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Adventures Out
Out of the Box Family Adventures
What to do, what to do. If you and your kids seek new adventures and active family outings, here are three unique locations offering a whole new way of looking at the world in a safe, supportive environment.
Fly Through the Air
The Trapeze School, part of the Jordan’s Furniture complex in Reading, teaches kids to fly with the greatest of ease. During open flying sessions, kids can sign up for one swing or three, learn the ropes, strap on the harness, climb the 23- foot platform, grab the trapeze and start swinging. First-time students learn the knee-hang – going from hands holding the trapeze bar to hanging upside down with their knees on the bar. By their third try, they may be able to do a somersault in the air before landing safely in the huge, sturdy net below. If they’re ready for more, the school also offers a two-hour flying trapeze class. By the end of that session, your circus star wanna-be may be ready for “the catch” – where the child and his instructor start on two trapezes, meet in the middle, link arms, and then the child releases the trapeze to fly with the instructor. Very impressive!
Climb the Walls
If your child is a natural tree frog, take her to the Boston Rock Gym in Woburn and prove it. During the two-hour Kid’s Climb, children ages 5 to 12 learn to climb the rock walls while an instructor belays their ropes from the ground. Parent/child pairs can sign up together for the two-hour Family Intro Course While parents are learning knots, belay technique and climbing tips, the kids are climbing with an instructor. Afterward, the pairs are ready to work as a team, with children climbing and parents belaying. A truly adventurous kind of family togetherness! Kids ages 12 and up can take the three-hour Introduction to Indoor Climbing class to learn about equipment, rope tying, belaying and safe climbing habits. The family and indoor climbing introduction classes include a two-week membership at the gym to practice climbing skills.
Start Your Engines
Forget the soapbox derby and head north to the Checkered Flag Indoor Karting track in Haverhill for motor-sport fun. The main track boasts 23,000 square feet of speedway, with two switchback turns and a 100- foot back stretch. Using electric karts, drivers do 25 laps for each race. Kids must be 54 inches or taller to use the main track. Children ages 4 and above can zoom along the 100-foot Mini Cup Track in smaller electric karts that average 5 to 8 miles per hour. All karts have an automatic shut-off for the safety of the drivers.
Topsy Turvy or the World Upside Down
The Amesbury Sports Park is known for its winter and summer tubing tracks. But for adventurous souls ready for something new, there’s the OGO or Outdoor Gravity Orb. The OGO is an 11-foot transparent, inflated sphere with a smaller sphere inside it. You climb inside the OGO and flip, flop, and roll down the 800-foot run, reaching speeds of up to 30 miles per hour. The IGO and WEGO versions include harnesses, but the H2Ogo model, for one to three people, does not. The H2Ogo is a wet and wild ride with the addition of five gallons of water. Designed for people ages 12 and up, the OGO park opens for the summer around June 1. It’s a whole new way of looking at the earth and sky.
(BPP, 4/09)
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