A Different Type of Climbing - I'm hooked!

The Bay Area's been experiencing some rainy weather lately, so things have slowed down a bit on the riding front. I've just been hitting the gym and the sauna.

Yesterday was another rainy day so Anthony and I decided to check out Mission Cliff's - a climbing gym here in San Francisco. I'm hooked (and sore). We took the introductory basics class where they taught us, well...the basics; how to tie on as the climber and how to set up to be the belayer. For those that don't know what a belayer does, here's a short quote from Wikipedia (I think you can figure out the Climber on your own?):

As the climber moves on the climb, the belayer must remove the slack from the rope by paying out or pulling in excess rope. If the climber falls, then they will free-fall the distance of the slack or unprotected rope before friction applied by the belayer will start to slow their descent. It is extremely important for the belayer to concentrate on the climber's situation, as their role is crucial for the climber's safety. Most belay methods also require an action by the belayer in order to arrest a fall, hence they must be alert and ready to perform this action at a moment's notice.

We worked our way around one small part of the wall...each of us taking a turn as the climber & belayer and then move over to the next rope...progressively getting more difficult. We climbed for about 3 hours and got to the point were our arms would tremble 1/2 way up the wall. Great cross training.