A bouldering mat or crash pad is basically a small mattress used for protection when bouldering. There are various sizes and makes, but the most common type is a folded mattress, 8 to 10 centimetres thick (3 to 4 inches) , that when unfolded measures about 1 x 2 metres (3 x 4 feet). They also have shoulder straps so as to easily move it between boulders. Its main use is to protect your feet when falling from between four and five metres. A mattress is a piece of bedding typically consisting of multiple layers of foams and fibers, along with an innerspring unit used to provide support to ones back during sleep. ... To make climbing as safe as possible, most climbers use protection to prevent injury to themselves and others. ... Boulderer in Fontainebleau, France Bouldering is climbing without a rope on large boulders. ...

The term crash pad was also a hippy slang expression for a place to sleep listed in an alternative society network of addresses. Hippies (singular hippie or sometimes hippy) were members of the 1960s counterculture movement who adopted a communal or nomadic lifestyle, renounced corporate nationalism and the Vietnam War, embraced aspects of Buddhism, Hinduism, and/or Native American religious culture, and were otherwise at odds with traditional middle class Western values. ... Slang is the non-standard use of words in a language of a particular social group, and sometimes the creation of new words or importation of words from another language. ... The phrase alternative society may have been in usage since the 19th century when Karl Marx and Proudhon represented two factions for alternative visions of social change. ...