Youth Blog

We invite you to join The Mountaineers for five days of summer camp activities and fun at home! Camps will run in morning sessions for 2.5 hours for campers aged 6-12, and each week includes a field trip to the Seattle Program Center at Magnuson Park. Read more…

Welcome back! Each week, The Mountaineers youth team is sharing ideas and activities for kids of all ages to stay engaged while also staying close to home and following your county’s phased guidelines. Last week's Stuck Inside celebrated the H20 (so fun!). This week, we are sharing youth-specific resources on racism to support Black Lives Matter.  Read more…

The Pacific Northwest is filled with incredible spots to explore but the type of outdoor recreation we teach at The Mountaineers teaches isn't easily accessible to everyone, To learn about barriers to being "outdoorsy", I recommend starting with this Code Switch podcast. Because gear can be one of those barriers, The Mountaineers Gear Library normally loans outdoor gear to youth groups for free. In light of COVID, we're now offering pearsonal gear rentals for Mountaineers members.   Read more…

Welcome back to Stuck Inside where we share ways to have fun and connect with the outdoors while also staying safe. Did you figure out all of the riddles from last week? If you didn’t and they’ve been rattling around your brain, check out these answers. Read more…

As part of the Stuck Inside blogs, a series designed to keep youth entertained while at home during these times, The Mountaineers announced its first Explorer Art Contest! Participants sent in a piece of art showing what they love about the outdoors.  Read more…

Welcome back! Each week, The Mountaineers youth team is sharing ideas and activities for kids of all ages to stay engaged while also staying home and safe. Last week's Stuck Inside offered up some ideas to keep your body active while at home. This week, we are sharing some ways to keep your mind active too! Read more…

Welcome back! Each week, The Mountaineers youth team is sharing ideas and activities for kids of all ages to stay engaged while also staying home and safe. Last week's Stuck Inside explored ways to show all the adventure moms out there we love them. This week, we’re going to check out some fun in-home workouts the whole family can do together.  Read more…

Welcome back! Each week, The Mountaineers youth team is sharing ideas and activities for kids of all ages to stay engaged while also staying home and safe. Last week's Stuck Inside kicked off our Explorer Art Contest. This week, we are sharing some creative ideas for celebrating Mother’s Day. Read more…

Growing up, I counted down the days to when the Activity Bus would roll into our parking lot with my class on its roster. The air static with excitement, we would board the bus in single file, sitting side-by-side on cracked bench seats with backpacks at our feet. Short of a snow day, we were about to embark on one of the single greatest grade school events: a field trip. Read more…

Welcome back! Each week, The Mountaineers youth team is sharing ideas and activities for kids of all ages to stay engaged while also staying home and safe. Last week's Stuck Inside celebrated Earth Day. This week, we are opening the Explorer Art Contest! Read more…

Welcome back! Each week, The Mountaineers youth team is sharing ideas and activities for kids of all ages to stay engaged while also staying home and safe. Last week’s Stuck Inside focused on learning new skills with all this extra time on our hands. This week, we are suggesting ideas on ways to celebrate Earth Day! Read more…

Welcome back! Each week, The Mountaineers youth team is sharing ideas and activities for kids of all ages to stay engaged while also staying home and safe. Last week’s Stuck Inside focused on connecting with others. This week, we are giving suggestions for new skills you can learn with all this extra time on our hands. Read more…

Welcome back! Each week, The Mountaineers youth team is sharing ideas and activities for kids of all ages to stay engaged while also staying home and safe. Last week’s Stuck Inside focused on how to keep spirits up during this less than ideal time. This week, we’re offering ideas on how to connect with others as we are physically apart. Read more…

Welcome back! Each week, our youth team is sharing ideas and activities for kids of all ages to stay engaged while also staying home and safe. In our first Stuck Inside, we presented our best ideas for fun ways to bring the outdoors in. This week, we’re focusing on ways to keep our spirits up when we’re in a funk.  Read more…

Are you missing your friends and adventures beyond your home’s four walls? Fear not! The Seattle Youth Team is here to help you with some clever ideas on ways to have the best time while sticking close to home with the members of your household.
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This summer, our Olympia Branch of The Mountaineers is offering four weeks of unique and exciting summer camp adventures. With a combination of day camps and overnight camps (both cabin and camping opportunities), we have opportunities everyone will enjoy. See what we have planned and find a week (or four!) that works for your family. Read more…

As a child, do you remember anything more exciting than a snow day? The magic of waking up to a blanket of crisp white snow, the world outside your door transformed into something new and seemingly boundless, was unlike anything else. You’d grab your coat, tug on boots, and run outside to dive headfirst into winter, making snowballs, swooshing your arms into a snow angels, and grinning ear-to-ear at the snow-capped trees. On snow days, the cold didn’t seem quite as bitter and your cheeks didn’t feel quite as red. The world was a whole new place to be explored. Read more…

