climb on

It's not that often that I'm sitting around a computer at home killing time, but today I got home and T was half way through a movie and I'm not one to sit down part way through. So, I thought I'd write up a quick summary of my rock climbing experience, if for no reason aside from the fact that it should be entertaining to read some time down the road.

I wrote a blog post in Dec 07 saying that I was keen to "shake things up" by trying some new things, one of which I listed as a rock climbing lesson. Well, it was some months later before that happened, and it was entirely due to Tracey that I eventually tried it, but it did happen and I was right: I love it!

My first climb was back in September (I think). I went with Tracey and her friend Mel to Crag X, the local climbing gym (hat tip to matty here). Here's what I remember about that first climb:
- tons of fun
- clearly both a physically and mentally challenging sport
- I have wimpy grip strength!
- Tying a rope to yourself does not really lessen any fear of heights you might have!!!

Since then, we've started going to the gym roughly once a week. We made a point of stopping in to a large gym in Vancouver (Coquitlam, specifically) where we discovered what a really good climbing gym is all about. That place is awesome. Where CragX is basically all featureless, flat walls and relatively short climbs, Cliffhanger is twice as tall, has more organically textured walls and lots of variety. The place is flat out awesome.

Now that we've been climbing for about 6 months, things have started to move along. I'll put up a few more posts to bring you up to speed.