Or maybe a Tarzanish type? Scaling ropes with ease up to the crow's nest or that fantastic perch in the highest branches?
So did little D. Don't get me wrong, J loves a good tree climb and is game for rock climbing, but only up to a certain height. Put a ladder or rock wall sideways, keep it 4-5 ft off the ground, he is a GOD of scaling. Put it upright, well the interest is there.......
Anyway, with two climbers and one out of hand (don't know if the wife mentioned it but he has scaled all the fences in the yard and pretty much anything climbable, steady or not...freaky), we went for the challenge of a rope ladder off the deck.
Gotta stop for a minute and tell you that Sweet went out on the net and looked for rope ladder instructions for hours, AND she is an awesome web surfer. I even pitched in and helped (and I'm a better web surfer) and still, forgive me for saying so but....crap. Nothing worthy.
So intuition wins. Hey, let's just tie them in square patterns with no slippage. And there you go! Works nicely too.
We did learn to find a place where we could 'spread' it a bit and it would probably be better with another piece on the left side, but it works fine for everyone (even adults) and the kids have had it up less than 24 hours with several sessions of climbing thus far. That pays off.
So it's all good. Kids are flailing on the rope, swinging around and getting their legs stuck in the rungs. Fantastic stuff, seriously.
Next comes additions to the web to move it to the next level.
Two things accomplished. One, the climbers can climb something that is challenging but won't kill them or fall apart. Two, we prep for the future, when rope ladders connect the rooms in our multi-tree, tree fort. Can't have the boys stuck in one room just because they don't get the rope ladder.
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