Nordic Walking in fields of Blackberries

Blackberry pie is delicious, one of the few things better than fresh blackberry pie is picking berries fresh off of the bush. Monday afternoon at the Boys and Girls Club we strapped in to several pairs of One Way nordic walking poles and set off to search for the biggest, juiciest and best blackberries in the forest.

Shalina finding a snack along the trail

Nordic walking is a great workout for your entire body. In addition to working our upper and lower body muscles we focused a lot on coordination. Moving fluidly with long sticks in each hand can be a challenge so we practiced tossing and juggling our poles. Another challenge we gave our minds and muscles was the Figure 8 Clock. Standing in a circle we raised one foot and rotated it clockwise while trying to draw a figure 8 in the palm of our hand. Think it is easy? Give it a try yourself.

After about 45 minutes we came across a really big patch of blackberries. A path was even smashed down in a few sections so that we could get to the really good ones. Perhaps a bear had lunch here earlier today?

Shalina, Cheyenne, Francine, Railena, and Trinity take a break from harvesting blackberries

Although I was starting to get kind of tired the kids were eager to find more berries and explore more of the trails. Our nordic walk ended up being pretty long and I was impressed that we were out for 1.5 hours. There were a lot of berries that were still red and I look forward to them being nice and ripe for next time. Maybe we can harvest enough to make a blackberry pie.