Join Angie Austin as she dives into the beauty and excitement of the YMCA of the Rockies this fall. From stunning elk sightings to captivating leaf-peeping opportunities, discover why this location is a must-visit during the autumn months. Jason Nelson, the marketing and communication director, shares valuable insights on how to make the most of your visit with family-friendly activities and unbeatable discounts.
00:00:00 Introduction and Fall Activities at YMCA of the Rockies
Hey there, Angie Austin here with the good news. Thank you so much for joining us. I wanted to talk a little bit again about my favorite place in the United States of America, including Alaska and Hawaii, which is, as you know, YMCA, the Rockies. There’s two locations, Estes Park and Snow Mountain Ranch. But the reason I want to talk about right now is I was just telling my girlfriends, but it’s weird, but my old girlfriends, Jason Nelson, who’s joining us, Jason Nelson, marketing and communication director, welcome. I just, my old girlfriends from NBC in Los Angeles, we started traveling again. And so we’ve been to Nashville and we’ve been to Tucson. We’ve been to Los Angeles. We went to my One of my NBC friends pool, you know, opening. But I said, you know, you guys should come out here because falls a big deal up in the mountains. So can you tell us a little about what’s going on at YMCA the Rockies this fall with the colors, the elk and your discounts?
SPEAKER 01 :
Oh. Oh, man, like it is peak beauty out here, you know, between rutting season. So Estes Park, Estes Park Center, where we have one of our locations, like there’s going to be elk on site every day. Yeah, it is every day.
SPEAKER 02 :
I mean, seriously, last year when I just wanted to see elk at Moraine Park, of course, is great. If you can get in there, if you can get a pass. But if you come to YMCA, the Rockies, and you have a day pass, you can just hike into Moraine Park. But I told my husband, I’m like, please, just let’s go up and just drive around the Y and we’ll see. And that’s where we saw that giant split five, as they call it, that huge elk that everybody’s seeing on social media recently. He hangs out. at the Y and every time I’ve gone to the Y, especially in the fall, there’s just elk walking around.
SPEAKER 01 :
Oh yeah. I mean, they’re, they’re everywhere. Just these giant bulls with their like huge, huge antlers and all their lady friends, you know, parading around them, you know, and you know, they are very docile, right? Like we’ll see them just kind of lounging around the YMCA property, munching on the grass, eating our little trees and bushes and whatnot and, Um, but at the same time, like as fun as they are to look at, I always have to kind of stress like safety first. Right. Cause I saw, you know, folks, you know, uh, last fall, like leaning out of their car window, like trying to pet an elk and it’s like, like if they’re laying on the ground, don’t try to ride them. Right. Keep your distance. We always say like the rule of thumb is to hold your thumb out. And if your thumb covers up the elk, you’re at a safe distance. If you’re any closer and the thumb is larger than your thumb, take a few steps back. You know, safety, safety first.
SPEAKER 02 :
That’s a great rule. I mean, I was checking in once at your front desk. And I said to the girl, I’m like, I just saw a parent try to put a kid on the back of an elk. She was, oh, my God. She said, you would not believe the things that we see up here. And Jason, we hear over and over again, like bison don’t want a selfie with you. Moose, they don’t really want a selfie with you. An elk during mating season, they definitely don’t want a selfie with you.
SPEAKER 01 :
Right. I mean, people are just doing it for the likes, but, you know, better to, like, go home, you know, all in one piece without any bumps or bruises.
SPEAKER 02 :
Unbelievable. All right, so tell us about the discount you guys are offering this fall, 20% discount. Yeah, 20% off discount for stays up to Thanksgiving.
SPEAKER 01 :
So with that, the code is F, as in fall, FG, G as in Gary, 20. So if folks go to our website, ymcarockies.org, they’ll see information about that code on our pages for Estes Park Center, which is our center in Estes Park, and Snow Mountain Ranch, which is on the other side of the mountain over in Grand County near Granby. But yeah, fall is happening. And we were talking about the elk, but Leaf peeping season is the other big hot item. So we’re expecting leaves to start changing here pretty soon. Some of the reports that we’re seeing out of the stations in Denver were reporting about mid-September for places like Estes Park, places like our Snow Mountain Ranch location. And it’s perfect time to, like, come up, get some really just good hikes in. Like, the temperatures are dropping slightly, but it’s not cold. It’s, like, the perfect time to throw on a nice cozy sweater, like put some hot chocolate in your thermos or some, like, apple cider that’s a little bit warm in your thermos and just go on a hike and just see some just amazing leaf changes with the way that the aspens turn over their colors in the fall season. Yeah.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, it’s wonderful. And you guys have some new things. And I just want to remind everyone. like when they see my pictures, when I post them on social media of like, you know, the roller skating or in the winter of ice skating. And then we go to the craft shop, which there’s a small fee for each of the projects you do there. But like the dodge ball and the pickle ball and the putt putt, people are like, oh, that must be expensive. No, you just go grab your putt putt, you know, you know, stuff. You just go like my kids love gaga ball, which by the way, Jason, I don’t think it’s a fair game because my husband’s 6’6″. My son is 6’4″. My daughter is 5’10”. And then the little one now just passed me. She’s 5’6″. I’m 5 feet. Gaga ball involves jumping. I can barely jump over the ball.
