Traveling and exploring with kids is so much fun, but finding those adventures and planning the activities can be time-consuming and frustrating. Wouldn’t it be great if there was a resource for parents, put together by like-minded outdoorsy parents, all about getting OUTSIDE with kids in the city you’re visiting?! And what if that resource included all of the fun ways to spend time together OUTSIDE, from outdoor dining to hiking and biking, to water activities and playgrounds? Friends, you’re in luck!
Run Wild My Child has that resource just for you! We are pleased to announce the launch of our Get Out Guides! Executive team member Nichole Holze has put her talent for finding unique kid-friendly outdoor adventures to use as the Editor of these new guides, which are available now!
What exactly are Get Out Guides?
As super-outdoorsy parents, we get asked all the time for our favorite outdoor activities with kids. We’ve tried so many. We love finding new creative, and unique ways to spend time outside together. And we want you to do the same. So, we put everything together for you in one convenient place! Introducing…our Get Out Guides!
The Run Wild My Child Get Out Guides are our one-stop resource for travel planning! We know what outdoor activities kids (and parents) love. We designed these digital ebooks (which you can print, if you want) with outdoor-loving families in mind! These guides are meant to help you plan your travels (both near and far) or perhaps even help you be a tourist in your own city.
They’re cultivated to be a resource to help you discover fun places to explore both close to home and while traveling. The Get Out Guides are community-sourced and vetted, with lists of things to do and places to see, each carefully selected to highlight a different adventure in a specific city or area.
What is in the Get Out Guides?
Our Get Out Guides are packed full of enough adventures to keep you busy for an entire vacation and beyond. While each guide is unique to the area it covers, there are a few commonalities that you’ll find in all of our Get Out Guides. The following items and topics can be found in each of our Get Out Guides:
- hiking trails
- biking trails
- outdoor dining locations (and to-go food options for outdoor picnics)
- parks and playgrounds
- farms and farmer’s markets
- unique outdoor attractions
- nature centers and gardens
- water adventures
- sample itineraries (if you only have a day or weekend to explore)
- resources
Each Get Out Guide is unique
Each Get Out Guide is jam-packed with our favorite tried and tested outdoor activities. We’ve included all the favorites (listed above), but each city has so many things that make it unique, so each guide will be a little different and tailored to highlight what’s great about each area.
For example, our Bentonville Get Out Guide has a “day in the life” page that highlights an ideal day from a local parent, extra biking adventures (because Bentonville is known for that), links to websites or social media for all of the adventures listed, places to stay and camp, and an interactive map that you can use to play your activities! The St. Louis Get Out Guide has all the traditional outdoor activities listed above, but includes additional fun things to do like golfing, fishing (fly fishing and spinning rod), geocaching, baseball, urban adventures, animal encounters, and more!
Why do you need a Get Out Guide?
Why wouldn’t you?!
But really, these guides are going to help so many parents just like you find new ways to explore outside with your kids. We want to cultivate a resource for busy families that aligns with our core value of getting kids off screens and outdoors. That applies while traveling or adventuring in your hometown. We want to make it a little easier for parents to plan outdoor adventures while traveling and be a resource for local families to discover even more adventures right in their own city.
Our Get Out Guides are different than traditional travel guides. You won’t find many major indoor attractions in them. Fewer play centers, more parks, and playgrounds. Fewer museums, more hikes, and creeks. Fewer restaurants, more patios, and picnic options. They focus on the OUTDOORS, on connecting you and your kids (not only to each other, but also) to nature. They’ll give you tons of ideas and inspiration for making lifelong outside memories with your family, and help you raise a nature kid.
We hope that these Get Out Guides inspire you to examine how you spend time outdoors while vacationing and open new doors to adventure right at home.
Who are the Get Out Guides for?
Busy parents that want to spend more time adventuring outside with their kids. Is that you?
Truly, our intention with these guides is to share adventures that are accessible for everyone. Whether you’re a local parent wanting new ideas for places to explore and things to do in your own city or just passing through the area on a family road trip and want to get outside to explore and play, this guide is for you. We know that you don’t have a million hours to research all the best outdoor places to play and plan your activities. And sometimes the research won’t get you the “good spots’ that only the locals know about! That’s why these guides are so good – they’re written by parents that know, live, and play in that area.
