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I did this on Friday, but didn't get a chance to write up until now.
You have to pass a test to climb with ropes at Rockcreation, so I had James teach me and coach me, and I was still petrified when I showed up. I am not so good at tests where I have to perform with someone watching me. (Tests where no one's looking over your shoulder, like the written sort, don't bother me.) In fact, I think I have a mild phobia about them. Also, I had expected that they would watch me tie knots and so forth before they let me actually belay someone, to make sure that I knew how to do it before they actually let me hang on to someone suspended twenty-six feet up. But no! They had me tie one figure-eight knot on to James' belt, and then belay him.
I did not actually let him hit the ground. I just want to get that out of the way first. But I did mix up "On belay" vs. "belay on," and I let him drop too far, and the equipment they gave me was different from what I'd been practicing on, and I think I also got points deducted for looking petrified. So I flunked the belay test. Like I said, I have a problem with performance anxiety, which stems from a fear of doing things wrong under a hostile gaze and then being publicly informed that I did everything wrong. (I blame this on my father's unique method of teaching me to do various things-- show me once, then scream-- which resulted in me either never learning how to do them, or else learning several years later from someone else. Which just goes to show that insight alone is insufficient to change patterns, but I digress.) Anyway, I almost burst into tears, but recovered when I realized that I was still allowed to climb, just not belay-- especially since we weren't going to have me belay without a lot more practice anyway.
I really liked climbing with ropes. The knowledge that I was going to be caught if I fell took away a lot of the fear factor, and made me much more willing to take chances than when I was bouldering, and knew that if I missed the hold, I would just drop-- on to a mat and not very far, but a drop is a drop. There's always the possibility of acquiring a nasty joint injury. But I knew James wasn't going to drop me, and the book on climbing he loaned me said that no modern rope had ever broken just from catching a falling climber. I can't say that I did a huge amount of looking down at the floor, but I did look down to see where my feet were, and it was surprisingly un-scary.
I climbed several 5.5 and 5.6 routes, and one 5.7, on an eight metre (26 foot) wall. No falls where I had to be caught (one where I hung on with my hands), though there were a couple times when the extra balance I was getting off the harness might have been decisive. Unlike the bouldering experience, I didn't feel like I'd been hit by a truck the day after. I wonder if the hit-by-truck feeling was just because of the several times I fell and hung on by my hands, or because bouldering is physically harder, or the routes I was doing this time were substantially easier. Usually one doesn't condition the muscles in a new sport that quickly.
It occurs to me that the amount of fear one feels over any given activity or state is some combination of two conditions and how much weight you place on each:
1. Likelihood of undesirable outcome.
2. Degree of unpleasantness of undesirable outcome.
To take the examples of bouldering, wall-climbing, and belay testing:
Bouldering has a high likelihood of undesirable outcome # 1, which is falling. The degree of unpleasantness of falling itself is low (for me.) It has a moderate likelihood of undesirable outcome # 2 leading off of # 1, which is a bad landing causing some minor to moderate injury. Undesirable outcome # 2 has a high degree of unpleasantness, as far as I'm concerned. In other words, there's a low-to-moderate chance of something which I would regard as really bad, ie, knee or ankle twist or sprain, which evokes a moderate degree of nervousness over the activity.
Possible bad outcomes of climbing with ropes are the height itself (if you're really afraid of heights), falling and being caught (if you're afraid of falling), getting stuck halfway up too afraid to go farther, and taking a serious fall. As far as I'm concerned, the first two have little unpleasantness factor and the second two are very unlikely. Hence ropes = good time.
The test, however, had high degrees of both how much I would hate the bad outcomes, and how likely the bad outcome would be. Fear of poor performance, knowledge of likelihood of poor performance caused by a combination of lack of skills and nerves, concluding in bad outcome which then fuels future performance anxiety and poor performance... this is quite a historic problem for me.
The only thing I've found that helps is to improve my skills via practice until I get some good outcomes under my belt, at which point I am more convinced that a good outcome is possible and hence am more confident, and so forth. This has worked with public speaking and asking for raises and jobs, so since the skills involved in belaying at a beginning level are not all that complex, I'm guessing I will eventually manage to pass the test.
In retrospect, I have to say, I am impressed that James didn't run out of there screaming when the Rockcreation woman said, "And drop off the wall without warning."