SPEAKER 01 :
It’s the most unfair thing. It’s a brutal sport. I was playing it with some middle schoolers and like I would be out in like 10 seconds.
SPEAKER 02 :
it’s so competitive too. I think it’s my, my, my kid’s favorite thing to do there. I mean, I love the putt putt and we always, you know, a roller skate when we’re up there, it’s just so much fun. And didn’t you dedicate the rink to one of your employees that I would see up there for years? Um, he, he worked in, no, you probably didn’t know him, but Bob, didn’t you dedicate your ice or your roller skating rink to him?
SPEAKER 01 :
That sounds right. I am not sure of that story, though.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yes. Okay. So, Jason, he got to the point where because of whatever issues he was dealing with health-wise, he couldn’t walk without holding on to everything in the roller skating rink that he would hand out the roller skates. And so he’d have to hold on to the racks. And he kept working up to the last possible minute. And then I believe he retired and went to live with family. And I think his name is Bob. And you guys named the rink after him. And I just love the family atmosphere up there of like. not just the families but the young people you hire to work up there the seniors you have a program for them as well where they can live up there there’s one guy i don’t know if he still comes but he was in his late 70s at the time and he would lead our hikes and he said he’d come every summer um to work to volunteer at the camp to lead hikes and i’m like bro i can’t even keep up with you and like i’m half your age or at least at the time i was yeah i mean it’s the higher elevation like fresh mountain air that uh
SPEAKER 01 :
reinvigorates everyone. I mean, it’s amazing seeing our volunteer staff, and they are like the warmest, most friendliest folks I’ve ever met. I love, like, every single one of them. They are so wonderful.
SPEAKER 02 :
What made you come up there? You said you came up there, like, a year ago. What were you doing, and what made you take a position up there? Because you’re off the beaten track in Estes. I mean, you know, it’s a good hour up there, and, you know, it’s like you’re in a different world, and, you know, Snow Mountain Ranch, too.
SPEAKER 01 :
It is. It is. I mean, so I’ve been in this position as their marketing communications director for a year. Like, it’s a year right around the corner, and… You know, when I was in the process of interviewing and looking for jobs, the company that I was at prior had gone through a round of layoffs, and I was kind of caught up in it. But, you know, prior to that, I was looking for something where I could work for a company that was mission-driven, that I could kind of be in a position where I was able to kind of give back. And, you know, and part of that’s because, you know, the last couple of jobs that I had, you know, It wasn’t good work for the soul, if that makes sense. I was just sitting and praying. I was just like, I would just love to, dear God, please help me find a job where I can just give back, have this opportunity to give back. And I saw a post on LinkedIn for YMCA of the Rockies. And, you know, my family, I’ve got three kids, so they just turned 8, 11, and 14.
SPEAKER 02 :
Oh, they’re like the same age spread my three are.
SPEAKER 01 :
Yeah. Yeah. Three years apart. Like all their birthdays are in an eight-day time span. So it’s crazy. And I don’t recommend like birthday season. Birthday season is intense. But, you know, we started coming up to the Y like five years ago. Yeah. Like, my kids would always have just such a wonderful time. Like, you mentioned the craft shop. Like, each of our kids with, like, the three-year gap in between them, like, they could all find something to do, whether it was at the craft shop or some of the different activities that they had. And all the staff at the Y was always wonderful, like, working with them and, like, their different ages, you know, and, you know, whether it was, like, at the archery range or what have you. And so like when I saw the job post, I was like, oh, my gosh, like this would be amazing. And I mean, being perfectly honest, like I have not had this much fun at work ever. I mean, I was when I was looking for work, like, you know, a lot of companies were going back to hybrid model and, you know, thinking about like the hour drive into Estes Park. I was just like, well, I’d rather drive an hour into the mountains versus getting stuck in traffic heading down to Denver for an hour.
SPEAKER 02 :
And do you commute up there?
