Colorado Backpacking - Deaf and Hard of Hearing Women
The experiential nature of the Outward Bound curriculum provides hands-on opportunities to explore risk-taking, change, challenge, problem solving and self-direction. This course is instructed by women, designed to stimulate your creativity, help you change direction and address balance in your life and career. Through success-oriented challenges requiring teamwork and personal effort, the Adult Renewal course enhances self-confidence, motivates compassion and enriches personal experience. This course illuminates the importance of support systems by offering an opportunity to be in the mountains for 7 days with all Deaf/HOH women. The first three days of the course are run out of our Leadville Mountain Center where you will participate in activities such as rock climbing and rappelling, as well as spending some time on the ropes course. During this section, you will sleep in our cabins or on tent platforms and our base camp cook will prepare delicious meals for you. The last four days will take place in a wilderness setting tackling rapids as a team on inflatable rafts on the Arkansas River, participating in a backcountry expedition that includes a peak ascent and rounding out your wilderness experience with a solo. Your solo will give you time alone to reflect upon the activities, challenges and lessons you have learned. In the backcountry you will sleep in sleeping bags on the ground under the stars and cook your own meals (as a group) over backcountry stoves. Successful completion of your course demands mastery of skills, trust, fitness, confidence, tenacity, leadership, initiative and compassion. The promotion of these qualities, and the discovery of what's in you, is the purpose of Outward Bound. COURSE AREAThe Rocky Mountains, one of the most famous mountain ranges in the world, stretch 3,000 miles from Alaska to New Mexico. They have provided the inspiration for legend and have had a profound influence on the development of the continental United States. It is in and around these majestic mountains that your Outward Bound West course will take place. This course will occur in the Rocky Mountain' San Juan Range, which is often compared to the Swiss Alps. This range contains more land above 10,000 feet than any other place in the United States. It has always presented a formidable challenge for explorers. The area is home to many abandoned mining towns whose rather checkered pasts lend credence to Colorado's Wild West reputation. Here, too, did the infamous Alfred Packer perform his dastardly deed near San Luis Peak on Cannibal Flats.
Outward Bound is offering 3 wilderness courses for Deaf/HOH and Signing individuals in the Spring/ Summer, 2006. All courses are instructed in PSE/ASL and require that students be at least 18 years of age. Full and partial scholarships are available for students in need. Last year more than $20,000 in scholarship money was awarded to these programs, averaging nearly $1,500 per person. Applications are due at least 30 days before the course start.
"This opportunity to gain new insights and skills, problem-solving approaches, coping strategies, and new -found appreciation for nature and own inner resources proved invaluable. I have learned many tools and risen to physical and psychological challenges that can be applied to other areas in my life." --Outward Bound Student July, 2004
For more information check out their website at:www.outwardboundwilderness.org.
