Vertical View Climbing Gym — Local services in Meridian

For Boise, it’s a good place to go to try out climbing for the first time or a good place to go if you climb at a higher level and enjoy powerful, comp-style climbing. If you’re a moderate ropes climber between those two ends, I think there are better options around. There is also not much of a community feel when compared to other gyms, so it’s a good place to go if you just want a workout.

The bouldering is quite good with a variety of difficulties, styles, and a good number of fun problems. The rope setting is decent (though certainly reachy and power oriented), but there is a distinct lack of moderate roped routes. There are only a handful of .9’s and below, so if that’s your jam you’ll run out of routes very fast. If you warm-up on .10s and climb up to .12s, you’ll feel this gym was set for you (if you’re a slightly above average height male, you’ll like it even more). Their lead area is awesome but is really limited unless you climb steep .10+.

Of all the gyms I’ve been to around the country, Vertical View is the most concerned about safety. The top-ropes have tons of friction (I frequently saw people having to hop to take slack out), they blanket banned the Vergo and Cinch (as 2600 devices were recalled in 2017), and I felt the staff went out of their way to emphasize how things must be done without any consideration of the climber’s experience. Obviously none of these are bad as they give a standard of safety regardless of user, but these measures, coupled with the comp-oriented setting and lack of moderates, does not make this gym feel like a laid back place to climb.

*Edited: This review is my opinion based on 3 visits here and 4 visits to other gyms in Boise, as well as numerous gyms around the country. Not all of these points are unique to this gym, but they are what I experienced. It's not a bad gym, but it's not the gym I choose to climb at. Your...

We are in Boise for the holidays, visiting family. We were looking forward to our visit here! The gym looked like a great facility. Unfortunately, they don’t enforce their already lax mask policy, so we chose not to climb there. Swan Falls, here we come!

Just in response to your response below: We read the policy before we came to the gym, and understand that your written policy is in compliance with the state mandate.

Our main concern is that your employees weren't following your policy on the day we went to visit. An unmasked couple was engaged in a lengthy conversation with a masked employee at the entrance counter as we entered. The conversation continued as we expressed our concerns to another employee at the counter, and was still going as we left.

This experience led us to believe that your employees were not concerned about your written policies, or that they had not been trained in how to have these difficult conversations with customers. Either way, we didn't feel safe climbing in a gym that didn't enforce its own policies.

Thank you for your response. I hope you'll have some conversations with your employees about how to handle customers who are not complying with your COVID policy, the same way they would approach a customer who was not tied in correctly, or who was bouldering shirtless. We look forward to visiting again when you have enforcement protocols in place, or after everyone...

Amazing staff and such a friendly environment. The gym has a lot of rope walls and boulder problems available, and a 65ft lead wall. Great place for beginner climbers and advanced climbers; they have climbing walls from a few feet tall for kids and new climbers starting out, all the way up to the 65ft head wall. Plus, it is the only gym that I know of anywhere in the area that has some outdoor top rope problems. The staff puts on many activities, climbing classes, and climbing events for members, as well as hosting USA Climbing events. I started out as a new climber at this gym in the summer of 2022 and have been able to progress a lot here because of the multiple classes offered, challenging problems and the countless help and tips I’ve received from the staff and climbing coaches, as well as other patrons climbing at the gym. I took a couple of climbing classes to learn basic and advanced movements from foot placement to body positioning that really helped, and some of the best classes were their “Transition to Outdoors” and “Multi-pitch” classes where they teach climbers the skills they need to climb outdoors. I wouldn’t have picked up these skills anywhere else and it really instilled a lot of confidence when I started outdoor climbing. This is a great gym to go to;...