VietClimb — Attraction in Hà Nội

I loved my experience in this climbing gym.

Atmosphere - people were super nice and friendly, Vietnam was feeling very foreign to me at the time but the climbing community seemed just as open and welcoming as anywhere else. Also they had a dog there which was very adorable and no, it did not disturb anyone's climbing.

Climbing - I find the routes to be very fun and not so straightforward even for the lower grades. They are also adequately graded imo and I believe they had the biggest variety for V2-V3. I am a V4 climber.

Amenities - I loved the interior design of the whole space, I am not sure if it was made so purposefully but the becnches were at perfect angle for leaning a phone on them and taking videos. I liked their rental shoes althought they felt a bit aggressive for me. You could refill your water bottle for 5000/10000 dong, they had a bar, lockers, changing rooms and a small shop for clothes.

Downsides - it was an open air space so they didn't have aircon, which left me leaving puddles of water every time I sat. Also because it was open I got many mosquito bites and it felt a bit loud to me because of outside noises. Finally, their soft padding varied strongly so I basically hurt myself when I fell on a hard one and I struggled a lot with the start of a climb where I was sinking in the floor. Personally I dislike that you have to pay for water refills and also I do not mind it but I know some people feel uncomfortable around shirtless men.

Overall I loved the gym and...

I booked a 2 day rock climbing with this club and was quite disappointed. The trip was advertised as beginner friendly but day one it was obvious that the trip is heavily focused on intermediate/advanced climbers. The tour guide/club owner was very unwilling to actually guide the beginners (me for example) with giving little to no instructions on techniques with belaying as well as climbing in general. On numerous occasions I was left alone and had to ask for guidance of climbers around me (for example how to belay a climber down as I had never done it before and was in the middle of the process already) as the guide/owner was preoccupied with his friends/lunch or whatever he was doing at that time. In short, the lack of accountability and professionalism from the guide was very disappointing and made the experience kinda not worth it. The routes offered were 5A (1 route), 5B (2 routes), 5B+, and up. The food offered was also very basic with very little option for vegetarians. The guide even forgot to take a first aid kit from the bus which meant he couldn’t assist with the deep cut that we got while rock climbing.

Edit: The owner reached out with apology, refund and appreciated the feedback. Ensured that future trips will take care of beginners more...

Community was great. A competition was being hosted when I arrived, and although I didn't participate the cheering and supporting of one another that was present was good to see.

Outside of the 2 walls set for comp climbing, there were around 3 walls for people to use and 2 moonbards. It did mean that only a small handful of people could climb non-comp boulders at once, and as it was busy that did mean there was a relatively high amount of waiting for a bouldering gym.

However the actual climbs and routesetting in the gym was of quite high quality, and there were not many problems that felt typical or boring.

I would say that the difficulty seemed to tend more towards high intermediate climbers, but that may just be because walls had been set aside for the comp.

Although the Vietnamese have an average height lower than Australia, this was not as noticeable in their climbs, and so props to the setters for that. Intended beta's were not restricted to certain height classes, which is ideal.

Overall I would say this is a great climbing gym for anybody interested in bouldering, however if you are a complete beginner there might be better...