Clayton Arnall (pictured) along with fellow climbers Jason Duris, Andy White and Staci White will appear in a new film about Bouldering in the Okanagan.

Image Credit: Contributed

OKANAGAN – A year after their first film was named a finalist at the Vancouver International Film Festival, Kelowna climbers Clayton Arnall and Andy White are close to finishing their second film about bouldering in the Okanagan.

Out of the Shadows, the follow up to The Fields – A Bouldering Film, is about a small community of climbers who are at the forefront of an emerging sport.

Arnall describes bouldering as similar to indoor free climbing except there are no safety ropes and climbers make their way up large rocks or boulders. The Okanagan is fast becoming one of the best spots in the world to practice the sport and there is even an annual competition every June called Rock the Blocs.

The first Rock the Blocs attracted only a few dozen local climbers but last year Arnall says they had more than 100 from around the world.

“Nobody ever even heard about bouldering a few years ago,” he says. “But now there are guys that come from all over the world to climb here. One guy from Germany stayed for a month in a trailer.

“That’s why we called the film Out of the Shadows."

Arnall says their second film, which will be released later this year, is less an introduction to the sport than an exploration of the preparations climbers have to do to get a rock ready to be climbed.

“Before Andy (White) and Jason (Duris) came along hardly anybody bouldered in the Okanagan,” he says. “They’ve come along and put up hundreds of ‘problems’.”

A problem is a complicated route the climber has to find their way through. The climbs are often much more complex and challenging than a sport climber would encounter but there is a thick foam pad underneath them in case they fall. 

While the first film was focused entirely on a spot near Kelowna mountain called the Boulderfields, their second feature will include new locations from around the Okanagan.

“There’s Cougar Canyon near Vernon and an area near Skaha," he says. "It’s a pretty well-known place around the world for sport climbing but not really known for bouldering yet.”

Arnall says the majority of the footage for the film has already been shot, and only the editing is left.

“We decided to do a little teaser now just to get people interested in it,” he says. “The next step is to do a trailer and the actual film will be finished sometime before summer. The plan is to try and get the trailer for the new film out before the next competition.”