January - Climb Some Rocks

My first endeavor is a big one, to go indoor rock climbing every day, and of course January has 31 days, so this is going to be 31 days of more exercise than my body has seen in a very long time. The idea for this experiment was hatched through a cool site called Groupon (www.groupon.com) that had an awesome deal of a 1-month membership (including equipment rental) to an indoor climbing gym called Boulders for only $20. Considering a one day pass can range from $12 - $16, not including equipment rental (and renting climbing shoes is a definite recommendation), I really couldn't pass up this deal. My husband and I debated over how many days I needed to commit to going climbing to make spending the $20 worth it, and I was afraid even 8 days would be too much. How then I decided that doing it every day was a good idea, I'll never know.

Needless to say, I purchased the Groupon and waited patiently for January 1st. When the day rolled around, I wasn't so sure I wanted to go (considering it was right after the hustle and bustle of the holidays, and it was a relaxing Sunday afternoon), but I figured I had better do it, because if I didn't go on Day 1, the chances of Days 2 - 365 happening looked pretty slim. So, I put on some suitable rock climbing attire, and headed for Boulders (Boulders website).

When I got there, I filled out the required waiver and worked up the courage to tell the desk attendant my crazy plan of coming every day for a month, just so I could get some tips on how to start and what to realistically expect. Thankfully, he didn't laugh in my face, and kindly recommended I work on traversing (which I took to mean just climbing side to side on some of the walls) and if I was going to be bouldering (climbing without a harness or rope aka free climbing, since I didn't have a climbing partner to belay me) to start with the V0 routes, and maybe by the end of the month work up to some V1s or V2s. Now this was all a little overwhelming, but I figured I had a month to figure it out, so I thanked him, took my size 6 climbing shoes (since he suggested a half size lower than my usual shoe size) and my chalk bag (for keeping my hands  dry while climbing) and headed in. This is the view that awaited me:

Inside View of Boulders (photo courtesy of bouldersgym.com)

Ready or not, here I come . . .