Hiking Activities to Keep Kids Interested

Hiking is easily the number one activity when camping or visiting national parks. This makes perfect sense. After all, what better way is there to see all of the amazing sights this beautiful country has to offer than to go on a hike and soak in the scenery?

Of course, there are many other benefits to hiking as well. These include better physical health thanks to the exercise that hiking provides, better mental health thanks to the fresh air and sunshine, and an overall better connection to the earth. Hiking is the perfect way to connect with friends, as it provides plenty of opportunities for chatting, but it’s just as good of an activity to do on your own in order to take some time to quietly reflect.

Truly, hiking is a wonderful thing. Unfortunately, many kids disagree with this. Many young hikers find the act of walking through the wilderness boring and begin to drag their feet and complain, making the hike miserable for all involved. This could be enough to discourage any parent from hiking, but what if you could actually make it fun for the kids?

Below are some suggestions on ways to make hiking engaging and fun for the little ones in your group. Employ a few of these on your next hike to find the thing that works to keep your young hikers happily entertained as you trek through the great unknown together.

Related Read: Tips for Hiking with Kids

Scavenger Hunt

Giving the kids something to look out for while hiking is a great way to keep their attention off of complaining and on the adventure they’re having. This could be as simple as giving young hikers a verbal list of three things to look out for, or as elaborate as a multi-item list complete with pictures.

No matter how you go about it, a scavenger hunt is always a great way to pass the time while out for a nature walk.

Animal Watching

Being out in nature has the advantage of providing entertainment via the local wildlife. Point out interesting lizards or snakes, make a game of seeing who can spot the most animals, or even pack a bird watching guide and bring along a pair of binoculars for them to carry. You might be surprised just how interested kids can be when it comes to animals.

Related Read: Wildlife 101: Encountering Animals in the Wild

Hide-and-Seek

This game works best for slightly older kids who can be trusted to stay near the path. It’s hugely entertaining though, so if you have older kids you should definitely give it a try.

To play, send one person ahead of the group to hide 10–15 feet off the path. Meanwhile, the rest of the group should keep an eye out for the hider as they continue down the trail. If everyone passes by without noticing the hider, the hider wins. If someone sees the hider along the way, that person wins. Once the hider has been passed by all other players or found by another player, the game starts again with a new hider.

This is a great way to get kids motivated and moving along down the trail at a nice, quick pace.

Spot It

Similar to the scavenger hunt but with some fun twists, “Spot It” is a super fun way to get the whole family working and thinking together. It does require a digital camera, but even a phone camera will do the trick.

Begin by sending one player ahead to snap an extremely close-up photo of one item a few feet off the path. That player should return immediately after snapping the picture, at which point the other players look carefully at the photo that was taken. Once the hikers reach the area in which the photo was taken, the picture taker should give the other players a 10x10-foot area to search in. All other players search the area to discover what item the photo is of.

The trick to this game is to ensure the photo is very close up. It should be so close that only color and texture show up, leaving the rest a mystery for the other players to solve.

Photography

There aren’t very many kids in the world who don’t enjoy taking photos. Hand a kid a camera and they’re very likely to go crazy, snapping pictures of anything and everything they see. Therefore, offering your kids a camera that is used only during hiking adventures can be a great way to motivate them to get them out the door and keep them moving down the trail.

Kid-proof cameras such as this one are relatively inexpensive and almost impossible to destroy. They allow kids to take pictures of their surroundings from their point of view without worrying about dropping or breaking the camera.

Not only is handing a kid a camera a great way to entertain them, it will also leave you with some awesome souvenirs of your family hiking trips.

Related Read: Tips on Taking Great Travel Photos While RVing

Rock or Leaf Collecting

A final suggestion is to have the kids collect bits of nature during your excursions. Keep in mind that this may be against the rules in some places, so be sure to check on that before jumping in. However, where it is allowed, gathering rocks and leaves that have already dropped from the trees is a great way for kids to stay busy.

Wondering what on earth to do with those collections once you return to your campsite? Rock painting is hugely popular and happens to be a great craft project for kids. Once they’ve finished painting, hide the rocks for another lucky camper to find.

As far as leaves go, if they’re pretty enough you might consider creating a nice wreath out of them. Otherwise, leaf rubbings are an excellent way to hold onto and display the collection without keeping the actual leaves around. Try different colors within the same the rubbings to create cool effects.

As you can see, when you use a little out-of-the-box thinking, you’ll find that making hiking with kids enjoyable is totally doable. Do you have other suggestions of your own to share? We’d love to hear them in the comments below!