That evokes a fond memory for me. In the early to mid-60’s, we used to go to this vacant lot, a ravine of sorts a few blocks away from my street, that we would climb for hours, traversing it by holding on to various tree roots and branches, looking for the next footing, and and also climbing up and down it. We were in the wilderness searching for civilization! Sometimes we were escaping from the bad guys. We would stand on the ridge and try to figure how we’d get to the other side by going around the sides of it. That lot was all dirt and rocks and roots and trees but it was the coolest.
That sounds like the neigbourhood I grew up in. There was a huge park behind my house that was kept a wilderness and we would be in it for hours on end. We would also build forts into the hillside.
We had a county hunting area about 5 miles from home. In the summer when there was no hunting, we’d either hike or ride our bikes there. The bikes weren’t the variable speed bikes of today (the most advanced bike I had was a 3-speed and that was just before driving). So, we’d leave them at the end of the dirt road and hike. We’d sometimes carry a small backpack and sleeping bag, and stay the night, or, at times, over the weekend. We’d generally have the place to ourselves and knew every square inch of that area (it was at least 1 x1 mile in size). I’d simply tell mom what we were going to do and get a “Be careful” in response.