Discovering Family Adventures at YMCA of the Rockies

SPEAKER 02 : 0:00

Hey there, friend. Angie Austin here with the good news. You know, if you listen to the good news over the last, gosh, I’ve been on like 13 years now on this program. And if you watch me on TV over the years, you’ve heard me talk about YMC of the Rockies on multiple occasions because I took my family. They’re all they’re growing up and they’re a little older now and a few off to college. But that was pretty much our place. And I’ve been going there since I was a kid. So you can imagine how long that is. And we had our last family reunion there. It’s one of the top family reunion spots, really, if not the top in the country. And so I thought, you know what, I’ve got to get someone from YMCA of the Rockies to talk about all the new things they’re doing. So Jason Nelson is joining us. He is the marketing and communications director. And Jason, I think I’m your biggest fan of the YMCA of the Rockies.

SPEAKER 01 : 0:46

Oh, well, I really appreciate it. It was good hearing about your experiences with your family. You know, I started in this position about a year ago, but like five years prior, started taking my kids up to the Y. And just amazing time, amazing time. And they still have an amazing time up there.

SPEAKER 02 : 1:05

Well, we joked that my daughter, when we were leaving, she was maybe nine or ten at the time. She’s right now on Christian scholarship for – at a Christian college for volleyball. She’s a freshman. She just started. And, you know, that was, we, she cried when we left. And I’m like, why are you crying? She’s like, this is our place. You know, this is like our cabin. This is our, this is like our place. You know, we never did get a cabin in the mountains. That was our cabin in the mountains. YMCA, the Rockies Estes was my favorite, but we go to both. And, and she said, it’s better than Disney world. And I’m like, you know how much money I could have saved. I just, you know, would have taken it just to YMCA, the Rockies instead of Disney world.

SPEAKER 01 : 1:40

Yeah, I mean, that is not the first time that we’ve heard that. You know, I heard a story shortly after I started about, you know, family, you know, very similar. They’re leaving the Y and they’re like, well, next year, like, do you all want to go to Disney World? They’re like, no, we want to come back to the Y.

SPEAKER 02 : 1:53

I think it’s your young people, at least for me, that’s it. And I remember my husband, we were doing like a night hike and you guys hire such wonderful Christian young people. And I love your senior program too. So you’ve got the great seniors you hire, but the young people that you hire, my husband was walking in this night hike with me and we’re kind of hanging back and our kids, you know, now we’re about the age of these young people you hire. But he said, I didn’t even know they made kids like this anymore. Like they’re so wholesome and kind and like loving. He’s like, they’re so different than a lot of the kids you just meet in everyday life. And there are a lot of kids. But where my daughter goes to school, there’s tons of kids like the kids you hire. They are there. And I think a lot of these kids come as children and then want to come work at the Y later. And you have so many programs. There’s the ice skating. There’s the roller skating. At the time when we used to go, there was zip lining. And you’ve got the rock climbing. And And then you have like, you know, tracking animals and night hikes and building a, you know, a shelter. It’s like on every hour of the day, you could be doing dodgeball or kickball or something. Like there was never a down moment at the YMCA, the Rockies. I think that’s why they love it so much.

SPEAKER 01 : 3:03

Absolutely. And like Snow Mountain Ranch, like don’t forget about the tubing hill and, you know, come winter, as soon as we get enough snow, we’re going to be opening up for Nordic skiing as well. We’ve got like 80, 82 kilometers of groomed Nordic ski trails out there on like 5,000 acres. And it’s just amazing and beautiful.

SPEAKER 02 : 3:22

Yeah. Your ski center, I, you know, I, I never, the stamina and like the cold, it’s so hard for me, but I have done your tubing hills on many occasions, the winter and the summer and, And remember when you first opened up the summer tubing hill, what a great draw, you know, to bring people in. But also just I think the affordability for families and the wholesomeness of it. Let’s talk about some of the things you guys are doing that are new that I haven’t even seen yet. In fact, I’m thinking about coming up. either at the end of September or October because you’ve got the elk rut, which is like – Oh, yeah. Oh, last year we did come up there. That’s right, for one night, and we saw that split five. You guys have this giant elk that comes up on your property that is mind-blowing, that has like more ladies than any other elk I’ve seen. Do you know who I’m talking about?

SPEAKER 01 : 4:07

Oh, I do. I saw him just a couple weeks ago. No way. So I was out on a hike at our Estes Park center location, and that elk was, you know, just off trail, munching on some trees, and you could see, like, the velvet off the antlers was starting to come off. Huge. You know, I made sure, you know, was keeping my distance. Yes. The rule of thumb, you know, with elk is, like, if you hold your thumb out, and your thumb covers the elk, you’re at a safe distance. But any closer and you see more of the elk, you’re like, yeah, might need to take a few steps back.

