Photo: Guided by Adventure

A backcountry hiking and adventure club has expanded its touring to the Okanagan, setting up meet ups in Penticton.

Guided By Adventure originally opened up in Prince George in 2020, after Meg Keir, who was already working in the fitness industry and had a big love of the outdoors, wanted to venture into something new.

After getting certified with the Association of Canadian Mountain Guides as a hiking guide, becoming a paddle board instructor and building up her portfolio, she started run and hiking club, which turned into a full on business.

Keir discovered she created a welcoming environment for people who wanted to get outside.

"It ended up being a lot of 35 to 75 year old women, a lot later in life that maybe had always wanted to go hiking or backcountry camping, which it wasn't something that they grew up with. And then they're at this point in their lives where they're starting to focus on themselves again," she said.

"So up north, it's grown to this beautiful community of women that are now all friends outside of the guided trips, and they're all back country camping and hiking and snowshoeing. We went ice climbing in Jasper last year, and just doing all this cool stuff together."

Keir moved to Penticton at the end of summer last year, where she spent time paddle-boarding and checking out some local hikes.

She's been managing Nickel Plate Nordic Centre and is opening more club activities now that spring is on its way.

"There's a lot of people that [ask], 'Well, why would you need a guide?' And well, if you're asking that, then you're probably not the person that this is for," Keir added.

"It's really about building community, building confidence, and skill building too. So teaching about animal awareness, teaching about how to choose your terrain, track setting, all these different kind of things in a super welcoming environment."

While club members are often mostly women, any gender is welcome, along with any skill level.

"Definitely every skill level. So if somebody already has a group of friends, or somebody feels like, they know what they're doing, they've been doing it for a long time, and that's amazing. They can typically go off and do it...Absolutely open to everybody."

Coming up in March is a St.Patrick snowshoe and brew event.

"We run it every year up north, and it's been, like, so much fun. So I thought that would be, like a good kind of break into spring event. We just go somewhere fun and go for a snowshoe, and I bring a bunch of swag and silly glasses and stuff," Keir said.

"Then we're gonna go have a brew at Tin Whistle Brewing downtown."

Also starting up in March is the club meetups, which are free to attend.

"I find it's always just a good way to get people out to kind of like, meet me and meet the trip leaders and meet each other," Keir added.

"I think that we would appeal to is just those people that have always wanted to be more in nature."

For more information on Guided By Adventure, head to their website here.

Photo: Contributed

Photo: Contributed