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18 January 2015

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Hitting the wall03:55, 18 January 2015 by Roisin Finlay

When I first meet Brian Bliss in early December, he has ablack eye and looks like a man who hasn’t slept much inrecent days. The 34­year­old is covered in dust and dressedin workman’s overalls. It is a freezing cold day in SandyfordIndustrial Estate, with an icy wind blowing off themountains.

In contrast to his scruffy appearance and the bitter temperature,Bliss’s greeting is warm and full of energy. “Come on in and see thecentre. I’ll get Al,” he says, pointing to a small, lithe figure hard atwork up a ladder.

Al Sarhan (39) is his business partner in this venture, where anempty car salesroom is being converted into a climbing centre.When it’s finished, the centre will be able to cater for 100 to 150people at any one time, and will have cost in the region of€300,000.

Standing with the pair of them, with their protective clothing anddusty hair, it’s hard to picture that, just a few short months ago,both men were hard at work in high­flying white collared jobs.

Bliss was at the top of his game in the marketing department ofcomputer giant Dell, working between Dublin and Limerick. He, hiswife Sorcha de Eyto and their three children (10, 8 and 6), havelived in Sixmilebridge, Co Clare, for the past ten years in a cottagethey’ve been renovating. Sarhan was living in Bristol with hispartner of 16 years Aoife Byrne, heading up the employment lawdepartment of a large British firm Porter Dodson.

But everything changed back in January 2014 when Bliss got theopportunity to take voluntary redundancy. A text conversationensued where he sent Sarhan a message asking if he wasinterested in setting up a climbing centre with him.

“I’m in,” came the simple reply.

“I’ve always wanted to open a climbing wall, and Brian knew that,”says Sarhan. The pair have known each other for about 20 yearsthrough scouting, but they hadn’t seen each other for about fiveyears.

The first challenge they faced was persuading their partners, whoare also good friends, that this wasn’t a mad plan. For Sarhan, itmeant not just leaving his own lucrative job, but uprooting Byrne, atown planner, and hoping she’d find a new job back in Ireland.

Bliss, on the other hand, had to persuade his wife that instead ofusing his redundancy to pay off their mortgage, it was better tostart a new, risky project. He reckons that de Eyto was swung bythe idea of their children seeing them create something.

“I wanted the kids to see us build something. We tell the kids allthe time you can do whatever you want, but yet we’re in the ratrace, working 9 to 5, not doing what we want all the time. That’swhat swung it with my wife, I think,” he says.

Fast forward almost a year and, while there is still clearly a lot ofwork to do when I meet them, The Wall, as the climbing centre isaptly named, is taking shape after months of working from dawn till

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dusk. The coffee area is being completed, and the walls are alreadydotted with holds of many colours. It’s hard to picture that thebuilding once had two floors – the upstairs has been ripped out tocreate height for the climbing surfaces.

When I check back in with the pair just before Christmas, thecentre is open and packed – a testament to their hard work andbelief in the project – but for now, as we stroll around thesubstantial space (ultimately there will be 770 square metres ofclimbing surface), it’s a wonderful work in progress.

In response to my surprise that the walls aren’t as high as someother climbing centres, Sarhan explains that this is because thecentre will be for bouldering. It was something the pair decided onafter visiting many centres in Britain.

Are they concerned that the absence of ropes and abseiling will limitthe appeal of the centre?

“Totally the opposite,” says Sarhan. “Ropes and harnesses canactually take a bit away from the experience. With bouldering, itmuch easier to get started. After just a short ten­minuteintroduction, you can climb. It’s much better craic. There is a lotless standing around, and you can climb on your own, or with agang, or with people of all different abilities. It’s very sociable, andreally accessible for kids and families.

“With kids, there’s the fear factor [with climbing]. Whereas withbouldering, they see the holds and they just start going.”

On the subject of children climbing, Bliss adds: “My kids do sportslike karate and football, but most of the time, they don’t win. Andyou say to them: ‘It’s not about winning, it’s about taking part.’ Butthey leave knowing that they didn’t win. Or with football, say,sometimes they are left sitting on the bench. The experience isn’talways a positive one.

