Country crafts sessions using native materials get you out into the countryside gathering materials before teaching the intellectual skills and body know-how to work them into beautiful objects. Look for courses in basket-weaving, building willow structures, rope-making, carving greenwood furniture, or hedgerow winemaking.
9. "Grow your own" day
Open days at organic farms and agricultural colleges offer outdoor talks, demonstrations, and hands-on guides to cultivating vegetables. Sometimes there's a focus on one crop, such as chillies or onions, with resident experts, and at other venues you get to cook and eat the produce.
10. Try a conservation vacation
Visit some of the finest landscapes in the world and help to conserve them as you tone up, whether working on sites of classical heritage in Albania, doing coastal work to benefit birds and their nest-building in Bulgaria, or conserving the habitat of endangered primates in Cameroon. Accommodation is often simple and you have to help out with cooking, but that only adds to the sense of adventure. To find opportunities, look at The Canadian Wildlife Federation's website.
11. Active learning
A 2004 review of research found that getting away from a book and computer-based setting enhances learning. Being active in memorable place has an especially positive impact on long-term fact-retention: the more senses you use as you learn, the more of the brain that is employed in retaining memory. If you are studying, get into the great outdoors to shape up your cognitive skills.
12. Wilderness therapy
Encourage kids to take part in outdoor activity camps and trips to wild places. A 2006 review of research concluded that wilderness experiences are very important for a child's physical, emotional, cognitive and mental, and social development. Being in extreme places seems to forge long-lasting behavioural changes by forcing young people to think responsibly, look after themselves, and protect others.
13. Grown-ups' summer camp
Don't let kids have all the fun – surprise them by booking yourself onto an activity camp this summer. Ease in gently with a yoga or t'ai chi camp, which offers teachers from diverse schools of practice and early-morning and late-night sessions. A hike camp with dawn-to-dusk guided walks may suit more seasoned exercisers, though even these include gentle rambles and nature-watching sessions suitable for novices.
14. Take a city stroll
If you don't live near the countryside you can still exercise in a green way. Buy a guidebook or download a city walk that takes in handsome buildings, industrial heritage sites, rivers, parks, and cathedrals. If there's a tower, climb the steps to the top for a panoramic view.
15. Celebrate seasonal fare
In town, seek out seasonal festivals celebrating the harvest. At apple days, sample local varieties and take part in apple-bobbing games; at a tomato festival, sign up for a fruit-throwing contest; at eggplant or pink onion time, enjoy speciality dishes and dancing till dawn.
16. City park fitness
If you like being pushed to achieve your best, look for army vets teaching fitness sessions in city parks. In addition to push-ups, instructors include team-building games such as tug of war and participants are graded by ability, with fitness-focused, weight-loss, and team-building options.
17. Scavenger hunt
Join a team to run about town or countryside for a day or weekend searching for items on a list and photographing them, or performing extreme (often embarrassing) tasks to order – and being taped in the act. The first to finish or the team with the most objects wins.
Read more:
• Fitness on the go
• Photo gallery: 5 easy ways to beat exercise excuses
• 10 ways to sneak exercise into your day
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Excerpted from 1,001 Ways to Get in Shape, copyright 2009 by Susannah Marriott. Used by permission of Dorling Kindersley. All Rights Reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced except with permission in writing from the publisher.
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