You have to pass a test to climb with ropes at Rockcreation, so I had James teach me and coach me, and I was still petrified when I showed up. I am not so good at tests where I have to perform with someone watching me. (Tests where no one's looking over your shoulder, like the written sort, don't bother me.) In fact, I think I have a mild phobia about them. Also, I had expected that they would watch me tie knots and so forth before they let me actually belay someone, to make sure that I knew how to do it before they actually let me hang on to someone suspended twenty-six feet up. But no! They had me tie one figure-eight knot on to James' belt, and then belay him.
I did not actually let him hit the ground. I just want to get that out of the way first. But I did mix up "On belay" vs. "belay on," and I let him drop too far, and the equipment they gave me was different from what I'd been practicing on, and I think I also got points deducted for looking petrified. So I flunked the belay test. Like I said, I have a problem with performance anxiety, which stems from a fear of doing things wrong under a hostile gaze and then being publicly informed that I did everything wrong. (I blame this on my father's unique method of teaching me to do various things-- show me once, then scream-- which resulted in me either never learning how to do them, or else learning several years later from someone else. Which just goes to show that insight alone is insufficient to change patterns, but I digress.) Anyway, I almost burst into tears, but recovered when I realized that I was still allowed to climb, just not belay-- especially since we weren't going to have me belay without a lot more practice anyway.
I really liked climbing with ropes. The knowledge that I was going to be caught if I fell took away a lot of the fear factor, and made me much more willing to take chances than when I was bouldering, and knew that if I missed the hold, I would just drop-- on to a mat and not very far, but a drop is a drop. There's always the possibility of acquiring a nasty joint injury. But I knew James wasn't going to drop me, and the book on climbing he loaned me said that no modern rope had ever broken just from catching a falling climber. I can't say that I did a huge amount of looking down at the floor, but I did look down to see where my feet were, and it was surprisingly un-scary.
I climbed several 5.5 and 5.6 routes, and one 5.7, on an eight metre (26 foot) wall. No falls where I had to be caught (one where I hung on with my hands), though there were a couple times when the extra balance I was getting off the harness might have been decisive. Unlike the bouldering experience, I didn't feel like I'd been hit by a truck the day after. I wonder if the hit-by-truck feeling was just because of the several times I fell and hung on by my hands, or because bouldering is physically harder, or the routes I was doing this time were substantially easier. Usually one doesn't condition the muscles in a new sport that quickly.
It occurs to me that the amount of fear one feels over any given activity or state is some combination of two conditions and how much weight you place on each:
1. Likelihood of undesirable outcome.
2. Degree of unpleasantness of undesirable outcome.
To take the examples of bouldering, wall-climbing, and belay testing:
Bouldering has a high likelihood of undesirable outcome # 1, which is falling. The degree of unpleasantness of falling itself is low (for me.) It has a moderate likelihood of undesirable outcome # 2 leading off of # 1, which is a bad landing causing some minor to moderate injury. Undesirable outcome # 2 has a high degree of unpleasantness, as far as I'm concerned. In other words, there's a low-to-moderate chance of something which I would regard as really bad, ie, knee or ankle twist or sprain, which evokes a moderate degree of nervousness over the activity.
Possible bad outcomes of climbing with ropes are the height itself (if you're really afraid of heights), falling and being caught (if you're afraid of falling), getting stuck halfway up too afraid to go farther, and taking a serious fall. As far as I'm concerned, the first two have little unpleasantness factor and the second two are very unlikely. Hence ropes = good time.
The test, however, had high degrees of both how much I would hate the bad outcomes, and how likely the bad outcome would be. Fear of poor performance, knowledge of likelihood of poor performance caused by a combination of lack of skills and nerves, concluding in bad outcome which then fuels future performance anxiety and poor performance... this is quite a historic problem for me.
The only thing I've found that helps is to improve my skills via practice until I get some good outcomes under my belt, at which point I am more convinced that a good outcome is possible and hence am more confident, and so forth. This has worked with public speaking and asking for raises and jobs, so since the skills involved in belaying at a beginning level are not all that complex, I'm guessing I will eventually manage to pass the test.
In retrospect, I have to say, I am impressed that James didn't run out of there screaming when the Rockcreation woman said, "And drop off the wall without warning."
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I have a problem with performance anxiety, which stems from a fear of doing things wrong under a hostile gaze and then being publicly informed that I did everything wrong. (I blame this on my father's unique method of teaching me to do various things-- show me once, then scream-- which resulted in me either never learning how to do them, or else learning several years later from someone else
((wry look)) You too, eh? ....of course, it has resulted in me being able to pick up instructions on first hearing in non-pressure situations. So basically a useless skill, that....
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Belay tests make me nervous. It's the public aspect thing.
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How long have you been climbing? How did you start?