“With bouldering, and with our wall, everyone is going to reach thetop at some stage. You don’t lose with bouldering. Even if you don’tget to the top this time, you will nearly always make it a couple oftimes later.”

And it’s safe too, they add. “We chatted to the guy who has thebiggest bouldering wall in Britain. He has about 300 people througha day, and he says he gets one or two twisted ankles in a year. Thewhole floor is covered in thick crash mats to protect you if you falloff. It takes all the impact. It’s 300ml. It’s really expensive andrated for the falls you could have onto it. There are no gaps. Ourwalls range from 4.5m, right down to 2.5m for kids,” says Sarhan.

Before the kids and other climbers arrive, though, there is work tobe done. On the day that I visit, various people are busy preparingfor the official opening on December 15, painting hammering,sanding, sweeping. Almost everyone seems to be a friend or afamily member.

Sarhan explains: “Our friend James Gernon, who we climb with andis a carpenter and a rope access expert, is helping build the wall.Another climbing friend, Neil Carroll, did the coffee counter top.

“Zeff Klinkenberg, a friend from scouts, has been in painting,clearing up, doing whatever is needed of him. Peter Byrne, Aoife’sdad, has been painting along with other members of the family. Thelogo and some seating was designed by buddies Pat and RhonaO’Donnell and Brian’s mum has been down helping with his kids.”

Bliss adds: “We kind of had the dream team when you consider mywife is really good on the property market. She’s a charteredsurveyor, so she knows the price of everything. Al’s a lawyer. I’ve asales and marketing background so I’m really good at negotiating,and Aoife, Al’s partner is a planner.” Not forgetting the fact, too,that they are all are passionate about climbing.

The men are massively hands­on too, as testified by Bliss’s shinerwhich he got while dismantling shelves. “We’re in here pretty muchseven days a week from 7am till 10pm. We want the place to beperfect. We want it to be an amazing bouldering wall, but also wantit to be a really nice place that’s clean and warm and serves greatcoffee. We’re so lucky with our location too. We’re really near theLuas, just off the M50, and we have loads of parking.”

When the hard labour is done, Bliss will mostly look after the booksand the marketing, while Sarhan will be in charge of the wall itself.Their passion for this project is palpable.

“We want The Wall to be the best. We’re using 11 differentmanufacturers of different types of holds. We’ve got 4,000 climbingholds in total. You could just go with one or two and you’d get agreat deal and a discount, but it means the climbing wouldn’t bevery good or interesting,” says Sarhan.

“And we’re working with some of the best route setters in theworld. We’ll be getting route setters over from Britain to start withfor the competitions, which we’ll hold every two months. We’reusing Ben West from Bristol, who is an international route setterand on the British bouldering team. And we’re using Juan O’Raw,who is a top ten Irish boulderer. We want to train our own route­setters too.

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“We’ve nine different circuits. The reason bouldering is so special isthat it’s about solving problems – it’s not simply about strength orpower and it’s not about fear – it’s about figuring out the way toclimb something. We have between 25 and 30 problems on eachcircuit, so we’ve a huge range of climbing.”

It’s fitting that solving problems is at the heart of this project. Thepair have certainly faced plenty of them over the last year. Thelease was the most serious stumbling block, and almost scupperedthe project completely. Despite finding the building in March andagreeing a deal in principle with the landlord, the goalposts keptmoving due to a rising property market.

In the end, the lease wasn’t signed until the middle of Septemberand the pair almost walked away, having already spent the guts of€15,000 on planning permission and legal fees.

The delayed lease didn’t just cost money, it also meant that Blisshad to start the building work on his own because, with noredundancy to fall back on, Sarhan was waiting to hand in hisnotice. He eventually handed it in in July, but had to wait threemonths to finish up. He got back in October, and drove straightfrom the ferry to Sandyford.

The build was also tricky. It involved ripping out a whole floor andcompletely revamping what seemed like perfectly good stairs,thanks to a change in building regulations.

Despite being a major boon, Bliss’s redundancy was also anythingbut straightforward in the end. “It was agreed in January, but Ididn’t finish till October. Dell said: ‘Sorry, Brian, we can’t do withoutyou.’ In the end, I had to fly to Copenhagen, corner the vice­president of Dell and persuade him.

