NOMAD Bouldering Gym

I had heard great things about this place and was excited to try it. The location is good and the facilities are decent, but it feels like it’s a gym past its prime that’s been left to degrade.

Probably the best way to describe the feel for Nomad is a gym that’s on a budget and doesn’t want to spend time or money going above and beyond. The routes jump around in difficulty quite a lot, making difficulty colour guide somewhat inaccurate. The routes when we were there also seemed to top out early on quite a few, rather than continuing to the top of the wall, which made them less satisfying. The layout of the gym is also sub-optimal, with few seating areas, meaning a lot of people sit on the mats, resulting a few near-misses the couple of times I’ve been there, as well as meaning you need to walk under/past climbers often. They also no longer put out liquid chalk, which is fair enough, but considering they used to, it just emphasises that feeling of being on a budget.

Furthermore, the gym is poorly maintained, with some equipment not working very well, or with loose fittings. The deadlift platform is too wide, meaning the plates drop on the wood, instead of the rubber, defy the whole point of the rubber flooring. Some of the cardio equipment displays don’t work, although I suspect that’s as simple as no one having changed the batteries.

Their yoga studio and balcony are lovely, and probably one of the few distinguishing elements that set Nomad above competitors, but even there you can see the corner cutting. Little sings of lack of care like the fact the propagation tubes, with plants hanging out, were all bone dry when we were there.

Ultimately it’s still a decent gym and will keep a lot of people happy. I still like it more than a lot of other gyms I’ve been to, but it has stern competition and for as long as they have that “on a budget” feel to the gym, I’ll spend my money at one of their competitors in Marrickville, which is my favourite gym in Sydney, and less than 10min away from them.

I hope to see them and their staff take a bit more pride in their club and bring it back up to scratch, so it can better compete against the local competition.

Id like to extend a massive thank you to Nomad Bouldering Annandale for providing me with a beautiful trial period experience.

Prior to finding Nomad, I've had an extremely difficult time going to regular gyms due to my history with body shame and insecurity. I was attracted to Nomad following a deep reflection of what going to the gym meant to me. I concluded that the unconscious reason I was going to the gym wasn't for health or wellness but to fight the self-loathing thoughts I had about my body.

Following this realisation, I knew I could no longer go to a regular gym that profits off the shame and insecurities of their clients. I wanted to prioritise celebrating what my body could do rather than trying to make unrealistic changes to what it looked like. Serendipitously, the day I quit my gym membership my partner had a bouldering experience with her workplace and got an idea that we try out your gym which is a 5-minute walk from our home.

Immediately upon our arrival, we were greeted so warmly by the staff and beautiful neo-soul tunes through the speakers. I was genuinely getting emotional from the get-go. The energy within the space for me was of play and introspection which is exactly what I needed. We are new to bouldering so we enjoyed the process of discovering our difficulty level and found that we advanced faster than we expected

After a couple of climbing sessions with a few smaller gym sessions in between, we went to try your yoga.
Oh my days it was perfect.
The space, the instructor and the plants were just so warm, inviting and grounding. One of the best sessions I've had outside of a yoga retreat.

The entire experience was just divine for us and we will without a doubt be joining for membership once we're back from holiday

I’m visiting from the states and found NOMAD is way better than the climbing gym in my city! Love the chilling vibe and spacious semi-outdoor place where you can explore different levels and challenge yourself! (All level friendly ;) They also have a lovely coffee bar, green yoga rooms and first-week exploring pass for only $21… too many good things to say about this place

Beginner here. I started going here as part of a Meetup group and as I feel I'm slowing progressing, this is a highlight in the week. The sport is quite hectic, but I feel that the people here have been so inviting and friendly. The sport itself is very inclusive and everybody wants everybody to win. I feel people at Nomad are embracing that.
On the gym itself, it doesn't fall short of anything. I've been loving it every time I've gone.

