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In the clogged heat of the day, we clambered up the steep hillside, clutching at jutting rock and tree roots, our backs and faces running with sweat and smeared with red earth. ‘It’s an easy climb up to the low viewpoint,’ we’d been told. Easy but terrifying, when you have no faith in your physical ability. We made it to the top, but coming down was more treacherous. The path plunged downhill at a near-sheer angle, with few hand or footholds, but a free-swinging knotted rope to hang on to.

‘I can’t do it,’ I wailed. ‘My knees are like jelly.’

‘Don’t worry,’ said Martin, cheerily. ‘They’ll be all right in a trifle.’

The fact that nobody took my fear seriously didn’t make me any braver or more proficient. I reached the bottom intact but shaking and vowed never to do anything so stupid or strenuous again. As we walked back to our bungalows, we paused to watch the real rock-climbers scaling the vertical limestone karst cliffs, all roped and harnessed up, every muscle bulging and tendon tensed. Utter lunacy, I thought, and slunk off for a siesta.

That was Day 1, on a Paradise-like peninsula in south-west Thailand that is known to travellers on the Asian beat and climbers from all over the world. Accessible only by boat - 45 minutes by ‘longtail’ from the nearest town, Krabi - it consists of three beaches (Railay, Sunrise or Railay East, and Pra Nang), a few acres of coconut groves dotted with bungalows, and a soaring mass of craggy cliffs, dripping with stalactite dreadlocks. (Think The Man with the Golden Gun: ‘James Bond Island’ is just a boat trip away.)

Railay is a Mecca for international climbers - Pepsi-Max Americans and Aussies, wiry Scandinavians, enviably toned Eurobabes - not just because of the thrilling ascents (there are over 250 bolted routes and many more uncharted ones), but the setting, the sun, the accessibility of the rocks (just mooch off the beach and up a cliff), the cost of living (cheap), the ‘rest-day’ activities (sea-kayaking, island-hopping, diving) and the après-climb (Bobo’s for sunset, YaYa’s thereafter). ‘If you learn here,’ said stringy Harry from Melbourne, ‘it’ll spoil you for the rest of the world.’ No worries, mate. I was staying at sea level.

I had set off alone for a spell of sun-worship, but had soon teamed up with a band of comrades, as one does, notably Dino from Durban and latterly of the Earl’s Court Gym, where his impressive 6 ft 4 in frame is employed as a personal trainer. Each day, we’d study the climbers. One Thai, his body taut and gleaming like a Giambologna bronze, scaled a smooth overhanging rockface as if it were a ladder. But there were beginners, too, who, I noted, were roped to points above them on the cliff, making it impossible to fall. On Day 4, Dino announced that he was going to give it a try.

I accompanied him to One Two Three, our popular local cliff (all grades of climb, always in shade) and watched apprehensively. Half-way up, some 20 ft off the ground, he got the shakes. He continued to the top but, back on terra firma, admitted, ‘I just wanted to cry and say “Let me down!”’ I mention this not to sneer (later he completed 70 ft climbs) but because it marked a breakthrough for me. If a superfit young buck from South Africa was scared, then it was OK for me to be. All of a sudden I wasn’t.

I signed up for a half-day introductory course with Pung, of Krabi Rock Climbing. A lean, long-limbed cat-woman, she climbed with effortless grace and clipped the rope to the top bolt. My turn. I laced myself into painfully small rubber-soled shoes (that’s the way they should be, so you can grip on a mere ripple in the rock. Theoretically). One end of the rope that dangled from the cliff was secured to my harness with a double figure-of-eight knot; the other end was fed through a ‘belay’ device, which acts as a brake if the climber falls, attached to Pung’s harness. My heart was beating overtime as I dipped my fingers in the powdered chalk - for added grip - and climbed onto the rockface. It seemed a lot steeper than it looked from the ground. But, as I rose and Pung pulled in the slack on the rope, I felt totally secure - far more confident than during my low viewpoint descent.

After the first 15 feet at a slight slope, the cliff became vertical and the holds more difficult to spot. ‘Left foot where right foot is,’ called Pung. ‘Right hand up, further, Sue, further.’ Since I wasn’t going to die (turns out that sports climbing, on ready-bolted routes, is statistically far safer than playing football), I took the leap of faith and reached for a seemingly impossible hold. Amazingly, my body followed. Courage alone, however, couldn’t hold me onto the rockface when the cliff was overhung. I couldn’t get past the last lip.

Climbers habitually say, ‘It’s all in the legs’ (you’re supposed to push off, not haul up), disregarding the fact that their upper bodies are so strong that simply holding on to the rock doesn’t register on their arms and fingers. For one who has putty for biceps and digits trained on a computer keyboard, holding on to a poxy pinnacle on a cliff that’s leaning your way is not an option. I couldn’t cling on any longer.

‘I’m going to fall!’ I cried.

‘OK, Sue, I got you,’ called Pung. ‘Sit back, rest.’ Sit back? Rest? I ventured a half-squat, but my fingers gave way and I dropped off the cliff. The rope sprang taut and I dangled like a puppet, shaking my feeble arms. That wasn’t so bad. Pung lowered me a couple of feet to where I could try again. This time, following her instructions, involving a wide stretch with the right foot and pushing off with my left hand, I made it up to the ledge, to the cheers of Dino and Pung. Now to be lowered off - like abseiling, only with someone else at the controls. If I’d been told a week before that I’d be walking backwards over a 40 ft cliff, I’d have laughed witheringly. Yet, having just tested my weight on the rope, I really wasn’t scared.

Dino and I were hooked. I did three more half-days (I hadn’t the strength for more than two or three climbs a day), sustained a total of 34 bruises to my legs, and pledged to go indoor climbing back home. That was a year ago. I’ve only been to an indoor wall once in Britain, but I’ve been back to Railay with a climber friend. The great thing about climbing is that, as long as one person is experienced enough to lead, you can be self-sufficient. Our best day was the sort of ad-hoc, outward-bound adventure that I never expected to have (not without a team of instructors, porters and St John Ambulance men).

We hiked up to the low viewpoint - a doddle this time, and just the prelude to a roped 65 ft ascent to the high viewpoint. Then came my first-ever abseil, requiring another leap of faith since I couldn’t see the ground for the trees. Apart from a minor hitch when my backpack got caught on a branch, we landed safely and marched to Pra Nang beach, ropes slung over our shoulders, feeling part of the club.

There can be no beach more idyllic than Pra Nang: a sweeping belt of sand as bleached and powdery as climber’s chalk, clear sea of jade and sapphire, islands for focal interest, and a shoreline of trees with arching trunks and dollopy leaves that form a neat coathook-cum-parasol. We hung up our climbing paraphernalia and paddled out to a longtail boat to buy a lunch of fresh pineapple and coconut water and lovingly prepared tuna salad rolls.

After a swim, we continued to the caves at the far end of Pra Nang beach. A rather nerve-racking scramble through the blackness and up bamboo ladders with every other rung missing led us to the far side of the mountain, above Railay beach. A final abseil and a short jungle trek, and we were back at Bobo’s, ready for the ritual sunset-gaze over a cool pina colada. Stringy Harry was right: climbing is so enjoyable in Thailand, it does spoil you for the rest of the world.

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