I love sports and the one that I recently got into is mountaineering - which involves intense climbing!
I have never done that but am interested and would like to know more about it
Well, intense mountaineering involves scaling the faces of mountains, but novices can get into the sport by simply hiking...if it involves scrambling over basic grades of rocks, of course.
Oh that is a lot more intense than backpacking! Is there special equipment needed?
It really depends on where you are mountaineering at. For example, if it's a snow laden area, you would want skis, or other such gear that makes it easier to traverse through the snow.
I know rock climbing is popular is mountaineering very popular?
It's very popular amongst those who love traveling to exotic places. I would say it is much easier to get into rock climbing than it is to get into mountaineering.
Is it the same thing as Alpining?