This is one of my latest trips to a State Park near my home called Deer Creek. This is an absolutely beautiful place to be with the family, and a great place to get in some green exercise. My beautiful wife Krystle and I started off the day relaxing on the beach and enjoying the time with the kids. We all soaked in the wonderful rays of the sun which provided a nice healthy dose of Vitamin D.
For everyone reading this please don’t be scared off by the sun- it was put here for good reason and provides us with a lot of great health benefits. Just don’t over expose yourself and you will be fine.
With the relaxing done and the kids enjoying their time trying to build a sand castle, (which by the way turned out to be more a mud hole in the end), I went out to swim several laps out to the deep water buoys and back.
Swimming is an awesome exercise and really works the whole body. It is also less harmful on the joints as compared to running. So I like to get in as much swimming as I can whenever I can.
Here at Green Fitness World we truly believe that swimming is an awesome form of green exercise. It accomplishes a great deal while placing a reduced load on the joints and bones, and in addition is a wonderful form of rehabilitation for anyone recovering from an injury. Some consider swimming more an aerobic exercise given the fact that it requires a lot of oxygen be supplied to the muscles. However don’t count it out as a muscle builder as it can build nice lean muscle, and actually works muscle groups no other form of exercise can touch. Green, and great! Think of the term this “swimmers build” -actually one of the most sought-after physiques. Start at whatever level you’re comfortable with, as in any green fitness routine. Soon, you’ll be amazed at the distances you’re covering with ease.
This is a not so clear picture of me making my swim back towards the beach. However, I love the fact that I can be out with the family and having a good time and also get a good workout. My kids thoroughly enjoy the beach and they also get a nice green workout at the same time. To them it seems like fun. I think more kids these days are missing out on this and that is one thing I would like to help change. Kids today sit glued to the TV, games and the computer and lack real fun exercise. Remember when it was a punishment when your parents told you couldn’t go outside?
Once we had our fun at the Deer Creek beach we headed out looking for a nice playground for the kids. This would be my final place to get some green exercises in for the day. It was also the last stop for the kids because they were going to be worn out from the long day at the state park. I allowed the kids to enjoy their time on the playground and when they were ready to leave I put together a nice green fitness routine that I will illustrate below.
The first part of the routine was three pole climbs, with dips at the top. On this climb I started in a seated position and then climbed to the top with out the use of my legs, which required complete upper body strength to get myself to the top. This really worked the whole upper body- Pecs, Lats, Delts, Triceps, and gave me a great pump.
The second part of the routine was on the wooden playground equipment where I did side to side pull-ups touching my shoulder for each rep. I did a set of three to failure with a 60 second rest to the next part of the routine.
The third part was to hit the tricep again and really get them pumped. The park just so happened to have a nice piece of equipment that I called caterpiller which had “antlers” on the end. This was a really nice spot for my next three sets of dips to failure.
The last part of the routine was jumping pull-ups on to the wooden playground equipment. The odd shape and shear thickness of the wooden beams made this pull-up routine a lot more challenging than normal and really tested my grip strength
I must say this was an enjoyable trip for all and ended up affording me a really nice green fitness routine in the end. The family was also able to put in some time getting their blood flowing with some good old fashioned green fitness fun at the beach and playground.
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What a great idea! A family outing combined with a an outdoor workout. Beats the inside of a gym, I guess.