I promise this isn't a troll - it's a serious question, that's been driving me nuts. No matter what I do, I can't seem to find a place that gets me excited to boulder outdoors, and I've been living in CO for half a year now.

My problem is that I spend a lot of effort and time getting somewhere to boulder, and there ends up only being a handful of climbs in that location - the guidebooks end up being pretty vague, and I find a couple of warmups, and maybe one or two problems that are challenging but doable for me.

It seems like this is true of everywhere I've gone - get to one spot, see three problems, only one of which is appealing, climb that, then spend tons of time getting to the next spot, whether by driving or hiking. I spend all my time looking for boulders that actually interest me, and almost no time actually climbing.

Maybe I'm spoiled - few people think of the southeast as bouldering mecca, but I'm used to LRC, Rocktown, Boat Rock, and HP40 - places where you've got hundreds of boulder problems close together, and can walk around jumping on anything and everything for hours at a time. Climb V5? Great - there are 50 V5s. By comparison, everything in Colorado seems so spread out and difficult to locate that it barely seems worth the effort for a climber of moderate problems such as myself.


WTF am I doing wrong here? I've tried Sanitas, RMNP, Boulder Canyon, Eldo, and who knows what else - the only place I've found where I actually found more than one or two problems that interested me, before I got pissed off at the long hikes and spread out climbing, was at Three Sisters, and that's hardly one of the "big name" destinations.



Everything I heard before moving here was that Colorado is a world class bouldering destination. While that might be true for a V15 climber looking to project insane stuff up in chaos canyon, it's just not feeling like the case to me. I never thought I'd miss the rednecks and PBR cans of Alabama, but I'm starting to.



I know there has to be good bouldering to be had here - what can I do to actually enjoy it???

Carter Lake has alot of great bouldering in close proximity...Horsetooth is ok too (I like carter better). I just got back from Redcliff which has alot of really nice granite bouldering with small walks in between with LOTS in the 3-5 range. The Dragon's Den and the Lion's Den in the Lyons/Estes area are pretty decent as well.

Camp Dick I haven't been to yet but I hear ok things. Next boudering visit on my list when my tendonitis will let me is the Splatte.

Hartman Rocks

vedauwoo probably has the best bouldering in colorado. i hear you though, i have a hard time getting psyched about bouldering around here. it's pretty tough to find the ideal boulder problem, much less field full of about 100 of them. for me it's usually the landings, but i also have a hard time finding the optimal difficulty (ie not too easy, not too hard).

kind of reminds me of a story about 3 bears, a mama bear, a papa bear, and a baby bear.....

Try Durango. Three areas within 5 minutes of town (Turtle Lake, Boxcar, and Sailing Hawks). Good stuff in all the grades. The guide book for the area is good to. Durango Bouldering

Camp dick is good, but the boulders are certainly not close.

I really enjoy 3 sisters too. I think for what your looking for it's the best place for sure.

I have to say the bouldering at 3 Sisters is quite good & the approaches are minimal and flat, so I'm not sure which areas you were talking about there?? But I would encourage you to check out Mt Evans and Chaos (again?) Both are the epitome of excellent boulder problems in beautiful settings & if you have the time to explore a little there's some good moderate problems around! (that's my 2 cents! ;)

Firstly, Vedauwoo is in WY. The Lion's Den is Awesome and as the gentleman said the Kluttergarden in Red Cliff is good too. It all comes down to where you live in CO. I lived in Lyons for a while and spent a lot of time @ the Lion's Den. Now I am in Avon so I go out to Wolcott and Red Cliff a bit. It's there bro, where ever you are you can find a place to get your fix. Be patient and keep exploring.

This is why gyms are so popular around Boulder. That said, if you want to remedy the situation somewhat, here are a few suggestions:

1. You should probably aim higher grade-wise. Locals tend to focus on projecting outside and training and laps inside. Spend time outside at one specific area and don't hop around.

2. There is far more moderate bouldering in RMNP than the hype would lead you to believe. All you have to do is explore and climb what looks good.

3. The area with the highest density of problems around Boulder, while not everyone's first choice, is probably Flagstaff Mountain. You can get a lot of climbing done there in one visit. Carter works also. Further north, the 420s in the Poudre have a pretty good density of problems. South, people seem to think Castlewood is worth a trip.

