I rock...well, sort of...

When I was in college I went to Chicago to visit a friend. She insisted we go to the top of the Sears Tower and take in the view. I was the only tourist that stood in the middle of the room and sort of gazed out the window from afar. Everybody else was pressed against the windows looking down to the streets below.

I don't like heights.

We went to Las Vegas, and had to stay in the hotel a bazillion stories high. And of course we ended up on the top floor. I kept the drapes closed the entire time. Even then I made sure my husband slept on the side of the bed closest to the window just so I wouldn't accidentally roll out of bed and fall out the window. Seriously. I didn't tell him why, because we we're newly married and well, you know, I didn't want him to think he made a mistake choosing a freak for a life partner.

Anyway.

You could say I have an irrational fear of heights. (And clowns too, but that's for another blog. But I tell you right now if I ever met a clown on the top of a high rise...brrr...no...I can't even think of it, it creeps me out. )

And yet despite my fear of clowns, heights and Las Vegas, I found myself at Planet Granite last night; halfway up a wall, balancing on tiptoe on the littlest piece of fake rock ever made by man, supported by a rope, and a person who at best I can describe as not entirely reliable. And I was fine. In fact, I had fun.

We started on a medium hardish wall (well to me anyway), and I made it halfway up my first time before my brain interupted and said "Excuse me, what the hell do you think you're doing? You get down from there right now, young lady!" Then I had to practice coming down, which took some convincing. You actually have to let go of the wall and be lowered down by rope. My hands didn't want to let go at first, but the other option of just hanging on the wall for the rest of the night was not appealing.

Then after a few tries climbing the first wall, we went to a harder wall that had an overhang. It's interesting how few people understand the concept of beginner. For some reason if you are slightly active in other sports type activities people just assume that you can race down rocky trails on a bike, or climb up really tall difficult walls. Whatever happened to training wheels, and starting easy? However, I gave it a try and made it halfway up over the overhang. Then my leg started shaking, so I came back down.

The very last wall I climbed was the beginner wall (at last!), and I made it all the way to the top.

I thought for sure the hardest part of rock climbing would be freaking out over the heights. But the hardest part was trying to remember how to tie the knots on the rope. Where's a boyscout when you need one?

So fake rock climbing is kind of fun. Not as fun as mountain biking, but really, what is? However, I'm for any sport that has cute shoes. So I'll go back. I have to make it up over that overhang.