Click2Daily: Climbing to new heights at Texas Rock Gym

As summer nears and the temperatures start to soar, you might want to head for the mountains.

While a weekend trip to Colorado might be out of the question, we found a place, in Houston, where you can climb mountains in an air-conditioned environment.

The rock cliffs are at the Texas Rock Gym www.texasrockgym.com. The climbing venue is in Spring Branch, just north of the Katy Freeway.

Here, every wall offers a different mountain to climb.

Parker Schifer celebrated his birthday Thursday by climbing. For him, it was more than exercise. "It’s all encompassing." He told KPRC 2. “It requires the best of you at every moment. You need to be focused physically. You need to be focused mentally.”

He said it was not just about being physically strong, but also about being patient and focused. He said every trip up the cliff is not easy. “The one that I was doing was hard for me." He said. "It’s a style that I’m not particularly good at and sometimes you need to rest longer than you want to and sometimes you get tired and just can’t make that next move.”

The look of the gym changes constantly. Workers here constantly change the paths to make the climbs more challenging for climbers of different abilities. “If you want to come in and try it out, all you have to do is wear some comfortable-fitting clothes that you can move and stretch in," Allen Corneau of the Texas Rock Gym said. "Some snug-fitting tennis shoes..or you can use our climbing shoes here."

We met one climber as young as 8. He explained that he started climbing when he was only 4! For some, this gym is their complete, daily workout routine.

Tape marks the different possible routes to the top of the mountain, or to the top of this facility on Campbell Road. But that marked path did not mean it would be an easy climb, even if it was your birthday. “Forces me to focus on things I’m not particularly good at," Schifer said, "Like being patient. Rest. Things like that. To me, it’s an embodiment of all of my strengths and all of my weaknesses.”

Follow KPRC 2 Reporter Ryan Korsgard on Facebook and Twitter as the fun takes him to new heights.