The Blaine Rock Climbing Club will begin its winter session on January 14, 2016.  The club meets every Thursday after school from 3:30 to 5:30 at Vertical Endeavors in Minneapolis.  Registration costs $175, but that money gets you a ten-week pass to Vertical Endeavors, meaning that you can climb for free anytime, not just when the club is meeting.

Vertical Endeavors is a rock climbing facility that includes roughly 28,000 square feet of climbing walls and routes of up to sixty feet tall.  There are four parts in a normal practice: a warm-up, a lesson in some aspect of rock climbing, time to practice that aspect, and free climbing.  

The club runs three ten-week sessions in a school year, in the fall, winter, and spring.  The fall session ended in November.

Mr. Riordan, the club’s advisor, started the club last year.  He has been rock climbing for roughly ten years.  An Outdoor Adventures teacher, Mr. Riordan had to take rock climbing certification classes and, while taking them, decided that rock climbing sounded like fun.  

He has climbed at a lot of places, but his favorites include Copper Canyon in Colorado and Devil’s Lake in Wisconsin. 

Mr. Riordan says that you should join the club because it’s really fun to be competing against yourself, not other people.  He adds that climbing is peaceful because when you climb, you don’t think of anything else.