On my lunch break today I went with a couple co-workers to the climbing wall at my gym. They go pretty often on their lunchbreaks and have encouraged me to attend for a while. So today I took them up on their offer and went with them to climb. To my surprise, it was actually a pretty fun experience. I've always looked at the people climbing the wall at the gym and wondered how difficult it was or if I could do it, but I never really had the urge to do it. But today for some reason, I was just thinking "Eff it!" The only thing that really makes the experiences a little bad is being a novice at hooking up all the safety harnesses and the rope.
The harness that engulfs your "junk" wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I imagined it being very tight and constrictive, but it was not bad at all. And I bet it magnified my "junk" a little, which made me feel like Ben Stiller in Dodgeball with his crotch-pump. But once I got the harness on along with my rented climbing shoes and got roped in, I was pretty anxious to see how far up the wall I could get.
So my co-worker instructed me on the signals to use if I need to rest while climbing the wall and which color-coded pegs I needed to follow and I hop onto the wall like a cat climbing a tree. Okay, maybe not. But I hopped on that joint (LOL). I start climbing and I am making pretty good progress. Pretty soon I get stuck and realize that I am about a story or so off the ground. At this point I realized the key to this whole climbing thing is to NOT LOOK DOWN while you're headed up the wall. I got a little nervous but I kept it moving and eventually made it all the way to the top. 
Little did I know that the worst part would be trying to repel back down the wall. Once at the top, I realized that I had to rely on my belayer (the person holding the other end of the rope) to support my weight while I repelled back down. So I was a little apprehensive about just letting go and having someone else support all 62 lbs (LOL) of my weight while I repelled a couple stories down. But after some communication with my belayer, I eventually let go and repelled down the wall safely. After that I waited a couple turns before I went back up a section of the wall that was a little more difficult and made it to the top on that one as well. You know I was SICED! I am still a little upset that I didn't get pictures though. This all made for a pretty good lunchbreak. I think I am going to start incorporating a wall climb into my normal workout regiment. I typically run, lift, and hoop about 4-5 days a week so I guess I'll throw the wall in there once per week. I think I just got put onto something new and exciting and I might run with this one for a little while. Hopefully my workout partner Osei will be willing to try this. It's definitely a total body workout that will get you super-buff. Sort of like this guy:
"My bad, that's not a schlong, it's your labium! EEEWWWWWW"
4 comments:
That sounds like a lot of fun...I will never say never...but I couldn't even climb the rope in Elementry school, let alone a wall....LMBO! but maybe...
Good look though on trying something new
It's really not that difficult. I have seen people that I would assume could not climb a wall be able to get up there and climb. It seems like it's a combination of strength and knowing how to shift your weight that helps you.
But again it was my first time, so I could be wrong. It's worth a shot if you're interested though.
k.c., kara, japera and i used to go wall climbing after ballet class when we were younger. by the time we were done, our pink little tights had holes ALL in them. ha! good times.
Definitely good times. I am going to take the belay class next week so I can do this whenever I want. Maybe they'll have a climbing wall on our ship in January? Hmmmmnnn...Gotta look into that.
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