My Park is Yosemite

#MyParkIsYosemite

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My first time hiking Half Dome.

Yosemite National Park is certainly a special place, both in its physical beauty and grandeur but as well as in the imagination and mind of what we envision as majestic national parks. It is embedded in the mythology of the National Park Service with a rich history that includes the Buffalo soldiers, John Muir and Teddy Roosevelt, and of course its role in being a precursor to the National Park Service by being protected by Abraham Lincoln in 1864 before the establishment of Yellowstone National Park in 1872.  Yosemite is also special in that it is a world-class destination so close to so many communities in the Central Valley of California and yet not many in those communities may always easily access it.

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CA Mini-Corps Outdoor Education Program Instructors training in Yosemite to provide outdoor education to Migrant students throughout CA.

Growing up in the Central Valley I would often hear about Yosemite, but it would be years before I would really get to discover its beauty. I recall as a college student finally entering the Yosemite Valley on a morning with light fog and emergent sunlight. It was magical. I would return to explore Tuolumne Meadows and Lambert Dome. Later, with a group of friends we scaled Half Dome, and returned several times to repeat that experience. Whether it was walking Mariposa Grove with park rangers as we trained Latino college students to be outdoor instructors for migrant students, or simply hiking the Panoramic trail with friends, Yosemite kept providing a diversity of experiences. It is that diversity that presents an opportunity—to welcome a diversity of the American public, from near and afar, to enjoy a diversity of experiences within the park.

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It is important to me, as a Latinx immigrant, a US Citizen, an English-Language Learner, and the first in my family to go to college, to be a role model of how our parks are for all—and the work we need to continue to advance in true inclusivity. I strive to exemplify how my cultura is important to me in these spaces, and how we create more inclusive environments to welcome all regardless of background. Yosemite welcomed me in its grandeur, and as a Yosemite Centennial Ambassador, I want to extend that invitation to others. We much to do but we also have much to celebrate, and regardless we start somewhere. Since that first time I wandered into Yosemite Valley, I have visited many other national parks and public lands and yet in many ways My Park Is Yosemite. It does not have to be yours or it can be, so long as you can see and feel yourself reflected in such a place.

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En este año que celebramos el centenario de nuestros parques nacionales,  vengan, encuentren su parque, están bienvenidos, es mi placer ser su embajador y guía.

This post is part of the #MyParkIsYosemite campaign. If your park is also Yosemite, join us! If you want to express your love for other parks or other public lands share that too! #Next100 #PublicLandsForAll #EncuentraTuParque

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José González is the Founder of Latino Outdoors. He is a Yosemite Centennial Ambassador and represents Latino Outdoors in several coalitions including the Latino Conservation Alliance and the Next 100 Coalition. He also serves on a National Park Service advisory committee and has been recognized with several honors, including the National Wildlife Federation, Grist Magazine, and The Murie Center.

To learn more about the Next 100 Coalition, check out this site and sign the petition.

#VamosOutdoors- A Home Where I Am Me

The Outdoors Is A Home Where I Am Me

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Family Campout in Alicia East Campground, Mt. Tamalpais, CA. Photo Credit: Jose Gonzalez.

This is a sponsored post in collaboration with REI to support Latino Outdoors’ #VamosCamping & #VamosOutdoors–and invite our community to enjoy our public lands and outdoor spaces. All opinions, thoughts, and musings are my own. -Jose Gonzalez

I have often shared that some of my most memorable outdoor experiences have been among the redwoods, from the giants at Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park, to the intimate community of Muir Woods National Monument. Consistently, the term that came to mind was the magical realism associated with Latin American literature.  I would think…these giants exist…they are real—but with a sense of hyper-realism or maybe so unreal that they are so magical. They are living breathing giants, fantasy materialized. They are telling me so much in this silence if I listen attentively—I am not just looking at trees here. Layers of connection happen with all the senses and emotions as I walk around them. I am not just visiting a park to see things on display. I am connecting with myself in mind and spirit—a restorative experience. I learn about the place and myself and these elders have a story—a long life over so many human histories.  And all these connections, between nature and culture make me feel welcome and I think of how the outdoors connects with my ideas of home.

Home is where my ancestors and elders greet me

Home is not just where my immediate family is. My culture is deeply intergenerational and I’ve often lived in a home where my grandparents have raised me, where my aunts and uncles are ever present, but also where my elders from past generations still stop by to give advice or simply are present in the family space. So when I’m outdoors and I look at a family of redwoods, sequoias, or oaks, these are elders and ancestors as well— similar as those of Native American communities, where familiar spirits are present in these outdoors spaces. When I am connected to that in the outdoors, I am home.

