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The 52 Hike Challenge

por Karla Amador

Take yourself back to your childhood and recall a moment you spent in nature with your family.

I remember when I was young, during spring break, my mom would take my sisters and me on walks at the “Enchanted” Fern Dell Nature Trail a.k.a “Ferndell Nature Museum” at Griffith Park in Hollywood, California.

The trail was beautiful with towering trees, a natural spring that fed the waterfalls, lush green tropical ferns, and lots of flora popping out at you. We would look for magical creatures: turtles, koi fish and dragonflies. My sisters, Sarah, Sybil and I, would run around, laughing, playing hide and seek. I remember imagining fairies lived there. We even found our family dog, Sasha, while walking up the trail to the Observatory.

It’s actually one of the main things I remember doing with my mom.

This was one of few activities I looked forward to as a kid. With three little kids, my parents did not have a ton of money to spend on expensive activities, so walking it was. It’s actually one of the main things I remember doing with my mom.

I didn’t realize it then, but spending time outside with my family was one of the most powerful ways for us to connect to each other and make memories.

Now I know the incredible benefits of getting outside regularly, and with family. The great outdoors can bring you an overwhelming sense of peace and well-being. It increases creativity and overall joy. The best part of all? It’s FREE!

When you bring your family with you, you will all benefit.

Benefits of Getting Outside With Loved Ones

You will:

  • Find time and space to communicate with each other
  • Enjoy the little things and spend quality time together
  • Unplug from technology and your daily life
  • Live a healthier and happier life

As you can see, getting out in nature can have tremendously positive effects on your overall well-being and strengthen bonds with your loved ones.

When you get outside regularly, you increase your physical strength and stamina, reduce stress, improve your mood, and so much more.

So why not make it a goal for you and your family in the New Year?

The Goal: 52 Hikes In A Year

In 2014, I was looking for a worthwhile goal for myself. After falling in love with hiking, I decided to commit to a hike a week for the entire year.

Every week I looked forward to my next hike. I enjoyed packing a lunch and eating outside. I enjoyed enlisting my son and friends to join me. I enjoyed the feeling of accomplishment when I reached a summit.

It was life-changing, and I decided to share my 52 Hike Challenge idea with others. The idea took off and spread like wildfire. I now run this movement to help as many people gain the physical mental, spiritual and emotional benefits derived through nature and hiking. We’ve now had more than 41,000 people take the challenge.

With the New Year and a pandemic upon us, one of the best things we can do is commit to finding healthy ways to destress, find joy, and keep our families united. Hiking is a great way to do so, safely of course.

Challenge Yourself in 2021 – Commit to 52 Hikes

I want to challenge you to commit to getting out into nature once a week for a year. That’s 52 hikes in 52 weeks. Are you up to the challenge?

Commit to something that will help you enhance your physical and mental health, build stronger family bonds, and so much more.

Curious about getting started? Here’s what helped me stay committed to my goal:

5 Ways to Stay Committed to Your Outdoor Goal

  1. Set your intention (what do you want to achieve?)
  2. Share your goal with a loved one and your immediate family
  3. Keep track of your progress (log your hikes and take pictures)
  4. Join a community (engage with people who share the same goal)
  5. Reward yourself (and your family) for your hard work!

Are you ready to experience the life changing benefits of 52 hikes?

You simply never know where this year-long adventure will take you, but one thing is for sure: you’ll make tons of amazing memories with your family.

Sign Up for the 52 Hike Challenge Now

So, what do you have to lose? Commit to making the outdoors a priority in your life. Sign up for the 52 Hike Challenge now!

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Karla Amador is the co-founder of the 52 Hike Challenge, a global movement that has inspired hundreds of thousands of people around the world to get outdoors and take advantage of the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual benefits gained through hiking once a week for a year. Together, with the community she has created a culture of support, which can be seen in over 430,000 images shared under the #52HikeChallenge hashtags on Instagram alone.

