Mountain Project: Climbing South Platte

Basically, Buffalo Creek is a small burg in between Deckers and Pine on CO 126. The Buffalo Creek area is scattered and a bit confusing with many forest roads and dead ends in the area. It may be best to beg, borrow, or steal a guidebook with a good map of the area. Skinner Mountain, however, is easy to find. Just drive South from Pine (or North from Deckers) on CO 126 until you reach the Kelsey Campground. Park on the road outside the campground unless you want to pay the fee, and then hike West for about 15 minutes on an indistinct trail marked by the occasional cairn. This trail will deposit you about 50 feet above the start of Wally World. Skinner, and the rest of the rocks in the Buffalo Creek area, contains the usual S. Platte mix of quality cracks, less-than quality cracks, and runout slabs.

The Classics

Mountain Project's determination of some of the classic, most popular, highest rated routes for Buffalo Creek:

Southeast Gully 5.4 Trad, 5 pitches, 1000 feet The Castle

Cardiac Crack 5.9+ Trad, 1 pitch, 100 feet Asshole Rock

Two Jews Blues 5.10a Sport, 3 pitches, 400 feet, Grade II Little Scraggy Dome

Central Corner 5.10a Trad Skinner Mountain

Castle Corner aka Unnamed 5.10 5.10- Trad, 3 pitches, 300 feet The Castle

Nazi's Demise 5.10b Trad, 2 pitches Da Butts

Throne Room 5.10 Trad, 3 pitches, 600 feet The Castle

Featured Route For Buffalo Creek

This is the killer top pitch with great hands and a little other variety. On this early spring day there was still ice in the upper part of the crack before the final exit moves.

Central Corner 5.10a CO : South Platte : ... : Skinner Mountain

An aesthetic hand crack in a vertical to overhanging dihedral on Skinner Mountain's obvious headwall, Central Corner provides pleasant if sometimes awkward jams, great pro, and fantastic position. Definitely three stars and worth the hike up to Skinner just for this climb.Central Corner proper is actually the third pitch of any number of climbs on Skinner's lower section. The fastest way to reach the base is by climbing the first two pitches of...[more] Browse More Classics in CO

Comments on Buffalo Creek

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By Darin Lang
Jul 30, 2001

Some helpful mileages: (1) Buffalo Creek is about 9 miles south of US285/CO126 junction, or 1 mile south of Pine on CO126; (2) Skinner Mountain is 5.9 miles south of Buffalo Creek on CO126

By Jason Kaplan
From: Evergreen Co
Jul 22, 2008

Anyone have beta on the Twisted Sisters formation near A-hole rock? What routes exist, pics etc?

Also how many other undocumented but known crags are in the area between Da Butts and Little Scraggy (Two Jews Blues)?

By slim
Jul 23, 2008

Jason, there are a handful of decent to good lines on the Twisted Sisters rocks, at a good variety of grades. There are several fairly easy to moderate (5.6 to 5.9) crack systems, the best of which is a long slabby 5.7 corner. There are also a couple good cracks in the 5.10 range. Also, there is a fun hanging corner/flake sort of thing that is given 11d in hubbels book, but felt more like 11a or so. You should definitely head up there and check it out. There is quite a bit of rock in this area.

Also, there are some good cracks in the long, boulder-filled valley/gulley that runs fairly northward from A-hole rock. Check it out and give us a full report.

By Jason Kaplan
From: Evergreen Co
Aug 31, 2008

Well, let's just say that The Sisters aren't worth the walk on their own. I climbed what I would assume to be the slabby 5.7 corner which wasn't that great and less then 100 feet. Everything else seemed pretty hard/awkward or too short to justify the effort. I will post the area up later, with all the pics I took and update the asshole rock section with more pics of the other potential.

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Buffalo Creek

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