Live, work, climb - where should we go?

Hii everyone,

I need your help... I'm looking to relocate out of concrete London to somewhere else in the world where I can work and climb outdoors. I'm in an office job so need a large mountain town or city near the mountains (less than one hour drive). I can think of some obvious places like Boulder in the U.S., Geneva in Switzerland, and Manchester in the UK, but I would love your suggestions on other places around the world where I can still earn some money in an office job but climb to my hearts content over the weekends and holidays.

I lived in denver for 3 years got more climbing in then I can shake a clip stick at...but in my opinion it is becoming over crowded:(

Salt lake city UT!!! Hands down best climbing city in the world.

New Hampshire, got Rumney, Cannon, cathedral ledge and a ton of other climbing.

As much as I love NH, with the towns the suggested in the OP above, NH might be found pretty underwhelming. Id probably vote for Salt Lake City.

Salt lake city

Haha, yea, I know Zac. I have tossed around the idea of SLC too. But the leaves in the fall!! All the pretty colors! haha

Durango!

Great proximity to the desert, crags, and amazing alpine areas, as well as no crowds.

A city is a city, no matter where you are...traffic: yuck!

Durango's small, but depending on your line of work, it might be worth getting out of the concrete jungle...good luck!

Andrewww wrote:Haha, yea, I know Zac. I have tossed around the idea of SLC too. But the leaves in the fall!! All the pretty colors! haha

Its the place to be if you're on the east coast without a doubt. LIVE FREE OR DIE.

Durango, Co is great, also look at Chattanooga, TN. It's real cheap to live in the south

Troll?

Muscrat wrote:Troll?

Why?

This does seem so general and vague that it warrants the epithet of troll - but I will bite.

If you have the option of Geneva and you currently live in London, then nothing can really beat the access and opportunity for climbing there. My father, who was a climbing ranger in Rocky Mtn. NP and then North Cascades NP came back from the Haute route two weeks ago and said it blew him away.

You want an area where you can climb. Climb what? Bouldering or alpine? Ice or sport? Trad or skimo?

After living in the PNW for 20+ years, around the RED for two, and the frigid upper midwest for four - I made the decision for SLC.

I am only writing this because I wish someone would have told me some of these things first, and I did MUCH research and scouring of mountain project and other places.

The access is as good as it gets in the lower 48 IF you need to be near a large city. Having a job in my field was a requirement.

The mountains are not as good as other places in the lower 48, that's just a fact. The wasatch is an amazing resource but other ranges are better, considerably better.

You cannot beat the access to various types of rock in the canyons, great skiing in the canyons, respectable ice and mixed, good trails, and a decent mountain feel a 30 min drive MAX from my apt.

For example, after a 9 hour work day I have the option of the south ridge of superior and be home before it's dark - that's pretty nice.

The cons. If you are from basically anywhere else in the country, and I have lived in the south, it will seem quite conservative/box store/drive everywhere culture, and a lack of diversity. I thought I was prepared for this - it is a bit blander than I thought it was going to be. And don't tell me there is culture in Sugarhouse or mill creek - only by UT standards it that true.

The air quality. People around here don't seem to notice - it's bad. It's messed up. It changes the way I live, how I workout, how I recreate etc. It's geographical sure, but it is also cultural - it's a man-made problem.

All that being said, I am glad I live here and I have to end this right now because the fiance and I have to leave in 10 min. to get on some nice granite and then head to octoberfest. :)

What i meant is do trolls dream?

Hi all,
Thanks for all of the suggestions. I'm not really sure what a troll is but hopefully I'm not one! Just looking for some advice and I really appreciate all of the replies. I just need a head start on some research to narrow down my options. Cheers all!

Denver, Boulder and Golden all seem to meet your criteria (depending on what kind of office job you're looking for). Boulder probably has the best access to climbing, with quick access to Rocky Mountain National Park for alpine, Boulder Canyon for sport and trad, and Eldorado Canyon for trad.
Golden and the west Denver suburbs aren't bad either, with Clear Creek Canyon for sport and the South Platte and Eldorado for trad.

The entire Front Range is growing and has been for a long time. I don't think anyone from London is going to call it crowded, though, in spite of what EeT says.

SarahJD wrote:I'm not really sure what a troll is but hopefully I'm not one!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_troll

I am an East coast transplant (learned to climb in the Gunks 43 years ago) to SLC about 15 years ago. Best move we ever made. Not Mormon and no kids. We live in suburban Sandy. Besides all the local options, we're within easy driving distance of a wealth of other options, from high alpine to desert.

SarahJD wrote:Hi all, Thanks for all of the suggestions. I'm not really sure what a troll is but hopefully I'm not one! Just looking for some advice and I really appreciate all of the replies. I just need a head start on some research to narrow down my options. Cheers all!

Hey Sarah, if and when you get into reading this crazy site on a daily basis, you will discover the troll culture. When someone joins the site to ask a question, it is somewhat frequently a "troll". I just thought it was interesting that you had just joined, but had such a wistful, dreamy Post.
To answer your question, i think you need to post a little more info, if you are really searching for this. What kind of climbing, what level, what kind of work, what kind of culture. London is a hard town to leave, one of the great cultural centers of the world. Moving to someplace like Boulder (Bouldrites need not jump on me here) would be a shock. It is really a town about the outdoors, a place where it is common to hear people talking climbing beta walking down the street. Good local food, good local music, but it is not a large city. Culture shock!
That said, really many places, depending what you want to climb. Sport, trad, ice, alpine, ski. You get the idea. DO you want winters covered in snow, or do you want....you get the idea.

There are no jobs up here in North Conway, New Hampshire.

Best thing you can do for your climbing hobby, is get a "remote", aka work-from-home job.... That way you can work anywhere with an internet connection. Imagine living in Estes Park Colorado? or how about Yosemite Valley? Amazing. THIS is the way of the future.

Russ Keane wrote:There are no jobs up here in North Conway, New Hampshire. Best thing you can do for your climbing hobby, is get a "remote", aka work-from-home job.... That way you can work anywhere with an internet connection. Imagine living in Estes Park Colorado? or how about Yosemite Valley? Amazing. THIS is the way of the future.

I sure hope not! Can you imagine how many yuppie assholes would be living "dirtbag" in Yosemite Valley and scumming up the place if this were possible? Plus, it's hard to build a house on your laptop, or any of the other thousands of jobs which don't require a computer. Having said that, I personally wish my employer would lighten up and let me work from home more often. ;-)

In response to the OP, if language isn't a problem for you and you're actually serious about moving, then stay in Europe. It's nice that you're asking Americans on an American website where they'd suggest living, but in reality it's a massive expense to really move there and being approved for a green card to work there is also a sketchy proposition. Now for the suggestion: Innsbruck is way up on the list of best climbing towns in the world. Lyon seems like a nice place to live too, with good access to mountains and the Mediterranean. But I've heard the people aren't as accepting as I feel like they are in Innsbruck. Nürnberg/Bamberg are also good options, though Munich would probably be easier to integrate into and it would offer a similar experience to living in London.

Innsbruck, Turin, Milan