Climbing - an Activity Outline

Climbing is the fastest growing sport in the UK (MORI, 1999). This has followed the introduction of indoor walls which make winter climbing an option, and practise easier. There is also far greater access for people living in urban areas, making the sport ever more popular.

The Trekking Company provides high quality climbing instruction - this activity is one of the main components of our multi-activity courses as well as in the specialist climbing courses we offer.

Climbing is a general term covering a variety of activities:

Bouldering: training without ropes on large boulders

Indoor climbing: Originally used for training but now an activity in its own right

Rock climbing: as you would think...

Mountaineering 

Scrambling 

Winter climbing

Instruction is by our instructors qualified with at least SPA (Single Pitch Award) or MIA (Mountaineering Instructor Award); we guarantee a friendly approach designed to help clients who have no experience of climbing.

Rockskills Courses

Rockskills Courses 1,2 and 3 are weekend courses designed to introduce you to climbing so that you can learn to climb independently.
The courses enable you to start at any level according to your previous experience (or lack of it!) - so you could have never climbed before, used an indoor wall or juts be a little rusty…
After each course there is a stage of climbing for which you will have been taught the basics, eventually being taught how to ‘lead climb’ and what it entails.

The courses are held in a variety of areas; hopefully you will leave each course and practice the techniques learned, ready to progress to the next level.

Rockskills 1 - The basics
We teach you how to tie knots, use basic equipment properly, set up your own climbs on simple crags, belay (safeguard the climber) and a variety of techniques which are essential to the beginner.

Rockskills 2 - Get to grips
Learn the elementaries of gear placement and safeguarding yourself on the rocks. The main element of this course is setting up anchors to enable you to toprope using natural gear placement.

Rockskills 3 - Take the Lead
This is a basic ‘learn to lead’ course—leading is a complicated art which takes years of practice, but we will introduce you to the basic principles so that you can make a start.

Equipment

There is a lot of equipment required for these courses, and especially at levels 1 and 2 we assume you don’t have any specialist gear. At level 3 you would normally have some gear, as to reach this stage you will have decided that climbing is for you. However, it isn’t necessary to use your own - we will supply everything.

Costs

Rockskills 1 - £120
Rockskills 2 - £120
Rockskills 3 - £150 (All instruction only)

We organise Rockskills courses in Sussex (Level 1) and the Peak and Lake Districts (Levels 2 and 3). We also offer a full package for the weekend including B&B should you want this.