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Olompali State Historic Park, Novato, CA. Photo credit: Jose Gonzalez.

 

Home is where my familia welcomes me

Although the outdoors is a nurturing and healing space for solitary endeavors—often a place to “get away from it all” and quietly reflect by one self, to me home is also where my familia is present, in many senses of the word. Like many others, I do enjoy some personal space to be and reconnect with myself, but my community has raices in creating family in social spaces and the outdoors is and should be no different. Home is where the parents and the children play together and where families can be together to create a larger family of cultural familiarity and comfort. Home is where the campground feels no different than the plaza of my hometown, the cocina of my abuela, or me sitting with my parents on the front lawn, catching up on how the primos and tias are doing.

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Family Campout at Alice Eastwood Campground, Mt. Tamalpais, CA. Photo by Alicia Cruz, Latino Outdoors Regional Coordinator.

Home is where my cultura sings to me

Beyond my family, home is where culture is blended with the space such that it does not feel like such extremely different spaces. Yes, some of the activities may be different but HOW we do them can still be very familiar. It is where beans are soaking near the campfire stove and where hot chocolate comes in the form of Abuelita or Ibarra tablets. It is where Chespirito, Chapulin Colorado, Cholula, and chanclas are mixed with leave-no-trace principles, proper tent setup, and countless naturalist quotes. It is where the table cover around which we will gather for a meal—in its resplendent array of color—will have come from Mexico or Peru. And yes, it is where the homemade salsa will be on that tabletop or someone will be asking who brought the Tapatio bottle.

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Hiking Leadership module at Fernandez Ranch, John Muir Land Trust, Martinez, CA. Photo credit: Jose Gonzalez.

Home is Where I am Me

I am an immigrant from Mexico. I am an English Language Learner. I am a former Migrant student. I am the oldest of all my siblings and the first in my family to go to college. I grew up poor as my parents did their best to provide for us in a new country. My story is like that of many others and what my home was growing up was no different than countless others who followed a similar path. But I grew to love and understand the idea of “the Outdoors” in this new country, and advocate for a multifaceted view and interaction with nature and our public lands. Hiking, camping, and other outdoor activities became as comfortable and familiar as quinceañeras, bautizos, and posadas. This is important because it was powerful to realize I could function competently and comfortably in what could have been two seemingly disparate cultures. I began to explore the idea of being “ambicultural”— not just bicultural — a role in which I could leverage both my “Latino” culture and identity and my growing “outdoors” culture and identity to be me and be of service to my community. This was important because both places mattered to me and I did not want to leave my cultura at the trailhead or have my outdoor adventures be labeled as “another white thing he does”. Now I proudly take my huaraches to the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge or by the campfire at a local state park as we gather to make s’mores and others have their night cafecito con pan dulce.

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Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Photo credit: Jose Gonzalez.

Home is where we’ll pitch tent, where we camp, where we hit the trail, where we’ll look up at the countless stars and where we will greet el sol, Tonatiuh. Because we bring home with us, not just packed in our daypack or car trunks, but also packed in our minds and hearts, to be shared with each other.  When we say “Vamos Camping” we are creating the space to take home with us. That is a reality and aspiration that should be within reach of anyone that loves and enjoys the outdoors regardless of their background. If home is where the heart is, then we can make home anywhere, and the outdoors should be no exception.

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Photo credit: Graciela Cabello.

 

Jose Gonzalez is the Founder of Latino Outdoors. 

Latino Outdoors Receives a $25,000 Community Grant from Outdoor Foundation and Kaiser Permanente

Media Contactslatino-outdoors-logo-smaller

José González, Latino Outdoors

(209) 968-6155

jgonzalez@latinooutdoors.org

 

Graciela Cabello, Latino Outdoors

(805) 203-6679

graciela@latinooutdoors.org

 

In celebration of the National Parks Centennial, Outdoor Foundation and Kaiser Permanente support organizations connecting people to parks through outdoor recreation.

(LOS ANGELES), June 20 – Latino Outdoors is pleased to announce it was one of eight recipients of a $25,000 grant from Outdoor Foundation and Kaiser Permanente. The grant program awarded funding to deserving non-profits from Northern California that help connect local youth from underserved or urban areas to close-to-home parks.

