Where can you do some climbing training, indoors and outdoors, in the Stellenbosch area?

This photo was taken 1 week ago.

I spoke to the personnel at the gym and they aim for completion in 4 months. (Possible)
They assure me it will be roofed, and shop fronts all around.

It sounds like the plan is to have this the main entrance to the gym.
Think: A proper enclosed glass box structure like a car showroom.

Holding thumbs....

Cool, who is building the wall and where is it?

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Climb ZA - Administrator

As far as I understand it is being built by the Van der Stell gym. (the old Perfect Health)
It is however on municipal land, and a municipal building, so the legal semantics is quite beyond my.

Is at the Van der Stel Sport ground.
Corner of Du Toit Rd and Bergzight Rd.

That sounds good, but is there currently nothing? Anyone know of any boulders in the forests nearby etc? Does the University not have a bouldering wall or something?

The Neelsie does have a boulder wall.

No boulders in the fields as far as I'm aware of, no sport in the area, but there is some country-climbing trad in Jonkershoek.

If you're interested in a somewhat out of the way boulder that I regularly use for training, you can PM me. Its not much good for boulder problems, but its good for stamina training.

The wall in the Neelsie centre at the University is quite good for training - check it out.

Hi

There are some boulders in Jonkershoek. There is a granite boulder on the road to the Jonkershoek Nature Reserve, about 4km out of town, which has some tricky (but short) problems. In the nature reserve itself there are several, most of which are tricky to find (some will need to show you) but there are two that are easy to find: Go into the reserve, turn right at the first fork. Continue past the dam, after the road turns away from the dam it turns back to the left and goes up a hill. At the bottom of the hill there is a steep short road leading down to a road next to the river. Turn right on to this road, continue past the turnoff to the bridge over the river. Next is a wier in the river, there is a boulder in the wier which has some challenging problems on it. Also just next to the wier on the road is a overhanging boulder with more problems.

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Happy climbing
Nic

Thanks for the info, sounds interesting! Does anyone know how much it is to use the Neelsie as a non-student?

step 1 - get a visitors card to the university
This can be done in admin A, if you've been a student it very easy otherwise idk

step 2 - go to BTK room in 3rd floor neelsie between 1-2 (lunch time) and sign up.
I think its R180 for the year.. or something similarly CHEAP
They wil have you card activited within .. idk they are students afterall.

Btw in "regular" times there are always people there so just knock on the door.

I just spoke with Jan who owns the gym. He has requested some help from the climbing community to finish the wall. So there will be a meeting tomorrow night at the gym to show off the plans for the wall and the extensive bouldering cave to interested parties and hopefully negotiate terms for some people to assist with completing the work.

Anyone that's interested can attend tomorrow night (12 Apr) at 18:00 at the van der stel sports grounds (coffee shop area). It is opposite the police station in Stellenbosch.

Please note:

This wall is in no way safe for climbing purposes.

Under no circumstances should anybody climb this structure unless an engineer has redesigned the supports and tie-downs specifically for climbing.

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Some more info:

The steel structure has been designed to be bolted onto the building that will some day be built around it.
This future building will be the walls main structural support.

Currently the wall is being kept upright by temporary tie-downs that has been designed specifically as temporary support against wind forces.
The structure has been certified as such.

Before anybody puts a hand on that wall, please ensure that the structure has been redesigned for climbing purposes specifically.

Thanx Hann, I second that. The wall was designed to be bolted into the roof that is not built yet, and until that happens... no climbing. I'm wondering if a nice Black Southeaster wouldn't do the job of ripping those supports out, sommer while we wait...

I smell a white elephant...

It is truly worrying that the cowboys of the Van Der Stel gym are calling for volunteers to work on a dangerous wall.

In 2008 building props of a Stellenbosch building collapsed killing 3 and seriously injuring 4 others.
Some lost whole limbs.

If the intention of Van Der Stell gym is really to have that wall operational before it is safe to do so they should be reported to construction worker Health and Safety organisations.

There was a meeting.
Some people spoke up about safety and stuff.

Nobody will be getting on that wall until they have a "building" surrounding it.
Think they said estimates are in order of 3 months give or take.
Only then will they get "volunteers" and start putting up routes ect ect.

Otherwise sounds like the plan is to have 2 bouldering caves above each other.
And mostly they trying to involve climbers somewhat with idea and the design of more climbing space ect ect.

If you want to be kept informed send an email to jan at perfecthealth dot co dot za I think?
Ask him to add you to the mailing list.

If we lucky I think in 4 months from now (end of august) we might be able to start climbing there.

They are also going to expand the gym a lot. (Adding a swimming pool and so forth)

I hope I didn't gave any wrong information here. If so please correct me.

In anycase in the mean time the neelsie is about the best place to get some climbing practice. It really aint bad! its just a bit overcrowded sometimes.