for the climbing results check out: http://www.climbing.com/news/hotflashes/alex_johnson_wins_vail_world_cup/

Sheep’s Nose Bouldering

5/25/2008

Racked-up some excellent bouldering with Steve, Ben, and Terra on some South Platte granite at Sheep’s Nose. The drive is a little long from Denver, however the drive does contains stunning views of the rolling hills that line the front range.

Proof that Terra actually gets out and climbs and doesn’t just talk about it all the time:

Some of the views from Sheep’s Nose are very unique within Colorado. Pike’s Peak (14,110ft) is the backdrop for much of the climbing. Additionally the area was affected by Hayman Fire back in 2002 so most of the brush and a lot of the trees are burnt in the area adding an unusual ambiance to the climbing.

Ben up above the ground a bit on a cool slabby problem:

Steve working on the Air Jordan Boulder:

Steve, Terra, and Ben on the set of the new movie Jurassic Park #7:

Peace FoolZ!

Some Fun in Castlewood

Photo of Chris on this sweet dyno on the Nine Lives Boulder; he is getting close to sending it:

20080518-DSC_0326.jpg
Been spending some time over the last week or so finally really getting back into climbing. Went back to the nine lives boulder and spent the day working on a variation of the main arete and started to make some progress. Then a few days later went back out to the wood with Stephen, Chris, and Ryan and found new boulders in the Scary Monsters Area.

Chris on the Slabmaster Boulder:

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That was on Friday night, then on Sunday took a huge crew back to the nine lives boulder. Seven of us had some fun on a really beautiful day in castlewood:

Chris Ivy on the Nine Lives Arete variation:

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Maximus on the same problem:

20080518-DSC_0323.jpg

Also if you are still reading this post I added this to the climbing wall in the garage: http://www.routesetter.com/2008/04/21/diy-wall-improvement-volumes/

Peace.

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:

Punani boulder at Castlewood Canyon

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

Punani at Castlewood Canyon State Park

Falling off of Punani Boulder Problem in Castlewood Canyon

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

Bouldering at Castlewood Canyon on Punani

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!

Sending Punani at Castlewood Canyon

Finally we see that it is possible…

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

First Real Report on Anything.

So, to begin this I will preface this whole thing with these little gems of wisdom (?). For some reason I have been trying to have a portal that I can share some of the adventures I have with friends and let them see some of those photos I usually take of them (as all of you are always asking). In reality I been wanting to do something like this for a long ass time, so here it is in all of its glory.

So to start out I feel it only makes sense if I recap January as a very good month to be out bouldering. Yes I had several excellent days of climbing along with several great snow days all in January.

Additional Photos can be found here (or at the link to the upper right)

We begin this little adventure at Castlewood on January 5th!!! Plenty of snow to hike through, however, luckily Steve and I found some well covered rocks for a solid little session.

Really can’t believe that with as much snow as we had this area was dry (Location Link)

Bushwhacking (!?!) through c-wood.

Now for something a little nicer/warmer. Carter Lake evening session. Myself and Chris decided to go fly-fishing in Estes Park to take advantage of the day, well the fishing was going good until the wind picked-up and made it a little hard to toss those tiny flies. With Carter so close we decided to finish off the day with a quick evening session.

The next day we needed a little more climbing then the handful of problems we did at Carter, the only logical thing was to head off to Castlewood for late afternoon bouldering at the Buddha Cave area. Accomplices: Chris, Steve and Toby.

Chris in Berthoud Cave:

Steve trying to catch Monkey Shots:

On the way out we headed into a little trouble with the law. Apparently the park closes at 5:00 and when you come out in pitch black at 6:15 on a sunday night you get fined and stuff. But it’s all cool, we found out he was riding dirty…

Link to all the photos from the trip(s):

http://andylibrande.com/pictures/photos/album33

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