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As long as the knots are tied right, everything else is safe and pretty well controlled--less room for the unpredictable than one would think, or than with most such things.
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Maybe I can convince MK to go climbing at rockreation with me sometime, as we both work on that side of town anyway.
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Actually, I think I'm going to hound him to put aside $100 so we can both go in and take their belay/basic climbing class, which includes the belay test and becoming certified to belay there.
Because yes! That would be fun. And an excellent way for me to unwind after a long and stressful day.
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I've actually belayed, but not climbed, having pulled a calf muscle the day I could have climbed with them. Not sure how good I'd be--I am phobic about heights, though the fear never kicks in until I'm actually there; the intellectual idea of heights I like just fine. Must go back and try again.
The girls liked the coming-down part best of all. They'd let go of the wall, and the belayer would slowly or not-so-slowly let them slide on down. :-)
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If you do more complicated stuff, you'll get more sore...trust me on that.
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(You may even have been one of the many internet people who contributed to my getting the idea that this was something I could try.)
the book on climbing he loaned me said that no modern rope had ever broken just from catching a falling climber.
Yup. Unless it's been damaged by an external force (e.g. cut by a sharp edge of rock, or had battery acid poured on it, or is waaaay past the age when it should have been retired) modern gear just doesn't break. The force it will withstand is a) way, way above anything that'd be encountered in a climbing situation, and b) way above that which the human body can withstand.
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If so, I am THRILLED.
IIRC, what ended up happening with me climbing was that unlike the other sports I've gotten seriously into, where there were either regular classes I could attend at least weekly or I could do it all by myself, was that the gym was quite expensive and did not have regular beginner's classes, so I had to wait for James to get an expedition going that would be OK for a beginner. (And then I tended to feel like I was holding everyone back, because I was the only beginner.) So, not enough practice for me to ever get really comfortable with it.
Also, both the ropes and certain aspects of climbing were a little too mathematical/spatial skills-requiring for me. I recall a lot of getting stuck with people trying to coach me through a move by telling me to think about it in a puzzle-type way, when what I like about doing physical stuff is that it's less about using your mind and more about using your body. This is probably why I liked Shotokan so much - it's a very stripped-down martial art with a comparatively limited set of moves, and the idea is to learn to do a few things perfectly. So there is a mental aspect, but once you have the basic move down, you learn to do it perfectly by repeating it a million times with coaching. If you get stuck, you do it again. You don't get stuck standing still until you mentally figure something out.
The part of climbing I liked was the movement part. As I mentioned, I used to climb as a kid - the sort of climbing that's part hiking, part scrambling over boulders, part climbing up quite easy cliffs that are nonetheless actual (if small) cliffs.
…so how mathematical IS bouldering? If you don't care about getting really good at it, can you enjoy it at an easy level where it's more about physically moving your body than solving mental Rubik's Cube puzzles?
ETA: Falling when bouldering: I think I'd be less worried about that now. The little amount of climbing I did do overcame a lot of my fear of falling.
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Hrmm. Have been thinking about this (ironically/appropriately, partly while walking to a crag, bouldering mat on back) because I want to try to give an accurate answer that you can use, not just be all BOULDERING IS AWESOME EVERYONE SHOULD DO IT.
I think you can fairly rapidly get to a point where you can cruise round doing lots of "easy" stuff (whatever "easy" is for your climbing level) -- I was doing this last time I was at an indoor wall, running round mostly doing things I could do in one or two tries. You can get a lovely sense of flow going, with just enough mental challenge to keep it interesting.
It doesn't have to be the serious "projecting", spend an hour glaring at a problem until my forehead starts sweating blood, interspersed with trying and failing to string single moves together (then repeat, for session after session) type stuff. Which I also do, but it's not compulsory.
(Also: it's very often collaborative. Because you don't need a partner to boulder, boulderers are quite good at chatting to strangers and people-they-vaguely-know-to-say-hi-to-at-the-climbing-wall, and there's a lot of taking turns on a problem and sharing ideas. Which turns out to be a thing I can do when I feel like it, autism notwithstanding: it is "talking about a thing I am obsessively interested in"! that is a thing I can do!
At the crag today, there was a guy who wanted to work on the same problem I was glaring at, and I ended up contributing the bits of "beta" I'd already worked out, and then he worked out some other bits, and I worked out a bit from there, and now I potentially know how to do the whole thing, though I still don't know if I'm strong enough and have to go back for future sessions when I have more energy and also more skin.
So, even if you want to project harder stuff, you don't have to be stuck glaring and failing on your own.)
