Pacific Edge Climbing Gym — Attraction in Santa Cruz

I have been climbing here for a few years now, and it has always been a good experience.

The staff are not only friendly but also kind and knowledgeable. They offer classes covering climbing basics, whether you're doing bouldering or top rope, to advanced classes for lead climbing and preparing you for the outdoors and classes and camps for children. Every so often you'll notice a competition occurring or being set up, which I personally enjoy, as it's fun seeing how many climbs you can do in a row and see what number you stop at.

Since I joined, they expanded the back bouldering section, which has a 16-foot wall, crack climbing options, and two kilter boards. They have a 12-foot bouldering section towards the entrance with a solid overhang section and other cool features. The bouldering section can be a bit tricky, but the reward of bumping up to a new level or sending a project is totally worth it.

Aside from bouldering, they have a lead cave and a bunch of top rope options, allowing you to hone in your skills on ropes or have some fun for the day. There's a cool feature dubbed "the chimney," which is worth checking out too!

There are two cardio areas, one upstairs in the main room where you can watch climbers while using the bikes, treadmills, ellipticals, or other machines, and a smaller porch-like covered cardio area, which has a nice breeze on hot days and equipment including a StairMaster, rowing machine and others. Next to the outdoor cardio area is the weight room, where you'll find hang boards, a pull-up bar, a few weight machines, and other weight room essentials. They offer weightlifting classes every so often, and the front desk will have more information regarding that!

If that wasn't already enough, there is a room for yoga classes, which you can get for free with your membership and are good for winding down and stretching out. The yoga instructors, just like all the other staff, are great to be around and love what they do!

The bathrooms come equipped with lockers, showers and a sauna, and you can find water fountains in several places throughout the gym with options to fill up your water bottle.

I would highly recommend this gym to anyone in the area looking for a climbing gym that covers all aspects of climbing and a little bit more with their yoga classes and typical...

The moment you roll up to Pacific Edge, you’re choking on a fog of chalk and hearing echoes of “dude, hit that sloper” from every corner. It’s a breeding ground for vascular climbing goliaths who live on adrenaline and the unsatiable need to thrash their tendons on absurd lines. You walk in thinking you’ll send a few routes and head home, but the second your fingertips latch onto those plastic crimps, you’re in a wormhole of endless burnout sessions.

Your elbows will complain, your fingers will crack, and your forearms will feel like frayed steel cables ready to snap. Doesn’t matter though, because Pacific Edge is a vortex of next-level psych; it's a zero fall zone. You’ll cling to the idea of one more burn, one more desperate move, one more chalk-soaked boulder problem that leaves you questioning your life choices. Then you chalk up again and do it anyway. Climbing and campus boards? Mega. Overhanging king lines that devour your fingers? Unavoidable.

The community is straight-up madness in the best way possible. Strangers trade beta like secrets to immortality, and send trains happen like clockwork. Staff is dialed, ready to supply tape or dislocate your brain with fresh beta. It’s a full-on tribe of climbing fiends itching to push each other to the brink of a total meltdown. No one cares how taped up you are, only how stoked you are.

Pacific Edge is more than a gym—it’s a shrine to self-imposed agony and next-level gains; a factory for forearm annihilation, flappers, and sleepless nights spent replaying beta in your head. If you crave that holy mix of chalk in your lungs and the deepest forearm pump that you can physically experience, this is your home base. Bathe in chalk and get ready to transform into a perpetually sore climbing mutant. Get ready to enter a permanent...

Went climbing here with some friends(3 of us total, all first timers to this gym, but not to climbing). We all left rather disappointed with our experience. So this review is primarily for their bouldering area as we didn't feel like going through the belay test.

Anyway, I was unfortunate enough to have to rent shoes as I had left my gear at home, the rental shoes are comfortable but not sticky at all. Combine this with the dirty and worn out footholds and you've got next to no footing on quite a few of the routes I tried(ranges from V0 to V3), where I did find footing, I found awkward routesetting and crummy hand holds. Almost everything felt caked in ages of shoe rubber, chalk, and climber. That said, a couple routes I tried were fun and a neat change from my usual gyms, but the overall experience left a lot to be desired. I called it a day after an hour and a half of frustration while my friends lasted a bit longer. Maybe having their own gear helped?

All said and done, the facility was well lit and generally clean and the couple of staff members I interacted with were friendly, but we all agreed, we are in no rush at all to go back there.

Also note: the people saying this is "the best rock gym in Santa Cruz"... It's the ONLY rock gym in Santa Cruz, unless there's one at UCSC that I don't think most of us...