The Circuit Bouldering Gym SW — Attraction in Portland

The Good: Beginner friendly. New climbers will be able to many routes here—more than other gyms in the area. More affordable than other climbing gyms. 2 free guest passes a month.

The Bad: Kids run around and their parents aren’t always watching. The gym doesn’t seem to care either. I personally don’t want to be responsible for falling on a child.

Gym equipment is limited. Not a huge deal if you just want to climb.

Climbing holds often twist and shift when I put my weight on them. It happens to me around once a session( although I’m much heavier than the average climber at 210).

The padding under the climbing area feels old and needs to be replaced. My other more experienced climber friends I’ve brought have said it’s unsafe. I have hurt my back a few times falling(again, I am heavy). The gym equipment is also old. I saw the lat-pull-down bar break when someone was using it. Safety in general...

So what I'll say is that the people are great and whatever, but I was wild unimpressed by this location and will definitely not be returning.

Tasting notes: it was wild packed with kids when we went, you're not allowed to keep your water bottle with you, the main door was closed so you had to walk down a badly lit alley to get to the side door and then walk across the mat in your shoes, there weren't any changing rooms (and the bathroom is set up so that unless you huddle in the corner behind the sinks you're in full view of the gym), there's not enough room to sit (there's like one bench), and then to top it off it's super unfriendly for beginners (the whole gym aside from like 3 walls...

I was going to let this go, but the response to Hernan has changed my mind. I was another parent there- the safety protocol was never in question, but scaring 4-5 year old children at play by shouting at them when they haven’t had the rules appropriately delivered by staff for their age is in direct conflict with being a family-friendly option for the community. The interactions with staff were incredibly disappointing, veering towards accusatory and offensive, and kids were in the fray. This situation should be looked at carefully, as well as the ownership of where this went wrong. Truly...