SPEAKER 01 :
I do. I do. Oh, wow. The commute is beautiful. So for any folks that are heading to Estes Park, it’s heading up through Boulder. It’s heading up through Lyons. It’s just beautiful, especially this time of year.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, it is. When I moved to Los Angeles, when I was working for NBC, I lived at the beach. And at the time, I just missed the mountains and coming up to Estes. And, you know, here I was on the oceanfront, you know, and I was missing, you know, the mountains. And now they’re equal favorites of mine since I no longer live. live by the beach, but I just miss that drive, you know, on the way up there, and, you know, that little spot where you probably still lose your cell service, I don’t know, but, you know, you’re driving, and, you know, you definitely feel like you have left you know denver and the fact that like your cabins and the lodge rooms uh when the last time i stayed there no tvs except and when i stayed at that long’s cabin i think the family had a tv put in there but there was a way that front desk told me that i could disconnect it so the kids couldn’t use it and it was hilarious because i’m like well i think there’s a tv but i don’t think it works you know it’s not a yeah yeah i know and
SPEAKER 01 :
But, I mean, man, it’s such a blessing, though, to, like, take family up and just have that opportunity to, like, disconnect from technology. You know, screen time is, like, all record high. You know, mostly because of COVID and so many kids, like, being using screens for their education as we were kind of all in, like, isolation. And, you know, the habits that it formed out of that. And, you know, there’s plenty of studies that talk about, like, increased anxiety, increased depression, all this stuff. Yeah. I always think about my childhood. I was a child of the 80s and the 90s growing up in rural Missouri. The time where I’d find the most peace was when I was playing in the woods. My grandparents had 40 acres in Kansas City and just run around the woods like a wild child. And that’s kind of like the opportunity that families have at the YMCA, just like opportunity to just disconnect from technology, reconnect with each other, and just find that sense of peace and respite that, you know, maybe you don’t get, you know, when you go into a big city for vacation. You know, there’s that ability of… being able to have time. And so, you know, like we don’t have TVs in our lodge rooms and majority of our cabins don’t have TVs, but, you know, get a board game, you know, at our, at our recreation building, take the board game back, play with family and just, just have time with each other where you don’t have those distractions that we, we have because of technology.
SPEAKER 02 :
And, you know, you can check out board games. There’s a little cute little volunteer librarians. You can check out books at the library, which is so cool. I love that library. We’ve talked about the archery, the gaga ball, dodgeball. They opened up that playing field now with pickleball. And there is always something on that schedule that you can sign up for for the kids to do. And we’ve tracked animals where you’re looking for fur and tracking. We’ve gone on the history walk. We’ve gone on the night walks. We did this one time where we had to build a shelter. And my husband is such an overachiever. We had like the best shelter that we probably could have moved into, you know, it’s like, I have pictures of like all five of us, you know, in the shelter that he built and orienteering where like volunteers would take us and show us how to like navigate, you know, in the mountains, if you were like out in the wild and you kind of have a competition to go find things and there was like a bubble class and there was a parachute like thing for the littler kids. There’s lots of stuff for little kids, but almost all of this stuff is included or a small fee and the rock climbing. My whole family did it. In fact, you know, I wasn’t going to do it, Jason, but last time we were up there and my sister-in-law who’s quite a bit older than I am. In fact, now I think she’s 70, but let’s say she was 60 at the time. So she, did the rock climbing. And I’m like, if she did it, I’m going to do it. But you know how you’re supposed to like belay down or something, or like gradually let yourself down. She bounced the entire way down her body.
SPEAKER 01 :
Oh my God.
SPEAKER 02 :
Bouncing off the rock climbing wall. I got a video.
SPEAKER 01 :
Oh man.
SPEAKER 02 :
I still have to do it. But I’m like, oh, my gosh, she bounced the entire way down. Like, look, if she can do this, I can do this. And it’s so much fun. My whole family does it when we go up there. And my husband’s 6’6″. So it’s a little easier for him to get to the top and touch the top rock or whatever it is. But it’s just so cool to me that you don’t have to – when we go to, like, one of the upscale hotels, every single thing we do you have to pay for. And the last time we went to one, it was hundreds of dollars just to sign up for, like, The ice skating was 15. The candy lane was fine going, you know, into this area. Oh, if you got if you got a lounge chair in the nice part at that pool, you know, it was $50 each. And I said to my husband, I’m like, they are penny nickel dining us to death. Like every single thing that the kids want to do is an added price on top of the already expensive hotel. And that’s the thing that Jason was mentioning with the TG20, you can get 20% off. So that’s like Tom George 20. Or Fall George 20. Yeah, Fall, sorry, FG, Fall George 20, FG20, that you get 20% off and that most of these activities are included. And if it’s not included, it’s like a small fee to do some of the extra things and the craft shop. But it just to me is such a fun and a family bonding vacation, but also affordable.
SPEAKER 01 :
So the average family can. Oh, absolutely. Like, you know, winter is just around the corner. And I know we’ve talked a lot about Estes Park, but we have a location called Snow Mountain Ranch that it’s in Grand County. So kind of on the other side of the mountains. And with winter coming up, like we were going to have a winter tubing hill. People can come out. And it’s one of the free activities, right? People can come out, grab an inner tube, and ride down this tubing hill to the bottom and hike back up. We’re going to have like 85, 82 kilometers of groomed Nordic ski trails that goes all over our 5,000 acres out there. And, I mean, it’s an experience like none other, you know.
SPEAKER 02 :
And that’s affordable as well. So make sure people have your website. And the code, again, is FriendsGeorge20FG20. And what’s the website?
SPEAKER 01 :
YMCARockies.org.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, that’s easy enough. YMCARockies.org. And Family Reunions, don’t forget, we had one up there, and it was amazing. Thank you so much, Jason Nelson.
