Latino Outdoors is a Latine-led organization that supports a national community of leaders in outdoor recreation, conservation and environmental education. With an eye towards celebrating and expanding the Latine outdoor experience and bolstering the broader outdoor movement, we provide leadership, mentorship, and professional development opportunities and serve as a platform for amplifying oft-overlooked cultural connections and narratives. Latino Outdoors is a space for our comunidades to be present, share our voices, and showcase how an ethic of conservation and roots in nature have been deeply embedded in la cultura Latina for generations. The programmatic pillars of Latino Outdoors are: outdoor experiences, outdoor narratives, and outdoor leadership.
As an immigrant, Vanessa Chavarriaga, is used to existing between two worlds: that of where she was born, in Colombia, and where she lives now in the United States. This story is for undocumented kids, immigrants, women, people of color, and all of those who fight to exist in spaces that were made without them.“For years I existed in between things, american culture and colombian culture. Español e inglés. Community and solitude. Reality and performance. I was unwanted.” This is her story of being split between two cultures while learning to thrive with her own unique identity, told through running, skiing and poetry.
Lydia Jennings is a member of the Huichol (Wixáritari) and Pascua Yaqui (Yoeme) Nations and holds a doctorate in soil microbiology and mining reclamation. Her work is dedicated to environmental science and the essential role of Indigenous communities in these spaces and her hope is to create more inclusive academic and environmental landscapes. In place of her graduation, which was canceled as a result of the pandemic, Lydia chose to celebrate by running 50 miles in honor of the Indigenous scientists and knowledge keepers who came before her. It’s a run to honor past and present, while looking toward the future.
