Call to Adventure

Ages 10 - 12 | June 26 - July 2, 2025 OR Aug 3 - August 9, 2025 (Only 2 Spots Left for Session 2!) | Return to Youth Programs

"I had a great time backpacking. I was able to explore an interesting sea cave, spend a day on the beach and in the water, and discover ancient petroglyphs carved into the rocks hundreds of years ago. I gained many things, including mental & physical strength, as well as perseverance & courage. I now also appreciate the place we live in more." - Aiden, Age 10

Program Details | Sample Itinerary | Skills Introduced | Program Staff | Other Programs

Do you hear the call of enchanted forests, dramatic coastlines, and the wondrous night sky?

Call to Adventure is a fun-filled backpacking trip that inspires deep connection to the wonders of the wilderness. A group of nine young people (ages 10 - 12) and three adult guides will come together as a tribe, and journey for a whole week through the magical forests and beaches of Olympic National Park — learning to play, communicate, and share together in the challenges and joys of outdoor living.

Kids will explore tide pools, play games along the trail, share stories and songs around the campfire, and sleep under open, star-filled skies. They will learn about back-country cooking and shelter-making, about wild plants and animals and how to care for them, and about themselves and each other. Many of the journeyers (and their families!) will experience the trip as a significant rite of passage, as they spend a week away from loved ones and the comforts of home, and are immersed in an inspiring new environment.

Call to Adventure also provides an introduction to the activities and practices that form the heart of Journeys’ Coming of Age programs.

Alongside the guidance of mentors, kids will practice authentic sharing and listening in talking circles, explore bits of solitude and self-reflection, and engage in fun and meaningful group rituals.

We named Call to Adventure after Joseph Campbell’s term to describe the beginning of the Hero's Journey: a call that beckons each of us toward an experience that extends us beyond our level of comfort and current understanding. As they enjoy the rich opportunities for play and exploration, kids who answer the Call to Adventure will develop a variety of interpersonal skills and inner resources that will serve them well as they approach the mysteries of adolescence.

PROGRAM DETAILS

Ages 10 - 12
All Genders

Call to Adventure I: 6/26 - 7/2/2025

Call to Adventure II: 8/3 - 8/9/2025

Olympic National Park
Program starts/ends in Bothell, WA

$1195; Deposit $400.00
Financial Aid is currently available

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Playing and making new friends on the Washington Coastline.

Participants enjoy Nature Sit-Spots and Journaling activities.

Sample Itinerary

Day 1 | Participants and families meet at the Journeys basecamp for a gear check and send-off ceremony. After a ferry ride, van games and a stop at the Olympic National Park headquarters, we arrive at the 1st campground, have a fire, get to know each other and prepare for adventures ahead.

Days 2 - 3 | Time to start up the trail! We will embark on a backpacking expedition through the forest and then along the WA Coast, setting up camp as we go. Along the way we learn and practice backpacking and wilderness skills & community skills, while also playing fun games, enjoying the great outdoors, exploring nature, and hanging out around the campfire.

Days 4 - 6 | These days bring new heights of exploration and fun - and a bit of challenge as we complete our longest hike yet. We also take a day off from hiking, enjoy time along a river, check out petroglyphs and play big beach games. Through it all we deepen our connections with the natural world, experience time alone in nature and participate in spontaneous art projects and talking circles.

Day 7 | Time to return home! Full from the wonders and sights experienced and our new friendships, we'll make the triumphant journey back across the ferry to basecamp and waiting families. And yes, we'll have some stories to tell...

Skills Introduced

Call to Adventure Staff

Our guide teams for 2025 will be announced ASAP. We typically have guide teams assembled by Spring. You can learn about last year’s guides below and learn more about the rest of our guide teams from prior years on our Staff & Board Page

2024 Session Guides

rain webbert

Program Coordinator (Jun/Jul)

Rain Webbert

Program Coordinator

Rain (she/her) grew in Maryland, in the deciduous forest near the timeworn mountains of Appalachia, where the tulip poplars grow taller than any other tree. The forest became a place of belonging and endless wisdom; a confidant through the challenges and growing pains of adolescence. It’s where her love for foraging, mushrooming, and plant identification blossomed. Her college years are highlighted with devotion to activism, particularly motivated by the love forged in the forest for the earth as a true north. It became, and still is, a great mission of hers to protect and steward the natural world and all of its wild beings in a good way. She learned about collective action and organizing through this work. In 2020, she moved to Southern Oregon to live on an off-grid community as well as complete a regenerative agriculture internship with Rogue Farm Corps. Rain interned, and continued on to work at a non-profit farm whose mission was food equity and justice. She led groups of preschool and elementary aged students who visited the farm through “Rogue Farm 2 School” on a tour of the farm, deepening their connection to where their food comes from and practicing emotion regulation through interactions with farm animals. It is a humbling joy and honor for her to remind youth of their belonging and unwavering connection to our earth, helping them find their own points of connection that ignite a life long love and passion for our shared home. In 2022, Rain headed north to the temperate rainforests of Western Washington to be a student at Wilderness Awareness School. She continued for another year as an apprentice for the Immersion program, deepening in the art of facilitation, rites of passage, ritual, ceremony, play, ancestral skills, community and culture building, and nature connection work. She looks forward to reveling in the excitement and joy of curiosity of the natural world with the Call to Adventure participants!

Program Guide

On the baseball diamond and out surfing waves is where Aaron found his earliest mentors. It changed his life to have adults who he looked up to, who cared about him, challenged him, had fun with him, included him, and made big-time memories with him. Now, 43 years old, he is the same age as they were back then. Aaron’s career as an educator, mentor, and guide began over two decades ago when we was first trained as an “interpretive guide” by the Channel Islands National Park and Nature Conservancy. Then as an educator for the Floating Classroom program, working mostly with 5/6th graders; who after reading Island of the Blue Dolphins got to experience the islands for themselves! Five years and over 5,000 students later, Aaron moved to Central America to lead “sustainable adventure journeys” for a Canadian company called G Adventures. He learned many things during these years. People from all over the world came: different personalities, cultures, genders, generations, religions, ideas, intentions, you name it… He loved it, all of it, except he didn’t want to guide groups alone anymore. So in 2010 Aaron began his own adventure company and for the next six years he co-designed and co-led journeys with other amazing guides. The first trip he created was a 20-day journey through Guatemala, Belize and Mexico called the Mayan Heartland, that actually made the shape of a heart. He now lives in Ashland, Oregon with his beautiful wife, Milena, and children, ages 11 and five. He enjoys coaching baseball, surfing by the redwoods, and making meaningful, lasting, incredible moments of all shapes and sizes.