Devils Punchbowls - high altitude waterfalls huck day

The Devils Punch Bowls are a spectacular set of waterfalls accessible from either Crested Butte or Marble Colorado. The falls are in the upper reaches of the south fork of the Crystal River and generally get paddled a couple days each season by boaters who want to get off the couch from their work weeks and take approximately 2 strokes before hucking ze gnar. The drops are definitely clean but do require skilled paddling. Here is a little photo series of a recent day we had up there on July 27, 2007. Make sure to check out some of the text at the bottom of this article as I tally up carnage this year versus carnage last year and we revisit the video of the famous and amazing backwards boof.

Photos: Chris Menges

We met Mexico in crested Butte this spring. He is from Asheville, spending the summer out here. He was the first one to fire off the drops this day. Here he is scouting his line.

Mexi heading towards the lip and looking good.

He started falling off line right about here and kind of flipping over.

Mexico proceeded to swim in the boiling pool between the first and second drops. His leg had popped out of his thigh brace and basicall ejected him when he landed almost upside down. Luckily, the lip of the second drop is pretty shallow and he is able to stand up on the rock and then exit onto the cliff wall.

Our friends DK and Natalie from Glenwood Springscame up from the Marble side (mosy of us descended from the CB side)!

Johnny Myers went next and of course styled it. I talksed to him afterwards and he said the JUST BOOF IT stickers I had recently hooked him up with definitely helped him out.

Here's Johnny!

Johnny's girlfriend and her family came out to watch us huck. Here she is at the perfect viewing spot between falls.

These are some of my favorite shots of the day: Johnny Myers shot from above launching off the bottom dropp in perfect style. Blow these up, they are worth it.

Another angle of Johnny coming off drop number two on his second run.

KEEN!

DK went ahead and dropped next. As seen by this sequence of photos he had a super styling line off the top drop...

...but somehow, a slight over rotation ejected him from his boat causing swimmer number two. Total count so far was two swimmers for the first three paddlers.

Recovering DK's boat.

Zack From Crested Butte has been paddling a lot locally for the past few seasons but had never been out of the punch bowls. Here, he looks down at drop number two in preparation for his run.

This has got to be my best shot of the day (above): Zack on the first drop.

DK's wife Natalie went next and had solid lines. Here she is coming off drop two. Photo: Zack.

Chris Menges was the last to go. Three shots of his lines are below (Photos: Zack):

Top drop...
bottom drop...

Then, we fired up the first-d of this sketchy ass mank above the punch bowl's. JUST KIDDING!

Our trip out to the punch bowl's last year produced a legendary piece of video. Check out the following vid to reexperience the historical backwards boof a.k.a. "First backwards female Descent of the DP's".

Carnage report 2007: Three paddlers, One broken paddle,One backwards boof.

Carnage Report 2008: Six paddlers, two swims, one busted up face, one flat tire, one broken truck axle.

Stay tuned for a North Fork of the Crystal report and potential first D in the CB area coming later this week.