On the other hand: the problems are always different (you can repeat the same problem, and some people will try to repeat something a few times to "perfect" it, and that's sometimes recommended as a way to improve technique, but essentially you keep moving on to different problems). You improve your understanding of a technique (say, heel-hooking) by applying it in lots of different situations, and getting better at reading problems and recognizing when it's applicable. It's not going to be repeating the same move a million times in exactly the same way.
Also, both the ropes and certain aspects of climbing were a little too mathematical/spatial skills-requiring for me.
I only added the ropes after bouldering for three years, so I didn't have to master it all at once (thankfully, because I would not have been able to do it) but there's definitely a level of brain-breaking aaaaaahh WTF-ness that you get initially and that is temporary and transient.
when what I like about doing physical stuff is that it's less about using your mind and more about using your body.
*nod* Climbing's definitely not a thing you can do mindlessly, even when it's at the level of "problems I can solve super-quickly and boost my ego and delight myself with and run round going wheeeeee" (N.B. I was not actually running round the climbing wall going wheeeee the other day, though I might as well have been). What I get from it (among other things) is a feeling of mind-body fusion, that it's a problem I'm solving with my mind and my muscles and for a second it's all the same thing. It's a crossword puzzle which you dance, I have said once or twice.
So. That might or might not be what speaks to you.
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In the UK there's actually a thing called "scrambling" which is essentially that -- basically anything where you're sometimes going to be using your hands as well as your feet, and where you might occasionally use a rope for protection, but before you get into full-on rock climbing:
https://www.thebmc.co.uk/articles/tag/scrambling
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(The big obstacle is poison oak. FUCKING EVERYWHERE. And there's no way to get through it, because if it touches your clothes, you can't get out of your clothes without it touching your skin. Nobody likes it but I am actually allergic to it, or was as a child - I got a bad case that set off some weird skin reaction that I could not get rid of for literally years. Whenever I thought it was finally gone, it would come back. I don't know if that would happen again, but I have avoided the hell out of it ever since.)
But I've been on hikes where I found some nice potential climbing areas, but couldn't go as all-out as I'd have liked because I was alone, there's no cell phone reception in the hills, and in the unlikely but possible event that I broke my ankle or had an Aron Ralston-esque freak accident, I would be in trouble as I hadn't told anyone where I was going. But as long as I passed on my route to a friend before I got out of range and told her to call out the rescue guys if I didn't check in by [whatever time], I should be fine.
I was once lucky enough to hit a difficult-for-me waterfall climb at the same time as some clearly more experienced and friendly hikers were doing it, so I was able to ask them if they'd keep an eye on me while I attempted it. (I was pretty sure I could get up by myself. I was not sure I could get down safely - it wasn't that high, but if you fell or jumped, you'd be landing in water covering slippery rocks. Indeed, one of them did end up giving me a hand on the way down.)
But yeah, I'm pretty sure it's a thing around here even if it's not called that. A lot of LA hills are somewhat geographically similar to the ones I used to climb in India, though with more vegetation. So it's harder to get to the climb-y parts, because they're often off-trail - like, within sight of the trail so you're not going to get lost - but anything not right on the trail may have a poison oak barrier. In fact if I hike in summer, sometimes I have to turn back because the goddam stuff, while not literally growing ON the trail, has sent out fronds blocking the trail.
ETA: OMG. If Wikipedia is to be believed… "Toxicodendron diversilobum is found in California (also the original name of Los Angeles; Yangna or Iyaanga/poison oak place)."
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I think the term "scrambling" doesn't get used in the US (or not so specifically to denote a particular sub-sport), but obviously the thing still exists, just somewhere in the hazy hard hiking/very easy climbing overlap. "Class 3" (or sometimes 4) hiking might cover it:
http://www.utahoutside.com/2010/07/hiking-trail-difficulty-ratings-got-class-now-you-do/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yosemite_Decimal_System
Important note: scrambling is in some respects more dangerous than rock climbing, because you're usually not using a rope (people who get into the more serious scrambles will often take a rope and use it to protect particular sections).
(I am much, much more scared on scrambly approaches/descents to get to/from routes than when actually climbing. THERE'S NO ROPE OR MAT BUT IF I SLIP VERY BAD THINGS COULD HAPPEN. Also, unlike many climbers, I don't have a hillwalking/scrambling background, so much less practice.)
So yeah, potentially worth finding a hiking/scrambling partner(s). If you prefer to do it solo, then you have to be conscious of the risks (which obviously you are, as evidenced both by the comment I'm replying to and our shared fondness for incident analysis-type reading ...).
