“You must always push the limits. Because if you never fail, you will never succeed.” Unknown author. I’m horribly afraid of heights. Sometimes, looking out of an elevator or down a bridge is too much. But this fear also annoys me. So when my friends decided to take a climbing class for beginners, I decided this would be a good occasion to face this fear.

We booked the class with “Alpine Welten” and drove to Blaubeuren last Friday. The class lasted two days, Saturday and Sunday. At 9 am we met our group and our guide Fabian. We were six people who took the class. At Alpine Welten, that’s the maximum number of pupils in one class and I liked that very much. There are a few rocks around Blaubeuren so we needn’t drive anywhere else but could start right away.

At first, Fabian explained the most important knots to us.

Then, the fun could begin. Man, was I nervous… And the reason for my nervousness was this wall:

Can you see the nose sticking out, right above the first carabiner? That was a really nasty point.

On the first day, our mission was “simply” to get on top of this rock…

OK, I can do this…

Let’s see, there’s the nose, nothing to hold on to or to step on… hmmm

Oh well, who cares about the style…

Hurray, not very ladylike but successful!

I made it! I made it to the top!! Wooohoooo!!

What do you mean with “You need to get down now”, Fabian??

Abseiling??!!!

Feels like Spiderman! Awesome!!

When I was back on the ground, I was so proud – and relieved!

We did some more abseiling on the afternoon, 25 meters to be precise. Very scary, too, but awesome when you made it.

On the second day, we learned how to use carabiner, how to abseil yourself and did some lead climbing. And of course, safeguarding was a big topic, too.

You can imagine how awesome I felt after these two days of my climbing class. I’m still afraid of heights, but now I know I can get over this feeling if I want to. And in my whole life, I never thought I would be the proud holder of a climbing license one day… But now… Tatatataaaa:

Did I mention that I am very proud?

One of our lovely class mates was thoughtful enough to bring sparkling wine on the second day so when we were finished and had all gotten our licenses, we were able to clink glasses on our achievements.

Thank you again, Thorsten! That was a fantastic idea!

Blaubeuren is only a one hour drive away from Stuttgart. Alpine Welten offers a variety of climbing classes, ice climbing, fixed rope routes and more. I can highly recommend booking a climbing class with them as I felt very safe with and well educated by our guide Fabian. For the near future, my friends and I decided to do some indoor climbing in Stuttgart. Either at Kletterzentrum Stuttgart at the Waldau or at Climbmaxx Stuttgart.

More information about:

Alpine Welten (only in German)

Kletterzentrum Stuttgart (only in German)

Climbmaxx Stuttgart (only in German)