The Guelph Grotto — Local services in Guelph

The Grotto circa mid 2017 was an amazing gym, but at this point I’ll be climbing at Core (15 minutes away, just off the 401) once my semester membership runs out at the end of the year.

Since last year, they have ramped up their children’s programming, drastically reduced the amount of boulder route resets, introduced a new grading system that makes no sense (routes go from “this is a ladder” to “ok easy no problem” to “excuse me pardon what?”), changed their hours to leave little kid-free daytime hours open, and of course, raised their prices.

I get that kid groups have low operating costs, so it’s easy to profit on those alone while giving paying members the short end of the stick. I wouldn’t even mind the crowds of children if they would return to complete boulder resets every 2 weeks and the old hours where they opened at 11am. Leaving boulder sets up for 4 weeks (especially with the current grading system that does not leave the setters accountable to ensure a skill gradient is present at all) results in them getting extremely dirty by the tail end of their lifespan. Plus, if a set with particularly difficult or undoable routes goes up, you’re stuck with them for almost a whole month.

The early morning hours feel like a halfhearted attempt, 10-3 are the only hours I can go if I work an opening or a closing shift. Furthermore, now that they’re only open at 3 in the afternoon, the back workout room is usually full with a lesson.

I also haven’t been impressed with the supervision or lack thereof that kids get. They run under people while they’re on the wall and don’t understand they need to take turns with all the other members paying to be there. If you’re going to act like a babysitting service and invite all these kids groups, at LEAST do a better job monitoring them.

I had emailed the Grotto last year asking what was going on with the less frequent boulder resets and got a non-answer in response. I’ll email them again directly with these issues again, but unless they focus on their members again and not just kid camps, my climbing group and I are taking our...

Awesome Facility to spend time with friends and family. Busy hours are from 4-8 throughout the week and Saturdays/ Sundays are usually pretty busy in the afternoon towards the evening. Throughout the week the gym opens early for a members climb so if you have time you can get there before work and pump out some quiet climbing hours. The gym is completely open concept giving you almost complete visuals of each wall from the front of the gym. Two large boulders I'm between two top rope structures give plenty of space for climbing with a large kids climbing section on the back of the left top rope structure. With the gym still being under construction, new activities are being added regularly. At the back of the gym just past the far boulder there is a silks area where silks classes are performed. On the other side of the boulder is a Hydraulic wall Kilter board and beyond that is a decent sized workout room with free weights and workout equipment available to use. At the front of the gym above the change room there is a semi hidden room upstairs. This room contains a Moon board and a newly finished Campus board for Training purposes. If your into climbing and want to get better, I suggest checking out the...

This place has the best prices for day passes and rental equipment I've been to do far! Not only do they have a good variety of climbs at various difficulties (a great place for beginners and experienced climbers), they have a good amount of space and it never feels too crowded.

Compared to places in Toronto like Basecamp and Joe Rockheads, the prices are far better, the climbs are just as good, and you have much more space and it doesn't feel overcrowded. I would compare it to Boulderz in the west end of Toronto in terms of climbs and space.

We are taking a friend here for their first ever climb and they don't make you pay for a 2 hour training course for complete beginners. We're able to train them ourselves and then they will have to do the toprope test to make sure they know their stuff. Everywhere else I've been makes you pay a ridiculously high fee for a training course that's completely unnecessary, as long as you're with an experienced friend who can train you and make sure you're safe then you're good to go and that's how the Grotto does it.

Top notch staff, great climbs, great prices, and good music on the...