We decided to return to the climbing wall, but masks made it difficult

Holly Baxter hadn’t considered just how challenging it might be to do moderate-intensity exercise with a mask clamped to her face, but being able to do it made the weekend feel a little more normal

Grabbing at holds on a plastic wall while you attempt to haul your own body weight around is no mean feat (Shutterstock)

Most New Yorkers have had to give up at least one ridiculous-sounding exercise class during the coronavirus pandemic. My own class of choice – “mindful yoga and kickboxing with primal movements” – may sound like a parody from the California-bashing comedy Silicon Valley, but it pales in comparison to the others some of my friends partake in (bucking broncos on sand and spinning in a pool, to name just two). Besides, I haven’t actually had to give up my primal movements combined with active yoga. Instead, the married couple who run the classes sign in on Zoom every Saturday from their leafy home in the Hamptons, along with their young daughter (Mia-Luna, because of course) who toddles up to the screen at the end of class and says one of the only words she knows to the assembled online audience: “Namaste.”

Despite the joy I get out of that class, there’s one shared activity I’ve really missed: climbing. It’s an activity my fiancé, E, and I can do together (he’s got good upper body strength; I’m small – you basically only need one or the other to be able to do it, though it’s best if you have both.) So you can imagine our excitement when the Cliffs at Dumbo, our favourite outdoor climbing wall, reopened last week in time for “phase four” of reopening. We signed up without a second thought.

When I went to get my hair done for the first time in four months a couple of weeks ago, it sounded a little less traumatic than it was in practice

When the forms came through that we had to sign, basically saying that we wouldn’t sue anyone there if we caught coronavirus, we scribbled our digital signatures and moved on. When the extra rules were sent through, which told us that we had to queue six feet apart from everyone else, stay in certain areas on the wall, sanitise regularly, bring our own climbing chalk and keep our face masks on at all times, we shrugged and said we understood.

The problem is that the experience of climbing with all of these restrictions in place is slightly different to how you might imagine. Like when I went to get my hair done for the first time in four months a couple of weeks ago, it sounded a little less traumatic than it was in practice. At the hair salon, everyone was sectioned off behind plastic shields, we all wore face masks, I was directed to wash my hands twice (first with sanitiser, then with soap), and I had to sign another legal waiver as soon as I walked in the door. So far, so “new normal”. But the real thing that got me was the heat. With all of us covered in PPE, my hairdresser had to stop every few minutes because she was overheating next to the blowdryer and felt like she was going to faint. The sweat poured down my legs and puddled on the floor beneath me while she chopped at my fringe. Eventually, with my hair half-dry, I said I’d had enough and left to let the sun do the rest of the work outside. New York summers are no joke.

Similarly, at the climbing wall, neither of us had considered just how challenging it might be to do moderate-intensity exercise with face masks clamped to our faces. Even during our 6pm appointment, it was well over 30 degrees in the outdoor nook the climbing gym has carved out underneath the Manhattan Bridge. While walking round in an air-conditioned supermarket is fine with a mask, grabbing at holds on a plastic wall while you attempt to haul your own body weight around is no mean feat. E got so sweaty from completing one particularly challenging route that he almost blinded himself, while my mask ended up slipping up over my eyes when I was reaching for the top. Luckily the floor is lined with bits of rubber.

Despite the challenges inherent in continuing our favoured sport during a pandemic, we both agreed – over a well-earned beer on the sidewalk once we’d given back our climbing shoes and departed from the wall – that being able to do it at all made the weekend feel a little more normal. While New Yorkers still don’t go to offices, get on public transport, leave the country for vacations, or eat or drink indoors (and frankly, we think people in Britain who do those things are completely insane), we do enjoy our little freedoms. And though the heat might make for a slightly hellish masked-up climbing episode, it does contribute to the ideal environment for a post-sunset pizza and beer outdoors near the Brooklyn promenade while overlooking the New York City skyline.