Keep close to Nature’s heart… and break clear away, once in a while, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean. – John Muir

Have you camped yet this year? Gone for a hike? Made eye contact with a deer? No? Then my work here isn’t done!

I heard a ton of feedback after I posted my Solo Camping story back in June. Sure, some of the feedback was negative (that girls don’t go into the wild alone and it was too dangerous- what?!) or disbelieving I was really alone but the majority of the feedback was POSITIVE – whether that was women who really DO want to try a solo adventure to others who just needed the reminder to reconnect with nature with other people in tow. Just remember if it’s PEACE and ALONE time you want, then, well, alone is the way to go.

One of those girlfriends I heard from was Kelley, who was with me on my first Get Out Adventure in May when we hiked Wichita Mountains together near Lawton. As busy working women and mamas we only had one Saturday that worked in our fall schedule for our Girls Gone Wild weekend and we grabbed another girlfriend, Lori, to go with us. So this post it to encourage you to grab your gal pals and head for the hills. While a spa vacay may get you pretty nails for a week, I promise a trip in the wild is way more rewarding for your soul. Trust me on this.

To make the most of our day for hiking, we picked a close locale, Red Rock Canyon State Park , located in Hinton, OK about an hour outside

of the OKC metro. We ended up having a perfect weather day and it was my only Get Out adventure this year when it didn’t rain! We did two hikes and because my girlfriends are smartie pants, I joked that I was on a trip with Lora and Kora the Explorers. Ha! I’ll admit to hiking ahead when they were fawning over a new discovery on the trail, but we got along really well, including sleeping in a VERY cold tent that night. Yes, when you are away, things can go awry (Lori’s charger, my air mattress deflated, our neighbor with a TON of wood offered us NONE so we went into town to buy more.) The owls (which I LOVE) were quite noisy that night – remember earplugs – nature is loud, y’all.

This post isn’t tips HOW to camp because honestly I’m not that “together” yet but I get better about planning for each adventure and I can’t wait to explore more. If you’re reading this and it’s cold out, obviously I don’t think that’s an excuse for not planning adventures in the wild. A hike on a snowy day is gorgeous and you’ll get beautiful photos to remember it by. Plan other Get Out adventures that take you outside of your norm. One personal tip I will offer is perhaps to NOT tell people your plans way ahead of time as you WILL likely get some negative feedback if you are venturing out into a new place and especially if you are a chick. There is still a stigma and fear mongering about women going alone so DO be careful and take all precautions but don’t let unhealthy fear/paranoia keep you from trying new things.

Thanks to Lori and Kelley for going wild with me. 🙂 For more Get Out posts, click back through old posts to see adventures in paddle boarding, Aloha and more hiking treks. I’ll be back next week with a Get Real post and book review on the psychology book, Me, Myself and Us. Such good stuff.

xoxo and namaste,

Malena