My hands are sweating, my face is smeared with chalk, my feet are scrunched into tiny elf shoes and my heart is beating faster than is healthy. Oh, and I'm dangling off a cliff.

"I'm stuck..." The words escape as a raspy whisper, uselessly inaudible to the curious crowd that seems to have gathered at the foot of the cliff in order to laugh at me.

Rock climbing. Since I am never sporty at the best of times, it was always going to be an ambitious activity. But, as I gripped the slippery cliff face, I was mildly comforted by the fact that there was no better place on earth to learn how not to rock climb: Railay, near Krabi in southern Thailand.

Attracting the best rock climbers in the world, Railay is as majestic as it is secluded. It is an isthmus that you reach by long-tail boat. Railay consists of towering limestone cliffs, many of which descend directly into a perfect emerald Andaman Sea.

Railay may appear small -- there are clusters of beach-hut hotels and small restaurants -- but it is a giant in rock-climbing terms. Since the 1980s, more than 700 bolted routes have been attached to its cliffs, enabling climbers from beginners to experts to clamber up.

It was initially my overly energetic boyfriend who had wanted to visit Railay in order to try his hand at rock climbing. I had planned to sleep, eat, swim and drink the odd cocktail -- in short, nothing too trying.

But I hadn't taken into the account how seductive the setting would be. Arriving by boat at Railay's shores, I was awed by the drama of the landscape. That evening, as a burning sun dipped over the blue-green waters, we sipped beers in one of the laid-back seafront bars while enjoying our new favourite activity -- rock gazing.

We were transfixed as one particularly agile and nimble-toed climber gracefully scampered skywards beyond overhanging boulders and smooth vertical rock faces.

It was as mesmerizing as it was inspiring. A few beers later I found myself recklessly agreeing to give rock climbing a go the following morning. And so it was that we enrolled in a beginner's course at On The Rocks, one of several rock-climbing outfits in Railay.