The Sunday Times of Malta yesterday published an article about the benefits of climbing to children as young as five and their families in the context of a “Parenting” supplement.    This is a very topical subject given the very high level of obesity in both Maltese children and adults.  When was the last time you saw an obese climber?   The author Jo Caruana interviews Xavier Hancock of the Gozo Climbing Association/ Gozo Adventures who explains essentially that kids love to climb and they take to the sport like bees to honey.

Climbing is  safe, takes kids out to beautiful locations and gives them a good workout.  So definitely a sport worth considering if your child spends most of his day glued to a computer screen playing games or networking socially, like most kids do nowadays unfortunately!

The article mentions all three local clubs as a good place to start to learn about climbing, as well as the current availability of two bouldering walls in Sliema and Gozo.