We May Not Know It But We Need TimeOutdoors
By Jean Colvin,
Communications Director, Wisconsin Youth Company
I spent New Year's Eve at a cabin in Wild River State Park in Minnesota. I love the name of the park. It sounds like I should arrive there by dogsled in a furry parka with a bundle of caribou jerky, not how I normally travel, by Honda Civic in my fleece jacket with a bag of trail mix.
Most of my vacations are planned around some kind of outdoor time--backpacking, bird watching, snowshoeing, hiking--and most of them seem to involve heading north. Last year over Memorial Day weekend I went backpacking at Pictured Rocks in Upper Michigan. I was pleased to see a number of families there backpacking with young children. This time I headed north and west.
Wild River State Park hugs 18 miles of shoreline of the St. Croix River north of Minneapolis and has 35 miles of trails. It only snowed about two inches on New Year's Eve so the weekend of snowshoeing and skiing turned into one of hiking along the frozen river. All five cabins at Wild River were full, most with families and kids. On New Year's Day I saw Eagles gliding in the thermals above the river and a noisy flock of Trumpeter Swans in the still-open water. Coming back to the cabin I passed a group of four kids bouncing happily on the horizontal trunk of a downed pine, a natural jungle gym.
So much of our modern lives are spent indoors eating, sleeping, working, going to school. Much of our leisure time is spent indoors too, a lot of it passively watching TV, surfing the Internet, playing video games, checking email. I have found that I have a need for outdoor time. It soothes something in me that I don't even realize is roughed up until I get out there. Kids have an instinct for play and with encouragement from adults can get outside and smooth their rough edges too.
One night I stood on the cabin porch. Across the St. Croix I could see lights in Wisconsin. Whose house is that? My breath steamed in the bitter cold. When I looked up I saw a spray of stars. Is anyone out there? The next morning I found a neat line of small paw prints next to the cabin and leading down the trail to the river. I'd had a night visitor, a fox.
Footprints - Past Editions
December 15, 2011 233 kb 
November 15, 2011 236 kb
November 1, 2011 228 kb
October 15, 2011 239 kb 