SPEAKER 02 : 4:44

Oh, that’s a great rule of thumb with the thumb. Yeah. I like that. You know, when you take that hike to Moraine Park from your place, I love that hike. I know during that season there’s like warnings to be careful and even fence off some areas because obviously they’re more aggressive when they have all their harem with them. But that is a great rule of thumb. And when we come up, you guys have special things going on around the elk rut season. And just talk about some of the dedications you’ve been doing and some of the new things that you’ve got going on that I don’t even know about yet.

SPEAKER 01 : 5:19

Yeah, so up at Estes Park, we’ve done a couple of really big dedications. The first one is our Vice Family Recreation and Sports Park. The recreation sports park, when you first come up into Estes Park Center, it’s the heart of the campus. It’s the very first thing that you see when you arrive. It’s the last thing you see when you leave.

SPEAKER 02 : 5:40

Is that the big open area?

SPEAKER 01 : 5:43

Yeah. We have plenty of space where families can play, gather, make memories. We added a new pickleball court. That’s the new big thing. upgraded, you know, several of our favorites, like our firing, upgraded our basketball courts, the tennis area. And I mean, this field has been serving guests since we opened back in 1907, like some of the old photos of the YMCA of the Rockies, you know, show some of the early folks that came to visit this sitting out on the open field. But now there’s just so much more room for activities and, you know, so much more, more to do. And, our pickleball court. Like I see it right outside my office and you can hear like the little pop of the ball. All hours of the day.

SPEAKER 02 : 6:28

Do you still have the Gaga ball pit? My kids love that.

SPEAKER 01 : 6:34

We do. We do. That was part of the renovations as well. So brand new Gaga ball pit. We’ve got a cornhole that’s there more on a permanent basis, you know, before, you know, folks would have to like rent out and, you know, drag out the, the wooden boards. But we, we made some new installations, concrete concrete, for more permanent placements, new horseshoe rings, sand volleyballs out there as well. I mean, and it’s amazing, too, during the summer to see it just packed full of kids.

SPEAKER 02 : 7:07

I can’t wait to see that. I love the big chest that you guys had. And we would come up a lot, you know, for like 4th of July. And I still have this video where somebody was dressed up as like the T-Rex with the little teeny hands and trying to run after a basketball to get it. And I was laughing hysterically every time it pops up on my memories and I share it. People still remember it. When I worked at Channel 2, I got a fairly big following then from TV, and I would always post my videos up there. And the putt-putt, the putt-putt got me. And people, if you don’t realize, most of this stuff is free. And when I say free, you get a lodge room for a little over $100 or whatever. The prices vary. and you can eat there if you want. You can get a meal plan. But then all this stuff is free. And if you go to the craft center, it’s very economical. That’s where I actually saw your big elk, I guess they call split five. He was under the swing set, which I thought was hysterical. You guys have a great little playground right outside the craft center, which that’s one of my favorite places to go because you can paint, you can make jewelry, you can tie dye, you can do leather work. I mean, It’s like endless, the things that you can do in the craft center. And again, really economical. But he was under the swing set, like on that little hill and like watching all of his ladies. I just thought it was hysterical. This is a giant elk as big as the swing set, you know, watching his harem. And it looked like he was visiting the craft center.

SPEAKER 01 : 8:32

Right. Yeah. I mean, when it comes to running fees, I mean, we have elk all over the property. Yeah.

SPEAKER 02 : 8:39

Just like wandering around. Like you have to be careful. Like if you go on a hike, like you said, you can walk right into one right outside your front door.

SPEAKER 01 : 8:45

Yeah, absolutely true. And, you know, one of the things you mentioned earlier about the hike to Marine Park, I mean, one of the things that’s really unique about us is that our property borders right along Rocky Mountain National Park, and there’s several ways that folks can hike from our property into Rocky Mountain National Park.

SPEAKER 02 : 9:01

Yes.

SPEAKER 01 : 9:02

The thing that I always say is, like, bring your day pass, right, because make sure that, you know, at least from, you know, a national park access standpoint that you’re buttoned up, so bring your day pass. But, I mean, it’s so, so easy to, you know, come stay for a night and then go on a hike early in the morning so that you can see, you know, wildlife at kind of that pristine time, you know, as the sun is coming up.

