Climbing with kids outdoors

Kids love to climb but it is rather difficult to make the youngest once start liking outdoors. Indoors it is much easier as the holds are bigger, the mattress are softer and it is easier to be rappelled down, on a vertical wall. In fact, rope climbing outdoors will almost always end up with a problem lowering down the small kids on a slab, especially when they have a full body harness. In such case, it is almost impossible to make the youngsters to lean out backwards to be able to walk down like the firefighter. In one way, it is best to start climbing by bouldering outdoors if possible. You do not need any climbing shoes. Just help them push their gymnastics against the rock so the do not slip and hurt their knees. The only climbing shoes our kids use is the sandal look-a-like, Grip-it from La Sportiva. These they can use for hours and even walk to and from the crag. All normal climbing shoes they refuse to use. They are simply to hard and uncomfortable. Do not forget the helmet and once again it should be a cool and comfortable one so it can stay on for several hours. It is also good to have knee pads or rough trousers because the most common incident we have had is bruises on their knees. It should as always be noted that once inviting beginners to our rock climbing scene, make sure you begin super ultra easy on short walls. In practice this means bouldering grade 2a on 2 meters boulders or 8 meters rope climbing. Then they are of wanting to challenge themselves on more difficult and higher walls. It will not take long until they learn the grade system so you better start setting goals like climbing 100 meters or doing 10 boulders instead.