made it to the summit. “The biggest pay-
offs for me were the gorgeous views and
the sense of accomplishment of facing
down a fear,” she admits. “I will abso-
lutely do it again.”
A training wall is a great way for height-
averse people to test the waters, says
Chris Peterson, owner of the Waterfall
Canyon Climbing Park in Ogden, Utah.
“About 5 percent of people just can’t get
comfortable in the vertical environment,”
explains Peterson. “Some will finish the
training wall and say, ‘That was fun but
this isn’t for me; I’ll just hike to the water-
fall and take photos.’”
Visitors to Peterson’s park can choose
from three routes, which vary in dif-
ficulty. While they all take courage, he
says none of them requires great physical
ability. “If you can climb a ladder, you can
do a via ferrata,” he says. Peterson has led
climbers as young as 6 and as old as 70.
That said, you probably shouldn’t
expect your day of climbing to be a walk
in the park. Via ferrata is like climbing a
ladder, but an average route is more like
500 sequential ladders, so you want to be
rested and feeling strong.
What to Expect
Like rock climbing, via ferrata combines
the rewards of physical challenge with the
chance to be immersed in the beauty of
wild places.
From mid-June through Labor Day,
visitors to Smugglers’ Notch in Vermont
can sign up for a guided trip through a
via ferrata course where they’ll encounter
a whole range of outdoor wonders.
During the two-and-a-half-hour
adventure, climbers experience a zipline,
a rope bridge, a waterfall ascent and a
hike through a stream.
“It’s a hybridization, since the water-
ways are what Vermont has to offer,
rather than a canyon,” explains Austin
Paulson, owner of Smuggler Adventure
Tours. “Visitors experience rappelling,
canyoneering, rock climbing and a ropes
course wrapped into one.”
Not all routes have guides. Torrent
Falls, located in the Red River Gorge in
Kentucky, offers a self-guided course that
normally takes about three to four hours.
The course is divided into six sections
— with four degrees of difficulty — and
offers an exit after each section if you
Family fun:
Rock climbers
Christina and Erik
Dochtermann at a via
ferrata in Waterfall
Canyon, in Ogden,
Utah, with their two
young sons.
Though there are no guides on the
route, there are two training rocks,
allowing climbers to get comfortable in
a harness and test out the feel of clipping
and unclipping their carabiners. “Rock
guards” watch all of the climbers through
binoculars to make sure that everyone is
moving along safely.
Bring the Gang
In August 2008, Christina Dochtermann
and her husband, Erik, both avid rock
climbers, decided it was time to experience some adventure with their two
young sons, then ages 6 and 8. They
chose via ferrata.
The Dochtermanns, who live in
Bedford, N.Y., had read about the via
ferrata in Waterfall Canyon, so they made
the one-hour drive from their vacation
condo in Deer Valley to spend the day in
Ogden. “It was an extraordinary family
bonding opportunity, and once we got
to the top, the sense of accomplishment
was so satisfying,” says Christina. “As a
climber, there was a bliss and ease that
I could be on the rock face but still have
this great security.”
Although there are risks involved with
any type of adventure activity, via ferrata
sites all do their best to mitigate possible
dangers. Many sites will shut down if
there’s any type of precipitation, and
some have minimum-age limits. Families
should be sure to check out safety policies
beforehand to make sure that younger
climbers are allowed.
Though it may seem scary at first,
most climbers say that the rewards of via
ferrata are unbeatable. “I get some people
who are gripping on the rungs for dear
life and others who are standing on the
edge with a camera holding on with one
hand,” says Zook. “But the biggest reaction is excitement — all the people who
say, ‘I can’t believe I’m doing this!’”
Caren Osten Gerszburg is a writer and
editor in New York.
experiencelifemag.com
Resources
At all of the via ferrata climbing
areas listed below, equipment
(harness, helmet and lanyard),
and in some cases a guide, is
included in the cost.
Nelson Rocks Preserve in
Pendleton County, W. Va.
$48–$65 for a day pass. 800-
729-9230; www.nelsonrocks.org
Smugglers’ Notch in
Jeffersonville, Vt.
$35–$40, depending on the
route. Includes guide. 800-
419-4613; www.smuggs.com
Torrent Falls Climbing
Adventure in Campton, Ky.
$29–$32 for an all-day
pass. 606-668-6613;
www.torrentfalls.com
Waterfall Canyon Climbing
Park in Ogden, Utah
A guided trip costs $150 for the
first climber; $50 for each additional climber. 801-550-1761
Aventurex in Charlevoix,
Quebec
$40 U.S., $45 Canadian.
Includes guide. 800-762-4967;
www.aventurex.net
Whistler in British Columbia
$109–$129, includes sight-
seeing lift ticket for Whistler
Mountain. 800-944-7853;
www.whistler.com
For more detailed
information about each
of these sites, see
the online version
of this article.