Yo Alcanzo: #SheSePuede

por Dani Reyes-Acosta

Lo alcanzamos? Loaded with meanings, this word stays with me, constantly. At every stage of my life, I’ve discovered different aspects of its significance, complexities unfolding as I ascend deeper and higher into the mountains. For this child of the sun, descendant of Filipino-Mexican immigrants and Spanish-Mexican settlers, alcanzar brings expectation and fear, together with possibility and reaching. Together, these meanings define me. Alcanzo lo que puedo. Sueño en posibilidades.

Expectation and Fear

Born in Santa Monica, California, I spent the first fifteen years of my life near the ocean. Surfing, biking, and swimming ruled my childhood in Playa del Rey, nearly as much as piano practice and extra homework. As my Tata reminded me once: “My little Danielle will be a great doctor or lawyer.” My father would have added “…or concert pianist.”

I’m not quite sure if the expectations on my young shoulders weighed heavier from the memory of recent immigration or our history as Californios. But expectation drove me to achieve in a way that I never questioned and appreciated only later in life. Expectation meant doing well, because no other option existed. It was for this reason that my mother had worked her summer breaks from UCSB in the grape fields. Inasmuch my father seemed to be established in Los Angelino culture, in our church, in our neighborhood, I sensed, deeply, the work he put in. Success wasn’t given: it was earned.

I remember the togetherness of our family’s experiences: annual trips to Mammoth or Big Bear showed me that car trips in the Cadillac could take us to wonderful places. Camping in the mountains of Southern California or gazing out the windows of Yosemite’s Awhawnee gave me a glimpse into a future I never expected I’d embrace.

When life took me to Fresno, in California’s Central Valley, I found adolescent solace in distance runs under the baking sun. I paddled for inner peace in the surf while attending the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). I worked, tirelessly, to make lemonade from the lemons that life had given me.

When my maternal grandmother, who grew up in El Centro, CA, mocked the Castellano accent I’d picked up from studying abroad in Spain after my father’s death, I gazed at the palm trees rustling against an electric blue sky. I belonged out there, with the wind.

“The mountains have my heart, but the ocean owns my soul”.

Possibilities and Reaching

When I moved to Oregon for a competitive corporate job, I had two choices for recreation: volver al mar, a place I knew, or turn to the mountains. Nostalgia me llamó: the mountains held the secrets of my childhood, a happiness I hadn’t known for years. I bought a ski pass. I taught myself to snowboard. It was like surfing, a sport I’d known since 14. My employer had an indoor rock climbing gym; intimidated by the high-tech machines and former Olympic athletes found throughout the rest of the building, I went there to explore. The vertical realm intrigued me.

Six years and six countries later, an urge to explore the upper realm of lo posible has taken me to mountains like the Andes, Cascades, Coast Range, Rockies, Sierra Nevada, and Tetons. I’ve ticked off notable ascents (climbing) and descents (splitboarding aka backcountry snowboarding) not just for the sake of achievement, but often for something simpler. Joy and healing couple nicely with personal growth and empowerment.

My journey to climbing, together with hiking, camping, and snowboarding, didn’t just teach me that recreation could be a declaration of freedom. It was also an act of dissent, a rejection of a broader system and society that often tore me down and betrayed me. It was an assertion to my right for self-care and self-determination. Climbing and snowboarding didn’t just provide the happiness or empowerment many of us seek; they also gave me hope.

“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.”

Audre Lorde

The tiny spark of hope I found hiking on the trail, climbing at the crag, or snowboarding down steep snowy faces turned into something bigger. The fire inside me began to burn brighter, stronger. Si alcancé subir this mountain all by myself, what else could I do? Could I hike by myself, lead climb up a tower, or build a community that supported me, unequivocally, in all I do? Could I put my energy and time into things that really mattered to me, and build a career and life I love?

Mountains give me a lens to see the role choice plays in my life, every single day. From the results yielded by the hours put into training or the support I receive from the community I’ve cultivated, intention guides where my energy goes.

Out here, up here, life looks different, feels newer. I can see that we are just individual musical notes in a symphony beyond our comprehension. So I risk things: playing my own tune, finding my own key. I step out of my comfort zone, often, and find rewards I never thought possible. I risk failure, too, because I know there will always be a lesson.

My experiences in the backcountry have helped me find my truest self and start to realize my greatest potential—whether as an individual or member of a bigger community. This is the joy of embracing that I am part of this ecosystem; this is why I go outside.

