Once I was actually tied in and preparing to climbing though, I became a little hesitant. Heights have never been something that I would describe as a fear, but when you're about to climb 25ft up a rock face (real rock or man made) and you know that your life is in the hands of someone who is also new to it all you it suddenly becomes very real and a wee bit scary.
Not to mention that the chances of falling to your death are suddenly a lot higher than they were when you were happily walking around on solid ground.
Even once I'd got my head around the height there is the whole issue of technique to deal with, and I spent my first couple of months of climbing doing everything wrong, pulling up with my arms and getting tired very quickly. To put it plainly, there was a lot of wild flailing and scrabbling that occurred while on my route to poise and control! But I was hooked instantly.
Now, almost 3 years later, the boyfriend is long gone but my love for climbing has stayed. It's things like that that make you realise why people sometimes come into your life, if not to stay.
I've met so many lovely people through climbing.
When I found myself without a climbing partner after my ex and I split, I managed to pluck up the courage to head along to the Tuesday/Friday climbers 'club' at the EICA. I was so nervous on my first night there. I had posted up on the forum that I would be going along and I spent the night climbing with a guy called Rik. I got to know a good few faces and from then on I've always been known as 'Frecklechops'.
My current climbing partners are two guys called Zarek and Johnny. What I really love about the climbing community is the support and encouragement that people give one another. It a really positive environment to be in. I have a lot of fun doing it and it's a constant challenge to better myself and try to improve my technique (I'm still a little scrabbly and flaily at times).
I've recently gotten into bouldering too...so I decided to set this blog up to document some of my climbs and how my training and technique is going.
Watch this space.
