By then, John was desperate to prove how good he was, so we moved up to a cliff face, at the top of which Dave was preparing our safety ropes."Do you want to go first?" my wife asked."Don't mind," I replied. "Do you?"But what we were really saying was "Can we go home now?"Dave handed out harnesses, calmed our fears and explained the terminology "Climbing now Dave!" meant we were starting up. "Give rope!" meant we were stuck and needed to skeeter left and right looking for toeholds. "Take in!" meant we were scared and needed the reassurance of a tighter safety line."Climbing now Dave!" boomed John. Within seconds, Spiderboy had used tiny ridges on the rocks to bound up 20 feet."I will not fear," said Kate, repeating the "Litany against Fear" from Frank Herbert's Dune "Fear is the mind-killer Fear is the little death I will face my fear I will permit it to pass through me. Maybe not to 14-year-olds, but to any sane human being it feels utterly wrong.

We have feet, and feet are meant to be on the ground, not hanging 20 feet above Barmouth Slabs in Wales, scrabbling to find a half-inch ledge.Now, above me, I can see Dave working the "top rope system", which ensures that, should I slip, there won't be more than a foot or so of abject terror before I'm held. Nevertheless, I'm scared.John is already up there, having shot up this 60ft crag 10 minutes ago. Below waits Kate, my wife, shouting encouragement.Dave is ex-Army, an NCO He has taken pack-loads of juvenile offenders orienteering. He has rescued hundreds of people across the mountains of Scotland. He has performed burial rites for climbers on Everest.His craggy face has a natural authority which kept John in line until we were ready to tackle a proper climb.But first, traversing with both hands had to give way to traversing with one hand behind our backs, then with a flat pebble on the back of one hand and finally with pebbles on hand and boot. Climbing does that to you, especially when you have Spiderboy for a son. John, our 14-year-old, had long wanted to go rock-climbing en famille He had done a certain amount with the school This was his chance to show off.

I spent the weekend rejoicing in the fact that I was not going to die. This was his chance to show off. Climbing is an odd thing to do. Even our instructor, Dave Orange, admitted that it is not natural. And Dave had been on the British expedition that conquered the north face of Everest in 1988.It is also scary. But, then again, the Germans also have a tendency to believe that it always rains in England.. I'm just as happy exploring its romantic castles as I am enjoying the culture in the central German state of Hessen or having a "pamper-me" break in one of Thuringia's many spa towns. I love this all as much as Germany's wild Baltic coastline and its vibrant capital, Berlin - where UK tourists are now the number one group of visitors.