Last summer my family toured the inside passage of Alaska, where we discovered an amazing (and free) program through the National Park Service called the Junior Ranger Program! I can not rave about it enough! Basically, we went into a participating National Park Services building and told them we were interested in their program and we walked out with a borrowed backpack full of goodies to help us learn about the park, a checklist of things to do and learn and when we returned with the goodies and everything was checked off our son was sworn in as a Jr Ranger.
First we enjoyed Skagway, Alaska, a boom town in the Gold Rush Days. They let us borrow a really neat backpack with old fashioned toys, a check list of places to visit, games and learning information about the olden days. Since we were stuck in Skagway (poor us) because our boat had problems, it gave us so many fun and interesting things to do in the little town and we really got to dive deep into the history. And again it was FREE!
Then once our boat was fixed we headed down to Sitka, Alaska and they had an AMAZING program there! They had a wonderful backpack full of awesome learning material and tools to beach comb, a pamphlet of things to accomplish to get a Jr Ranger Badge, and again FREE!!! We had such a wonderful time and such a wonderful adventure.
Now our son needs to visit one more park and he will become a special Alaska Adventure Ranger award! There are so many parks to choose from and we will get to learn about the rich environment and history. I Googled this and YES, there should be a adventure near you too, ANYWHERE in the USA! Go to the Juniors Rangers site
http://www.nps.gov/kids/jrRangers.cfm and find a wonderful adventure for you and your family!
