Where can you fish, camp, mountain bike, play basketball, canoe, kayak, win a fishing rod, climb, meet Dinosaur Train’s star Dr. Scott, hula hoop, obstacle race, hang out with Broncos cheerleaders, celebrate Smokey Bear’s 70th birthday party and test drive a Trikke (a three-wheeled carving vehicle) in one day?
Triike-ing!
National Get Outdoors Day in Denver!
Mile High Mamas was thrilled to partner with OFF!® as they sponsored Get Outdoors Day, which encourages Americans (especially our youth) to get outdoors.
Haven’t had your fill this summer? Don’t miss our guides to getting outdoors:
- 10 of the best places to camp with kids in Colorado.
- 11 scenic drives in Colorado this fall.
- The best places to fish as a family in Colorado.
- Get kids outdoors at Denver’s nearby mountain parks.
- 8 nature centers in Denver your kids will love.
- Vela Adventures’ adventure day camps…for mom.
- Colorado’s first summer/fall tubing hill opens at Snow Mountain Ranch.
For National Get Outdoors Day, City Park was transformed into an outdoor wonderland and almost every booth had activities that taught children to embrace our parks, forests, refuges and other public lands and waters.
At the Off! booth, we gave away free samples of OFF! Deep Woods Towelettes, which keep mosquitoes, black flies, gnats and no-see-ums away for up to two hours and are perfect to throw in a backpack or purse. (Regularly priced $5.99 for eight towelettes). We also posed in their fun photo booth and personalized our paddles….
…and we were educated on how the West Nile virus is spread when a mosquito bites an infected bird and then bites a person. Did you know that avoiding exposure to mosquitoes is the best way to combat West Nile virus and the Center for Disease Control recommends wearing long sleeves and pants where mosquitoes and pants are prevelent and using repellents with deet, like OFF! Deep Woods® Insect Repellents?
Now that you know how to protect yourself, get out and play and that is exactly what we did at the four villages. While at the Expressive Arts Village we drew, painted and learned about urban farming. At the United Healthcare BodyWalk Village, we did obstacle courses, hula hooped, spun the wheel where the prizes were fun exercises and were fascinated to watch people of all ages and backgrounds test out hand-pedal bikes at the Adaptive Recreation Village.
My kids are alumni of Avid4Adventure so we had to test out their climbing wall and bike track.
Apparently my son rides side-saddle.
My kids’ favorite part of the day was at the Outdoor Adventure Village where they kayaked, canoed and cast a line in the fishing pond that was brimming with trout.
When we heard one of the booths was giving away youth fishing rods to anyone who could win at the bean bag toss, it became the bane to their [future fishing career] existence.
The problem was they were much more adept at fishing than they were at bean baggin’. Each child got four tries in one turn and the line was long. My son nailed it on round two but my disappointed daughter gave up after round 3. “I’ll never be a good bean bag tosser,” she wailed. Upon much coaxing–partly because I didn’t want her to give up and mostly because I didn’t want to pay $40 for a fishing rod–she gave it one last chance and she is now the proud owner of a new fishing rod.
This means fishing licenses, bait and hooks are now in our future.
And we’ll need plenty of OFF! to combat those mosquitoes during our early-morning fall outings.
To see how you can join in on the fun, visit www.facebook.com/OFF and www.Instagram.com/OffOutdoors. Mile High Mamas partnered with OFF! on this campaign and all opinions are our own.
Author: Amber Johnson
Amber is the founder and editor of Mile High Mamas, travel writer and former columnist for The Denver Post. She is a passionate community builder and loves the outdoors. She has two awesome teens and is happily married to a man obsessed with growing The Great Pumpkin.