4. A new and better guidebook is in the works from Sharp End

SOUTH CO BLDRING RULES! Check out the following:

Palmer Park Boulders
Ute Pass Boulders
Newland Creek Boulders

Carter Lake has more of what I think you are looking for. Though most of it gets to be a little HBish in my book.

When I first started bouldering in the area I found that I was clueless about an area until someone who know the problems gave me a tour. I really like Flagstaff and Morrison quite a bit.

Prod.

vedauwoo is a LEETLE bit closer to the front range than durango or gunnison. kind of tongue in cheek, similar to indian creek being the best colorado crag.

as far as eating goldilocks, well, can't put one by you, can we Calirado ;)

James, if you sport climb, then you're also going to be disappointed by what's out here. However, the trad out here is really good and you'll be psyched (though T-Wall is still the best crag in the country).

As far as bouldering, try doing some laps on the Gutter. That used to motivate me. I heard that the Ghetto is good, too.

Duh...forgot about Morrison. Thanks Prod.

There are zones in Castlewood where there's enough bouldering to stay put, get on several problems (including warm-ups) and get a full-on session. Still more areas where you several spots less than 100 meter's apart. As for the sea of boulders you are used to, remember our mountains have not eroded into piles of rubble yet like where you are from. Come back in a couple 100 million years or so.
Andy Librande's Map

Here's something else to consider:
Click on Destinations, then the Colorado page. Scroll down to where all of Colorado's classic routes are listed, and #1 on the list, Colorado's best route, is at CWC. I am not kidding.

Newlin Creek.

Hey JamesD-

I spent way too long trying to find areas when I was first starting out, a lot of it is because the guidebooks for Colorado bouldering are decent at listing problems but horrible for listing directions. Also my favorite guidebook, Colorado Bouldering 2, is no longer in print but if you can try to find a copy of that one.

Also a lot of the easy-moderate stuff is not documented in many of the guidebooks so it seems like a lot of areas are spread out, but in reality there are abundant amounts of climbs on boulders everywhere.

Three Sisters is a prime example, I think there are only 5-15 problems listed in any guidebook (if that) and if it wasn't for the work of Luke Childers and company no one would know about the other ~265+ problems in the park.

So yeah unfortunately the glaciers spread our boulders far apart but try to enjoy the natural settings as you hike from area to area.

A few other places to potentially check out:
- Millennium Boulder/Matthew Winters Park (once the heat cools down

- Fountaine Bleau Area at Castlewood (once the heat cools down)

- Lots of other places ppl have already listed.

I have no particular agenda in defending the honor of Colorado/Front Range bouldering, but seems to me that there's at least some pretty good stuff at the moderate level. I haven't heard Front Range described as a true bouldering destination (at the moderate level--maybe high level stuff is a different story with RMNP etc., as others have noted) so don't be surprised if it's not as good as destination areas.

Here's an online guide to Flagstaff with plenty of moderates and some harder stuff--rock is sharp, but once you get used to it, I'd like to think that the best probs at Flag would be at least "not horrible" at better bouldering areas. They've at least allowed me to have some fun / waste a lot of time over the years.

flagstaffmountainbouldering.blogspot.com/2010/01/down-mounta>>>

As a native to NC and cutting my teeth at the bouldering areas around Boone, HP40, Rumbling Bald, LRC and the sport climbing areas of the Obed, NRG, and the RRG I felt the same way when I first moved here. I looked at areas like Flagstaff, Clear Creek, Boulder Canyon, and Shelf as a joke when compared to even the most mediocre areas in the Southeast. However with further exploration I've come to love Colorado and have found classics in every area that I've climbed. For those of us that have tasted Southern sandstone it's hard to get psyched about the sandstone of Carter Lake and Flagstaff. However the Southeast is only for the weekend warrior, is way too hot and humid, and the season is much shorter than the ever changing seasons of CO. Sure I may only be able to goto Rifle for 5 mo, Mt Evans/RMNP for 3-1/2 mo, but the point is I can keep climbing all year round as long as I keep an open mind and goto the areas that are in season.

Keep exploring and the classics aren't hard to find, or stay bummed take up another sport(mtn biking), or even worse move back to the Southeast where you definitely won't be climbing from June to September...comfortably at least.