Here’s an edited transcript of this entry of Amy’s Outdoor Diary. Listen to the episode on iTunes, Google Podcasts, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts.
Is this a return to outdoor normal?
We’re still taking the current situation pretty seriously — wearing masks in stores, the boys aren’t playing with friends, we’ve severely limited the places we’re going and errands we’re running — but in many ways it feels like we’re returning to something resembling normal, at least when it comes to the outdoors and the summer.
School is ending in a completely non-normal way, but we’re ready to jump headlong into the normal of summer for us. Here that means long evenings full of outside time, riding bikes together, running, fire pit time, camping, eating dinner on the porch, an adventure a few times a week to a new to us trail or a favorite haunt.
It means kicking the kids outside for all-day play, and watching them play with sticks for hours on end. What is it with kids and sticks, anyway? And why do I keep spending money on toys?
This week of outdoor time for me meant, well OK you probably guessed it — a lot of running. But I’ve been using those outdoor miles to make sure my kids are getting some great outdoor time in, too, and they’ve been riding their bikes with me while I run. We even got a hitch installed on my Subaru this week so we can take those bikes to other places and not always just run and bike starting at our house.
We had hammock time, hit up the community green to watch a flyover from our local base, sat outside like cats in the sun napping and basking, went to a drive-in theater at the fairgrounds and listened to music on a lawn.
Sounds like a regular summer to me. Except — not. Because in all of these things there was distancing from others, some mask wearing, and a weird sense of “should we really be here? Is this OK?”
It felt OK. It was OK.
I’m also trying to do a new adventure each week. This week I hit up a new-to-me trail with my running pals, heading up 11ish miles and back to Eska Falls, a waterfall above Sutton, Alaska. It was a gorgeous hike and run on a gentle trail that was the perfect level of softness. The sun was warm and glorious. It was a wonderful way to spend a Saturday.
Through all of these things, by the way, I’ve been rocking my Goodr sunglasses. And Goodr is this week’s outdoor hero. They haven’t given me a dime to tell you this– but I love them. For $25 you get a pair of polarized shades in super fun colors. I’m addicted. My favorite right now are black and gold, but I’ve got a pair of pink ones I think I’ll break back out soon. Thanks for being awesome, Goodr!
You can catch me wearing way too many varieties of Goodrs for all of my outdoor adventures by following us on Humans Outside on Instagram. You can also see all of my daily outdoor time by checking out the hashtag #Humansoutside365. I’m sneaking up on 1,000 days in a row over here, so there’s lots to see. Tag your own photos so we can see them, too.
Until next time, we’ll see you out there.
