Hiking & Camping

Allowing Wonder to Overcome Fear

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / 1 Comment
A view up at the dark blue night sky with stars through dark trees

The sky was dark and smattered with stars. The Big Dipper shone out, bright and prominent. I stood on the campground road, looking up, my mouth partly open as if I was about to say something but then stopped in surprise. I watched the sky for a few minutes and then walked up the road to our campsite, my flashlight off. I gazed upwards every few moments, trying to cement the sight into my memory.

As I reached the campsite, my kids were getting ready to walk to the bathroom. “Keep your flashlight off!” I recommended. “You’ll see the stars so much better.” They hesitated, then turned them off, trusting me and the desire to see that beauty themselves.

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Looking Closely at What Surrounds Us

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment
A snail partly buried in the sand with a gray and peach shell

Skittering across the mud, a tiny hermit crab lunged at invisible-to-me prey. A few inches away, a crab with its shell covered in algae started digging. Caddisfly tubes made of rocks and shell bits poked up all around.

As I was observing this tiny tableau, I felt something on my foot. Something very much alive, moving, and animal-like.

“Ah, ah, ah!” I yelped, reaching down and trying to get it off. I spotted a long translucent creature and flicked it, only to have it hop up and land elsewhere on my leg. I finally got it off, much to my relief. As it turned out, it was an itty bitty shrimp and the shallow water extending to the horizon was full of them. I ended up with them in my shoes a couple more times that afternoon.

Despite my panic about having shrimp in my shoes, the low tide flats of Breakwater Beach in Cape Cod offered an awesome opportunity to look at nature up-close – really close. It was easy to miss the vast, wriggling diversity of life in the shallow water and sand unless you looked carefully. Once you did start looking, it was everywhere.

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Building Character Whether We Want to or Not

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Photo of a tiny orange newt on the bark of a fallen log with moss

“I swear, this hike felt a lot easier when I was 15,” I said to my kids, huffing as we hauled up what seemed like the endlessly steep mountain.

I had promised an “easy, fun, not that long” hike. I was right that it wasn’t that long. What I had forgotten was that it was nearly straight up, complete with patches of steep, smooth rock. It had rained the night before, making everything slippery as hell.

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An Unexpected Tour of the Adirondacks

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / 2 Comments

An Unexpected Tour of the Adirondacks, We'll Eat You Up, We Love You So; photo of mountains with blue sky

Note: This is an essay about an adventure that happened to me far, far before I had kids.

A crying girl, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and a supermarket parking lot. Not exactly the elements for an epic summit. But having missed the turn-off for our hike, we were now on the wrong side of Lake George in upstate New York, eating the lunches we were supposed to be having on the peak. By the way, I was the crying girl.

“This is your fault!” I pouted to my then-boyfriend, Chris, even though I had the map. I curled up in the passenger’s seat of his Civic, my tears falling on my bread. “If you hadn’t been speeding…”

“It’s too late now. What do you want to do?” he sighed. He got out of the car and started pacing.

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Finding the Place I’d Been Looking for Far Closer than I Imagined

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Finding the Place I'd Been Looking For (photo of a young boy walking on rocks through a stream)

A quiet stream with gurgling water, a spattering of rocks along the bottom. My young child plays nearby, the water just high enough for him to splash in without worrying about him getting hurt. I sit on a rock, my baby nestled in my arms.

I opened my eyes to a prenatal yoga class full of other heavily pregnant women. I struggled to stand up from where I was snuggled into a nest of yoga pillows and blankets.

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Exploring Science in Your Nature Study

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Text: Exploring Science in Your Nature Study; Photo: Two young white boys climbing up rocks next to a stream

“Do you have any recommendations on how to make being in nature more sciency?” a friend texted me.

I paused, because my first thought was “Uh, not a formal curriculum or anything.” But then I realized that learning so often has nothing to do with a curriculum. In fact, we do informal learning all the time in our family, from observing how plants grow in the garden to reading a map on a hike. Similarly, when I was an outdoor educator, we had a structure to our lessons but much of the learning was unplanned.
Whether you’re a long-term homeschooler or looking to complement virtual learning with outdoors time, every family can benefit from these ways to learn in nature:

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How to Find Nature in the City and Suburbs

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It may seem difficult to find nature in the city. But with these eight ideas, you’ll be able to find nature anywhere you go!

How to Find Nature in the City and Suburbs (Photo: Dandelion growing out of a sidewalk)

Flipping over a rock, I ask my kids, “Do you think anyone’s here?”

Spotting a rather large spider scrambling towards my pants leg, I almost drop the rock on my foot. “Ah ah!” I yell and shake my leg. My two and four year old turn to look at me, wondering what on earth just happened. “I just… there was a big spider. Did you see it?”

Despite the spider, we weren’t in a nature preserve or large forest. Instead, we were in a grassy area right behind our house, with a road on one side and a graveyard on the other. Despite living in a semi-urban area, we regularly find ways to encounter nature. I truly believe that you can encounter nature almost anywhere, even in the most urban of locations.

Here are some of our favorite ways to find nature in the city and suburbs:

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Outdoor Gifts for the Little and Big Kids in Your Life!

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / 3 Comments

If you want to buy fewer toys and enable more adventure, here are 12 outdoor gifts for the kids of all ages in your life.

Outdoor Gifts for the Little and Big Kids in Your Life! (Photo: White child in a hat with moose antlers, Who Pooped in the Park? book cover, plastic bug light, water bottle, children's bike, and Camp game display(

“We are not buying a whole bunch of toys for Christmas,” I said to my husband last year. In fact, that’s pretty much what I say every year. We’re not always successful, but generally try to focus on gifts that support our values of simplicity and adventure. Outdoors gear does both while also getting our kids more excited than ever about going out in what can be frigid weather in our area.

Adding some of these gifts to your kids’ (or your own) Christmas lists can help winter feel more fun and spring feel closer than ever. Here’s gifts that are great for our three favorite outdoors activities: hiking, biking, and camping.

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How To Stay Sane When You Travel With Kids

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How to Stay Sane When You Travel With Kids. (Photo of white mom holding a blond baby on her shoulders, walking down a path with trees.)

2014: Holding my one-year-old, I stared up at fireworks and started belting out Let It Go. Tears streamed down my face. It was the end of a week-long trip to Walt Disney World, during which I spent most of the time imagining my kid getting trampled. Earlier that week, my hands shook and mind went blank in the Tomorrowland snack bar as I had my first identifiable panic attack. That perfect girl is gone, indeed.

2017: Leaning over my four-year-old in his car seat in a parking lot in Nevada, I thought, “I hope he’s okay.” Right on cue, his cheeks filled, he leaned forward, and spewed out water and pretzel bits all over me. Touching my hand to my hair, it was wet and sticky. We were half-way through a three-hour car ride to Zion National Park. I breathed deep and said, “Hey honey, it’s going to be okay.” Then I got out the baby wipes and went to work cleaning up everything up.

What on earth happened in-between? In that three years, I had a second kid, started dealing with my anxiety, and grew so much as a parent. But I also learned a ton about traveling with kids. In-between the trip in 2014 and the one in 2017, we’ve been to Las Vegas, Cape Cod, multiple camping excursions, and so many day trips. While the anxiety still flairs, adjusting my expectations and my own behavior has helped me stay sane when we travel with kids.

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