UKC

Greetings, basically been out scrambling areas around north wales. Enjoying scrambling a great deal and I'm interested in gaining some rope skills to add into the equation. As a scramble is the middle ground between a challenging walking ascent and a climb, I'm trying to get some advice on the best course of action to take to develop the skills and get hands on with the equipment. So my questions are should I be looking at joining an indoor climbing club or would an outdoor bouldering course be the way to proceed? Any advice appreciated on starting out.

My somewhat biased opinion is to go on a course with a suitable qualified instructor / guide.

If you join a mountaineering club, some are supportive of teaching people the basics, other prefer some prior experience. 

I wouldn't bother with a bouldering course for what you want.

Hi Thomas, 

Definitely a few options for getting started. One of them would be a local climbing club, you can find a list of BMC affiliated clubs here: https://www.thebmc.co.uk/find-a-club

Clubs often run outdoor trips for new climbers, as well as regular indoor meets. It varies depending on the club obviously, but they’re a great way to meet like minded people. 

I would say it’s best to have some experience of climbing before joining a club though, as it will open up more opportunities once you’ve joined the club. I run climbing courses in either the Peak District or North Wales, feel free to get in touch with me if that’s of interest. https://www.mikenolanmountaineering.co.uk/climbing

I don’t personally see any value in just doing a bouldering course. Don’t get me wrong, I love bouldering outdoors, but if you have aspirations of roped climbing or scrambling, then you could definitely start with those.

Cheers, Mike  

If you know you want to focus on scrambling rather than getting into full-on route-climbing, there are courses focused on that -- Plas-y-Brenin does some, e.g.:

https://www.pyb.co.uk/course/advanced-scrambling---2-day/