En búsqueda de los límites de lo posible o ser parte de la vida que nos rodea: por eso, me voy afuera.

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Dani Reyes-Acosta is a freelance brand strategist, educator, writer, and advocate redefining who plays outside and how we build community with others on this planet. She is also a splitboarder, climber, runner, and waterwoman partnering with several organizations to build a better future. Her work explores regenerative economies in the American West, how heritage and adversity inform identity, how inclusive marketing can pave the way to the future, and more. Learn more at DaniReyesAcosta.com.

Finding my true calling

por Sebastian Moreno

My parents were born in Colombia and moved to the United States when they were teenagers. Because they had me in their early 20s, they had to grow up incredibly fast. I was born New York City and when I was 12, my parents decided it was more affordable to live in a house in Pennsylvania than cram four people in a one-bedroom apartment in the city. Growing up in a city and moving to the woods was a big change for me. I didn’t really appreciate living in the middle of a forest. I did spend a lot of my time in the backyard, but never exploring the four miles of uninterrupted forest behind our house. It was only when I reached high school that I began exploring the outdoors with my friends

After high school, I went to college to pursue a degree in pharmacy. Honestly, how I decided to pursue a career in pharmacy is still a mystery. Looking back, I think I chose that career because, as a pharmacist, I would be helping people, which is something I have always enjoyed. Also, I was pretty excited that I would be making a lot of money one day. What 18-year-old doesn’t love that idea?

“While I was on my hikes, I found myself asking all these how and why questions pertaining to nature.”

Sebastian Moreno

Pharmacy school sucked for me. I felt like I didn’t fit in with my peers and the classes were a total drag. I sabotaged my grade by not studying and putting in the effort to do well in classes. Due to my poor academic standing, I was kicked out of the pharmacy program. I found myself without any real direction and not quite sure what I wanted to do with life. I found solace being outside. I took this time to clear my head and think about what my next steps were going to be.

While I was on my hikes, I found myself asking all these how and why questions pertaining to nature. This piqued my interest and after talking to a few professors in the biology department, they suggested I take a population and evolutionary biology course. I really wasn’t sure what I would be learning but I figured what was the worst that could happen?

I loved the course, my peers, and my professors! Everything I was learning made sense to me. I was engaged in the classroom and my grades were significantly improving. My professors saw the eagerness in me, and I was presented with ecological research opportunities. First, I worked in a lab looking at squirrels and acorn dispersal. Although it was fun and interesting, I really wasn’t interested in working with small mammals. I then started working in a lab that studied birds. There, I learned valuable field work techniques and basic ecological concepts.

“My thesis looked at how large concentrations of urban vacant lots in St. Louis impact bird diversity. While working in this city, I was exposed to more than just birds.”

Sebastian Moreno

From my time in this lab, I knew I loved ecology and birds. But that was about it. I wasn’t quite sure where I saw myself working nor did I feel like I had enough experience to find a decent job. Graduate school seemed like a good way to continue improving my knowledge, skills, and narrowing my interests. I decided to pursue a master’s degree. My thesis looked at how large concentrations of urban vacant lots in St. Louis impact bird diversity. While working in this city, I was exposed to more than just birds. I got a first-hand experience of social and environmental injustices. This opened my eyes to a whole new world of ecology I was not familiar with. Although it was a bit too late to change my thesis, I knew my next chapter in life would incorporate these new interests. Again, with my newly found interests, I felt like I didn’t have enough experience to qualify for the jobs I was interested in. So back to school it was for me! Currently, I am pursuing a PhD. My goal is to mix my interests of birds, people, urban areas, and ecology together to create a project. While conducting my research, I also want to serve urban communities by connecting them with nature and empowering them to create positive changes within their community.

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Sebastian Moreno is a second year PhD student at the University of Massachusetts. He is interested in the intersection between wildlife and people. Sebastian‘s research looks to improve on the community science experience and lower the barriers that may prevent underrepresented individuals from participating in such programs. When he is not working on his dissertation, Sebastian is outside hiking, birding, or practicing falconry with his American Kestrel.