We hope our guides will bring value and a little relief when it comes to planning outdoor adventures. They will save you time. They will save you the headache. And they will blow you away!
How does RWMC put them together?
Each Get Out Guide is put together a member of our team or volunteer from our community that lives in the area they’re covering. Not only do we each know our respective areas VERY well, but we also reached out to other local moms in our online community to make sure all our bases were covered.
With each upcoming new guide we put out, we hope to gather contributions from our amazing community! And yes, that includes YOU! We have an intake form for anyone and everyone to make submissions of their favorite outdoor activities, adventures, and locations in their area. If your submission is included in the Guide, you’ll receive a spot on the contributor page with a link of your choosing!
What format are the Get Out Guides and how can I get one?
The Get Out Guides are digital downloadable PDFs. When you purchase a Get Out Guide, you’ll receive a link to download a zip file that contains the guide. You’ll also receive an email with the link. You can save the Get Out Guide to your computer or phone for easy access anytime you want. Or, you can print them out and refer back to them as you need to. Feel free to make notes on the places you want to explore or check them off as you check them out!
The Get Out Guides are for sale on the Run Wild My Child website.
Make sure to sign up for our newsletter so that you can be one of the first ones to know when a new guide is released!
Get Out Guides – Bentonville, Arkansas
Northwest Arkansas is a not-so-hidden-anymore gem of a place to visit, especially with kids. It’s where art and nature combine, where bike trails connect the entire city, and public art can be found on every corner. You’ll also find a thriving foodie culture and a world-class coffee scene. Northwest Arkansas is so much more than the home of Walmart and we want to invite you to see all it has to offer! Get the Guide!
Get Out Guides – St. Louis, MO
We are also launching the Get Out Guide for St. Louis, Missouri. If you know STL, you know that nature is everywhere in this city! It’s easier than you would ever think to find a challenging hike through the woods with gorgeous bluff overviews, a shallow rock-bed creek to explore, or long flat biking trails through parks, fields, and neighborhoods. Yes, St. Louis is home to the Arch and the Budweiser Clydesdales and the Cardinals (all of which we cover), but it’s so much more! It’s surrounded by limestone caves and coldwater trout streams and art and food! It’s a lovely place to live and fun to explore if you’re in the area. Get the Guide!
Get Out Guide – Cape Cod, MA
Cape Cod is a charming and picturesque geographic cape in the southeast corner of Massachusetts. It is a popular summer vacation destination but features tons of year-round outdoor fun and adventure. It’s an expansive area, and can be a bit overwhelming to find all the good outdoorsy stuff you’re looking for. The Guide will help you find a gorgeous beach to explore, a bike trail to trek, a windy river to kayak, a tidepool to explore, the best kid-friendly hiking trails, and our favorite ice cream shops. There are so many unique Instagrammable locations, amazing restaurants and boutiques, beautiful lighthouses, historic trails and museums, and so much more!
Get Out Guide – Virginia Beach, VA
Virginia Beach is hands-down one of the prettiest, most fun, and outdoorsy beach towns on the Eastern Shore. Virginia Beach is the largest city in the state and covers a huge area, so it can be really overwhelming for families to find all the good outdoorsy stuff you’re looking for. That’s where our guide comes in! We’re here to help you find a gorgeous beach to explore, a bike trail to trek, a place to see wildflife, a tidepool to explore, and an outdoor patio to enjoy a seafood lunch with your kids. There are so many unique Instagrammable locations, amazing restaurants and boutiques, educational outdoor activities, skate parks, historic landmarks, gorgeous trails, kid-friendly museums, and so much more!
More Get Out Guides coming soon!
Stay tuned because we’re working hard on a few more Get Out Guides. Upcoming Get Out Guides include Lake Tahoe, Kansas City, San Diego, and MORE! We have boots on the ground with Creative Team members in these areas that are busy helping us find the absolute BEST outdoor activities. If you’re interested in submitting an idea for the Get Out Guides, visit THIS link or reach out to our Get Out Guide Editor, Nichole. You can find her on Instagram at @coleyraeh or on her website.
GET THE GUIDES
We are so thrilled to launch the new Run Wild My Child Get Out Guides! We hope that they help to inspire you to get outside and adventure together, whether close to home or on the road! Happy adventuring!