The partnership between the Outdoor Foundation and Kaiser Permanente will fund eight projects that will engage more than 1,800 young people in recreation at parks. Part of the Outdoor Foundation’s broader “Parks4Kids” initiative, the program was announced at the Partnership for a Healthier America Summit in Washington, DC.

“Using cultural relevancy as a tool to connect communities to the outdoors, and foster the next generation of stewards is a top priority,” said Raquel Rangel, Latino Outdoors Regional Coordinator for the Central Valley. “The community we work with are underserved, first generation Latino families in Modesto, Stockton, and Turlock in California. The program will connect the participants to different nearby parks – local, state, and national. We believe that creating meaningful and memorable experiences, while experiencing different outdoor activities with their families, will empower them to continue accessing such places.”

“America is facing an inactivity crisis, which is contributing to a range of health issues for young people across the country and in Northern California,” said Chris Fanning, the executive director of the Outdoor Foundation. “Thanks to the support and leadership of Kaiser Permanente, we are working with great local groups to get Americans — especially youth — out of the house and into public parks to create healthy, active communities.”

The grant program was created to help combat the inactivity crisis prevalent among youth and young adults in America. The statistics are staggering. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, the average young person spends eight hours in front of a screen and only eight minutes outside and active.

 Latino Outdoors involves multiple outings to parks throughout the year, with the purpose of establishing new and healthy lifestyles and a love for America’s natural treasures. All of the eight non-profits were selected to work with the National Park Service to build lasting relationships between communities and local parks while inspiring a new generation of outdoor enthusiasts that will support and champion park issues.

 

The non-profits that received funding include:

  • Latino Outdoors: Central Valley, CA – Supports ongoing efforts to introduce youth and their families to national parks and other public lands.
  • City of Dreams: San Francisco, CA – Exposes youth living in or near public housing projects to new experiences in national, state and municipal parks.  
  • Earth Team: Berkeley, CA – Trains more than 100 students from Title I minority-enrollment schools to address environmental issues in their communities. 
  • Groundwork Richmond: Richmond, CA – Creates a youth Green Team to revitalize the community while providing environmental education for participants. 
  • Nature Bridge: San Francisco, CA – Provides underserved youth with a year of wilderness explorations, service projects, career workshops and more. 
  • Pogo Park: Richmond, CA – Brings inner-city youth to Yosemite National Park and Muir Woods National Monument to deepen their understanding of nature. 
  • San Leandro Boys & Girls Club: San Leandro, CA – Introduces urban youth to the outdoors through educational experiences and campouts. 
  • Waterside Workshops: Berkeley, CA – Provides low-income teens and young adults with daily opportunities for outdoor recreation.

This partnership initiative is a matching fund program where an equal matching share is required from the non-profit and other project partners. The projects will begin this spring and wrap up in December.

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About the Outdoor Foundation

Charitable arm of Outdoor Industry Association, the Outdoor Foundation is a national not-for-profit organization dedicated to inspiring and growing future generations of outdoor leaders and enthusiasts. Through youth engagement, community grant-making, and groundbreaking research, the Foundation works with young leaders and partners to mobilize a major cultural shift that leads all Americans to the great outdoors. In just five years, the Foundation has invested $4 million into 785 not-for-profit and college programs that have connected 200,000 young people to the outdoors. Importantly, 90¢ of every dollar goes directly into this critical work. Visit us at outdoorfoundation.org and outdoornation.org for more information. 

About Kaiser Permanente

Kaiser Permanente is committed to helping shape the future of health care. We are recognized as one of America’s leading health care providers and not-for-profit health plans. Founded in 1945, our mission is to provide high-quality, affordable health care services and to improve the health of our members and the communities we serve. We currently serve more than 10 million members in eight states and the District of Columbia. Care for members and patients is focused on their total health and guided by their personal physicians, specialists and team of caregivers. Our expert and caring medical teams are empowered and supported by industry-leading technology advances and tools for health promotion, disease prevention, state-of-the-art care delivery and world-class chronic disease management.

About Latino Outdoors

With roots in the past, a presence in the present and vision for the future, Latino Outdoors is a network of leaders committed to engaging Latinos/as in the outdoors, connecting familias and youth with nature, and empowering our community of storytellers to explore and share their personal experiences. Our growing online platform allows participants to creatively document their cultural connections to conservation, the environment, and the Great American Outdoors with the world.