On Saturday, Nov 9, 2019, The Mountaineers Tacoma Branch partnered with 22 members of the Franklin Pierce High School Adventure Club and headed to Mount Rainier National Park to tackle the Rampart Ridge Loop.  Read more…

Happy Thanksgiving! We hope you're celebrating with loved ones, delicious food, a brisk nature walk... and balloon turkeys? That's how the Mini Mountaineers celebrated here at the Seattle Program Center last week!  Read more…

You did it! We asked for your help to get more kids outside more often and now we can! Last month you helped us raise over $30,000 toward a 15-passenger Ford Transit and this month we brought it home. Thank you to the 34 donors who made it possible, and to the 9 donors who made their first gift to The Mountaineers! We’d like to give a special shout out to The Bradley Family Foundation and donors Ken Seamon and Jane Biddle who extended your support with the matching gift challenge  and to the Gary E. Milgard Family Foundations for helping to make the van possible!  Read more…

October 8 marked the official kick-off of this year's Seattle Mini Mountaineers! Our littlest Mountaineers braved scattered showers to enjoy a colorful fall walk through Magnuson Park. Read more…

The Mountaineers Gear Library recently turned one, and looking back it’s hard to believe a full year has passed since we started gearing up with youth organizations. Our hope with the library was to work with youth-serving organizations to reduce barriers to outdoor access. Since launching in August 2018, we’ve outfitted over 350 young people to explore and recreate in the Pacific Northwest, enjoying activities like hiking, snowshoeing, backpacking, and camping. Notably, we had an especially active winter season, sending out the most snowshoes in youth program history. We’re so lucky to be able to share our love of adventure with the future leaders of tomorrow. Read more…

Time is running out to help The Mountaineers get more youth outside more often! With the incredible generosity of our community, we are only $2,000 away from our $30,000 goal! These funds will enable us to purchase a 15-passenger Ford Transit and drastically reduce our need to rent vans or ask volunteers to drive their own cars to youth outings.  Read more…

My first outdoor memory is seeing the perfect pinecone. It was big and sturdy and had lots of surface area for decorating. I leaned down to pick it up and in the process dropped some of the many that I already had in my arms. I struggled to pick them all up, desperately wanting to bring home as many pinecones as my young arms could hold. I helplessly looked up at my mom and she, tired of this routine, patiently told me I could only take what I could carry. Read more…

Our twelve-year-old daughter loves to pester us with, “Are we there yet?”, “How much longer?” and “Can we take a break?” when we go on hikes. The solution? Bring a friend her age. If that strategy fails, we try to include a cool distraction like having a scavenger hunt, finding a geocache, playing in a snow patch, or identifying birds or plants. I recently stumbled on another technique you can add to your repertoire of distractions that can also work great on your pack carrying workouts. I call it “Gamify.” All it requires is a pair of dice and some creativity. Read more…

Each summer, we offer Mountaineers Summer Camp - a series of week-long camps for kids age 6-12 where campers spend their days rock climbing, learning outdoor skills, swimming, making crafts, and playing camp games. Our campers keep us busy, and more than once we’ve been caught off guard by their cutting commentary and goofy jokes. So this year, we decided to document some of the sillier things we caught them saying. Here’s a highlight of camper-isms from our 2019 Summer Camps: Read more…

“You'll be on your way up! You'll be seeing great sights! You'll join the high fliers who soar to high heights.”
- Dr. Suess, Oh The Places We’ll Go

Summer at The Mountaineers is the best! The kids are excited to be out of school and we’re able to take hiking trips in the middle of the week. In the last few weeks, we drove 14 youth to Heybrook Lookout with our Rock the Park (RTP) Mountain Workshop where we experienced an enjoyable day hike, talked about the history of the lookout, practiced our navigation skills, and we took a second RTP group to hike by Rattlesnake Lake and learn about the Cedar River Watershed.    Read more…

When Hannah Grage was four years old, she found herself face to face with a cancer diagnosis. Life stopped for Hannah, her mom Carrie, and the rest of her family. Thanks to a heroic fighting spirit and modern medicine, after three brutal years she beat it! 2017 marked Hannah’s five-year anniversary of being cancer-free. Read more…

“We’re off to Great Places! Today is your day! Your mountain is waiting, so… get on your way!” - Dr. Suess, Oh The Places We’ll Go

Dear Friends, 
 
We are going places! Our Explorers Program just came back from their annual 4-day climbing trip to Mazama; Mountain Workshops will be hiking in Snoqualmie Pass this week with Solid Ground as part of Rock the Park Program; and our summer camp field trips are coming and going every day, filling the program center with laughter, camp songs, and the smell of sunscreen.  Read more…

Although summer is here and many of us are busy enjoying the sunshine and fresh air, it's already time to start thinking about next season's adventures! The Mountaineers Youth Clubs are preparing to launch a new season of programming, designed to transform our young Mountaineers into lifelong outdoor enthusiasts. Registration opens this September - don't miss your chance to sign your kids up for a year of learning and exploration.  Read more…