“So they said: ‘Okay, you can go at the end of July.’ Then, in July,they moved it to October. We started the build at the end ofSeptember. At that stage, I was juggling the build, my Dell job, myfamily life,” says Bliss.

So, at the end of all of this, the pair are set to make a packet, right?Well, not exactly.

Sarhan is clear on the subject, “We’re not doing it for the money. Ifwe were after money, I’d stay being a solicitor and Brian would stayin his line of work.”

Bliss adds: “We need to support ourselves and our families, but thisis a way of making a living and it’s a way of life.”

Looking back at the careers and life choices of the pair, it’s clearthat while both have taken very different but successful paths, adesire for access to outdoor and adventure activity as well as qualityof life issues has always been at play.

Bliss’s career path was accidental from the start. After school, heplanned to go travelling on a year out, and took a job with Dell insales to make some money. But that year, as a 19­year­old, hemade €70,000. “I couldn’t believe it, and Dell was a great place towork,” he says.

Then, in 2004, Bliss moved to Clare to work in Limerick’s Dell office,taking a huge pay cut in the process, so that the family could havea better quality of life – and so that he could surf more and climb inthe Burren.

“We went completely for the lifestyle. We’ve had a really good lifedown there – sometimes with two months in summer in ourcamper van thanks to parental leave. I’ve worked in loads ofdifferent jobs in Dell. They are really cool to work for.”

Sarhan’s career path was more varied, but it was also driven, andclimbing was always a factor. He started out waiting and cooking inhis dad’s Lebanese restaurant, The Cedar Tree in Dublin 2, andteaching outdoor pursuits. He holds professional mountaineeringinstructor awards.

Then came a degree in anthropology in UCD while running theclimbing wall there. Immediately afterward, aged 26, he completeda diploma in legal studies at DIT and sat his FE1s before he’d evenfinished. His grades were so good he won an award. He went on tobecome a solicitor with small Irish firm Macaulay Solicitors, wherehe worked for three years, before taking a six­month break to climbin Europe with Byrne.

By the time the pair returned, the recession was in full flow, so theywent to Bristol for work, where they could climb close by inPembroke. “I also wanted the challenge of working for a big firm,”adds Sarhan.

As for who is the better climber, Bliss immediately points at Sarhan.“He’s climbed famous routes in Yosemite like Astro Man, El Capitanand Half Dome,” says Bliss.

Sarhan is modest, but under duress, says: “The hardest sportroutes [bolted] I’ve done are French 8b, the hardest boulderproblems I’ve done are 7c and I’ve climbed up to E6 trad climbing.I’ve climbed pretty much everything in Dalkey Quarry and theBurren.”

He’s quick to add: “Brian is a really good climber too. He’s maybe a

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bit more out of practice than me, but he used to come into the gymin UCD when I worked there and burn me on problems.”

Either way, the pairing seems to be working. The combination of alegal mind and a people­person marketing guy has already seenthem cracking some tough problems, and they always keep thereason why they are doing this clear.

“Sure, the last few months have been hard work, but it’s only threemonths of pain, and it’s a lot of fun really,” says Bliss. “This thing isa huge opportunity. I’m really lucky. I’m taking this money andbuilding something we like. My wife can support us for a year. Theposition I’m in is awesome.

“It will be a success for me if loads of people are coming back. ThenI will think we’ve done a good job.”

Sarhan’s take on it is slightly different. “I want a local scene aroundThe Wall. I want to have a squad of young climbers. I want to haveschools and kids and people who’ve never climbed before, coming inand getting into climbing. And I want the established climbers tosee it as a really good venue.”

As an afterthought, he adds: “I used to sack people for a living. Imight not get rich this way, but just look what we are creating.”

......

Read Wall about it

The Wall opened on December 15, and is already a hub of climbingactivity for all ages from six up. It’s open seven days a week: Mon,Tues, Thurs & Fri: 12pm­10pm; Wed: 7am­10pm; Sat & Sun:10am­8pm. €8.50 – adult; €7.50 – concession/children.

If you are bringing your child for the first time, contact Bliss orSarhan for a chat on 086­7736989.

The Wall, 5 Arkle Road, Sandyford, Dublin; email: brian@thewall.ie;web: thewall.ie