SPEAKER 02 : 9:26

It’s heaven. It’s heaven. But I love what you do. I love your senior program or seniors can come up there and live and work. I love that. I love the young people you hire. But something I found out about recently that I didn’t even know you did. And I didn’t tell you this. You have a program. One of my former producers, he doesn’t make a lot of money. In fact, he just lost his job. I went up there for the day and I went in to get a hiking map. And I bumped right into him and I was like, oh, my gosh, his nickname is Moose. I’m like, Moose. And he’s up there with his whole family. Right. And one of his kids had battled cancer. Another had some other health issue. And he’s like, we’re on vacation here. They have a plan, you know, a program where families who need a little help. They can come up here on vacation. Tell us about that because that is absolutely wonderful that you guys do that.

SPEAKER 01 : 10:16

So that’s, that comes through our, our donor sponsored programs, you know, and that’s, that’s made possible by people that believe in our mission. So YMCA of the Rockies, like, well, we operate as a hospitality and travel place where people can come and stay in our lodging. We also operate as a nonprofit, you know, so, you know, the, the, the revenue that we’re driving through occupancy, it goes straight back into our mission. You know, people will donate, you know, to these donor-sponsored stays so that people can come up and stay on property. So, you know, we sponsor, you know, foster families. We sponsor families with children that are going through critical illness. We have military discounts for military families so that, you know, while they aren’t deployed, they can come up and stay with us. And, you know, same thing, too, with teachers as well. So, you know, one of the things that I like to share out is we have this program called Teachers Recess, where teachers and staff of K-12 can come up and stay. The discount’s like 50% off of the stay, and it’s all made possible by our donors, folks that believe in our mission. It also extends to – so on the other side of the mountain, we have our Camp Chifure, and it’s one of the best summer camps in the state of Colorado. And, you know, we also have folks as well that donate so that kids who maybe can’t afford going up to either our day camp or our overnight camp can be sponsored through scholarship, through these programs, so that – Anybody, you know, regardless of accessibility can experience the outdoors and experience like these things that you’re talking about that you and your family experienced during your time up here. Just that sense of like joy and relaxation and that ability of just connecting with each other in nature.

SPEAKER 02 : 12:14

Well, let me just tell you that I’ve worked at a lot of big stations around the country. I worked for NBC in Los Angeles. I worked for Fox in San Diego. I worked in Santa Barbara for ABC, Channel 2 here in Denver. I’ve pretty much worked for every network there is. You wouldn’t know that I was in foster care, that I grew up in low-income housing, that I came from a very impoverished background, and we never went on vacation once my parents were divorced. Never. I mean, my mom worked in a factory, and if the Buick broke down like that, you know, and our phone would get disconnected, you know. And so for you to make someone to cry for you to, you know, offer these programs for these families, it’s such a big deal because some of these kids don’t get up to the mountains that like live in Denver or that, you know, they just don’t go on vacation with their families. Like in particular, Moose, like he wouldn’t have been on that vacation up there and you’re like feeding his family and they’re on vacation. I just think it’s a wonderful thing that you guys do to, you know, help families enjoy the outdoors that wouldn’t be able to do it. And teachers and military people, foster families. You know, I think this is just such a wonderful mission that you guys doing. You mentioned you’re a nonprofit. I’ve stayed in some of the cabins that families have donated that long cabin you guys have. I know it was built a while ago now, but when we first stayed in it, it was pretty new. And it’s like a big one and some family from Texas had donated the money. And then the families don’t get the cabin. They just get to stay there a few weeks a year or whatever and get priority booking. And then we get to enjoy it. And of course, we’re almost out of time. So I want to make sure give us the website so that people can come up there and experience some of these things. And it’s a very economical family weekend if you stay in one of the lodge rooms for sure. So what’s the best website for YMCA, the Rocky Snow Mountain Ranch and Estes Park?

SPEAKER 01 : 13:58

Yeah, so people can find us at YMCARockies, R-O-C-K-I-E-S.org, YMCARockies.org. And folks that are interested in coming to stay, you know, during the fall, we are currently running a 20% off promotion. Oh. You know, folks can find that on our website. The code is FG20 at checkout. But, you know, folks that want to come out and try us out, experience all the things that we’ve been talking about, rutting season’s right around the corner, leaf peeping season, the aspens are going to start turning here in, I think, like two weeks. So right around mid-September, it’s going to be beautiful out here.

SPEAKER 02 : 14:39

SG is like Sam Goat 20?

SPEAKER 01 : 14:42

No, F as in friend.

SPEAKER 02 : 14:45

Oh, okay. Got it. Excellent. Thank you so much, Jason. And thanks for all you do for others. Really appreciate it.

SPEAKER 01 : 14:52

Hey, I appreciate it. Thank you so much.