Also, doing a bit of climbing/bouldering will expand your repertoire of moves for scrambly stuff, IMHO.
Only semi-relatedly (but I'd forgotten you were in LA) -- this might interest/entertain:
https://www.amazon.com/Climbs-Alternative-Uses-Architecture/dp/190103349X
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The trouble with finding a partner is that it can be quite logistically difficult to get together due to the sheer size of LA - this was a big issue with rock climbing. Also I like being solo in the wilderness.
That being said, I'm hiking on trails so an actual Aron Ralston situation is impossible - people are on them literally every day. Even when I go at odd times/days to get the fewest others around, I always run into a least one person once. The absolute longest I could get in trouble would be overnight - hence the text-to-friend if there's any chance of a non-freak accident. I think doing some bouldering with others would be fun though, and as you say would improve my skills.
I'm meeting with my orthopedist to have a talk about switching the focus of PT from "relieve pain" (mostly accomplished) to "rebuild strength so I can do some moderately challenging activities, given the arthritis, meniscus tear, and the fact that I spent most of last year as a complete invalid on a sofa."
(I had the same talk with my PT and he agreed that given my goals and excellent treatment response, I should continue. He did some tests and found that while my left knee is much worse, my right is also weak, so it might have a problem too but more likely (or also) I am just in lousy shape for obvious reasons. (For calibration, at previous (years ago) PT sessions I scored high on most strength tests not involving the injured part.)
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*votes for immediate re-naming*
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Down is often so much harder than up. As you can imagine, this is a way to get oneself into trouble.
(One of my personal rules for outdoor climbing, which I learnt the hard way and still occasionally have to re-learn: Always Check The Down-Climb.)
(I once let a friend talk me into trying a boulder problem in Fontainebleau which I surprised myself by being able to do. However, it was too steep to be reversible, and while it was only three metres or so high, the way off that boulder was over the top and down the easiest face, which was indeed easy but was also eight metres high. Doesn't necessarily mean I wouldn't have done it, but I generally prefer to know about things like that in advance ...)
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Giant forest near Paris full of thousands and thousands of sandstone boulders.
Has some of the hardest boulder problems in the world, but also vast numbers of delightful easy problems (there are even circuits specifically for children) -- in fact, vast numbers of everything. You can go there and climb/play at any level you want. Also, beautiful.
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Man, I wish I'd known about that when I was actually in Paris. I would've gone.
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Okay, the boulders are in clusters, with more tree-full areas (or sometimes stretches of sand) in between, but it is that kind of density in each cluster and there are a lot of very big clusters.
(I actually have issues with my brain being broken by Font because there's JUST TOO MUCH OF IT and it's impossible to process.)
In some areas there are circuits where you can do the whole circuit without touching the ground, by stepping or jumping between boulders.
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Here's the hill I used to climb about once a week between the ages of seven and twelve, usually by myself by the time I was nine or so.
http://avatarmeherbaba-israel.com/images/gallery/archive/Seclusion%20Hill/Seclusion%20Hill_1994_2.jpg
I couldn't find a good close-up, but see that cliff-ring near the top? It's fairly steep, but has tons of holds. (The actual danger is that many are loose and can come off in your hand or underfoot.) There's a trail that cuts into the cliff. If you follow it, zero scrambling is required. You can also not follow the trail and go straight up; that involved lots of scree and some climbing; some routes were probably do-able but I didn't try them because you'd break your neck if you fell. I stuck with the ones where a fall wouldn't be too serious. In my nine-year-old judgment, plus my Dad pointing out and banning a few.
It also had a lot of geodes, which I learned to find by weighing rocks in my hand and seeing if they weighed less than they should, plus an unusual rock called okenite (locally called punite), which has a recognizable look on the outside, feels impossibly light, and is FURRY if you crack it open. (But you don't want to actually touch the fur, that ruins it; it's incredibly fine crystals. It does feel like fur though.)
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http://www.hikespeak.com/trails/santa-ynez-falls/
I don't recall the rope; either someone removed it, or it was not clearly visible. That photo makes the waterfall look hairier than it actually is - when I was there the water level was lower and there was less moss and more obvious holds.
Anyway, that's one of my favorite trails. It's really beautiful but the photo with the blue flowers gives you an idea of how overgrown the trail gets. (Similar to what's shown, but more so - look at the background, not the foreground.) Last time I was there I couldn't even get to the falls because I'd have had to push my way through poison oak. (Someone comes through periodically and thins it out, I assume.)