My local Bouldering gym. Staff always friendly and helpful. Place is kept clean. Music isn’t to bad. Great for a climbing workout

Great atmosphere and the friendly community made me feel really comfortable as a beginner. The staff are very accomodating and there is a wide variety of climbs for all levels. Also great gym facilities & amenities (they even have free sanitary products for women) Highly recommend!

I used to love this place, but in recent years, they've really changed their style to be overly crimp heavy. This means that if you don't have the finger/forearm strength, you simply cannot do the climbs.

I've found that either climbs are far too easy for me, or they're impossible, with no in between. In previous years, they had a much larger range of hold types, meaning that you could have difficult climbs with nice hand holds, as well as ones that required crimping. They were challenging, but not impossible to achieve for the semi-regular climber.

This was the only bouldering gym that I would use before the injuries that I've recently got over. I don't think I'll go back again.

Nomad is an excellent bouldering gym, easily my favourite I've been to so far!

Huge gym, loads of climbs aswell as the variety in the types of climbs.
The facilities in general are good:)
Food and coffee are nice too

But my favourite part is that the crowd here are great:)

Best Sunday morning tunes I have ever experienced in a climbing gym. Absolutely cured my slight hangover.

Staff were great also!

Excellent bouldering gym, lots of cool features including top-out boulders and cracks. Large variety and number of climbs.

Awesome gym with a wide variety of sets on rotation! Staff are super friendly and the community atmosphere is great!

Awesome climbing, friendly regulars, fabulous staff, scrumptious coffee, what more could you want.would recommend time and time again.

Great gym, training facility and coffee. Lovely people too. A great place to try hard and have a good time?

Bouldering - better than climbing cause it just is. Anyway Sydney has a range of climbing gyms, few dedicated just for this pure art. Nomad is the biggest. The ups (haha) are that they regularly reset the routes & there is a good range of difficulties, esp important for beginners. Good coffee and there are few rules. Price - it’s expensive esp when sydney sandstone is free - but it’s probably worth it. They do have memberships. And yoga

My favourite location for indoor climbing, large epic walls, good coffee on site with an excellent selection of climbing shoes? ‍️? ‍️

Such a disappointing customer experience. I have been referring friends to Nomad after climbing there a few times but I’ll never do that again. As part of my niece (7) and nephews (5) Christmas gift, they wanted to go climbing so thought we’d make it a new thing of ours starting at Nomad. Unfortunately, the English accent woman on shift (30/1/21) had some sort of complex and needs some serious training. I understand that to reduce the risk of injury, Nomad has specific parent-to-child supervisory ratios, which change depending on the age of the children. However, she misquoted your guidelines verbally and I queried her misquote as my situation was no different to what she was saying so I was trying to explain her logic. When she realised she was wrong she poorly referred me to read the paper or the website with a world of attitude.
After we got over that it then it got worse. She pulled the covid card in terms of transmission of the kids street footwear in the gym compared to unsanitized oversized shoes that would need to be padded out. I'm sorry but I didn't see any NSW COVID SAFE sign in clearly at the entrance and both of the sanitiser I attempted to use when I entered was empty. So once again a poor excuse to try to make any experience better even if Nomad couldn't cater for children.
When we decided we were not going/wanting to stay
the best thing she did was recommend Sydney Indoor Rock Climbing gym in St Peters. We went the and had a blast. The staff there were amazing. Nomad should headhunt a few.
Anyways, I won't be back and will only he referring people to Wayward around the corner for a beer.

I had a great time trying to climb up the walls. Quite a laugh. The young lady staff member was friendly polite approachable and professional.

The problem styles are different from 9 degrees, so if you want variety this place is great. However the place is really hot and stuffy most of the times, and not many places for rest or watching people climb.

Nice gym with friendly staff and good vibe. It seems cater more for advanced and pro level climbers tho, very few beginner friendly problems but a big section for competition climbing.

Floor too hard. When you fall it jarrs your neck. They used to be much softer but now they are just too hard.