The Climb

Okay, climbing may not be true cardio, but it is an incredible workout and much more exciting than your average daily run, so I thought it blog-worthy.

Now I'm not a climber by any means. I don't know any fancy climbing lingo and I usually need help making the knots. I've done this just a few times in my life so far, and only recreationally at that. Last time I did this my fingers, wrists, and arms were so sore for so may days I was barely able to use a pen effectively!

But nonetheless, I'm lucky to have a rock climbing wall near my small town to begin with.

Although the climb was painful I'm glad I have my friend, Farrah,  that will "suggest" it to the point where I actually think I want to go. That sounds bad. I had fun and I did feel like it was a major accomplishment, even though this was not nearly the tallest climbing wall I've ever seen.

Well, there she goes. Showing me how to go all spider monkey. 

Guess I better do up this knot now, temporarily forgetting just how much this workout is going to make me sweat. And hurt. And feel very, very defeated at some points. 

That is one comically long arm I've got.

There are 4 courses at this place, 1 being the easiest and 4 being the hardest. Last time I climbed, I got to the top of walls 1, 2, and 3, although I may have slightly cheated assisted myself on an adjacent wall while climbing number 3. So the goal for today was to own wall number 4. 

 

And about 30 minutes and just enough assistance later, I finally did. Which for me, that means I actually accomplished 2 goals with this climb...making it to the top of wall 4 and not chipping off any nail polish! I know, it sounds ridiculous. I just really like well-kept, non-chipped nails for myself. And winning. 

But on that last picture, I'm actually on wall 2 again. I thought it would be "fun" and "easy" since I've done the harder walls already. Not quite so. The strength left in my wrists and fingers was minimal and it felt nearly as hard as wall 4 by the time I was only half of the way up. 

I guess for this activity, you've just got to hang on, literally. If you missed your footing once, try it again or try a new path. You may slip, but you're not going to end back up where you started, they won't let that happen to you. 

That sounded so philosophical, so I'll stop there.