(music playing) - Being outside in Denver is incomparable to anywhere else.

- Cycling allows me to go out, allows me to take in the scenery, allows me to breathe.

It pushes me to my limits.

- The 14ers is something not for everybody, but for people that want to push themselves.

Longs Peak, down in the books.

- Hi, I'm Lindsey Ford.

The outdoors is a place to be in the moment, a place of healing, a place of acceptance.

Colorado's beautiful scenery offers that and so much more to those across the state.

And this week, we spoke to those who have a strong connection in nature and who strive to get outdoors as much as possible.

- My name is Brooke, and I've been with Black Girls Do Bike since the start of the COVID pandemic.

- Hi, good morning.

I didn't even realize it was you.

- Like everyone else, I got really excited about getting on my bike more.

- Hi, my name is Debra Gilbert, and I'm with Black Girls Do Bike.

- Hi, my name is Deandra Sharpe.

I'm with Black Girls Do Bike.

- Several stereotypes around what Black women, or just people of color, in general, do and don't do.

And when it comes to the outdoors, that's definitely--there are some ideas.

I'm no stranger to the phrase, "Oh, I didn't know Black people skied," or, "Oh, I didn't know Black people snowboarded," or, "I didn't know Black people ran."

And that's why we're building these organizations, to say it loud and proud.

Black women ride.

Black folks run.

Black folks ski.

I've always heard that there are extreme sports that we don't participate in.

But you grow up, and you realize that's not true.

But it's hard to find representation or people that look like you who are doing those same activities, especially a state with Colorado.

- I've been able to travel through so many small towns and recognize that people see me as a Black woman and that they have a reaction based on that.

And sometimes that's scary for me.

Sometimes I feel uncomfortable and not in a safe space because I'm a Black woman.

- It just brings me peace to be out on two wheels.

But then, when I discovered Black Girls Do Bike, I thought I had died and went to heaven, all these beautiful Black women that --You hear their individual stories and learn a lot about who they are as individuals, it's amazing.

- We, as Black women, experience microaggressions throughout the day.

But it's nothing like getting on your bike and getting with a group of Black women, and really being able to have laughs and conversations, and know that this a safe space for me to be myself and not really take on the whole burden that we sometimes do, when we're at work and we're the only Black woman, or we're at the grocery store, even, in Colorado, and you're the only Black woman.

This is a time that we get to have experience Black joy and Black joy together.

- With all the racial unjust, everybody's really taking notice of us and what we're doing.

It feels really good.

It feels really good to have allies on our side.

- Cycling allows me to go out, allows me to take in the scenery, allows me to breathe.

It pushes me to my limits.

There are times where I don't think I'm going to be able to turn back and go home and make it on my bike.

But it actually me to push my own boundaries a bit.

- I want to live a long, healthy life, and this is just one part of what I do in order to live a long, healthy life.

You got to do what makes you happy.

And this is my small piece of joy, and coming into this group with these women, the camaraderie, is amazing.

And that's what Black Girls Do Bike is creating.

It's creating a safe space where you can be authentic and come as yourself, and where we're advocating for reducing any barriers to the outdoors for women of color, and supporting Black joy.

- [ALL]: Black girls do bike!

(music playing) - It took me 38 years to get a chair that could pair with who my real nature is.

And now I found my passion.

We're outdoor people.

I don't think we're designed to be in an artificial building all day long.

You get out.

I feel natural me.

- It's so enjoyable.

And socializing and being in the community, being outside in Denver is... incomparable to anywhere else.

- I was in a car accident when I was 13, back in 1984.

It was the last day of school.

Missed a 90-degree turn and flew 18 feet into a tree.

My head went into the windshield, and that popped one of my--C4, C5 popped into the spinal cord.

That's pretty much changed everything after that.

Next thing I know, I woke up probably several weeks later in intensive care, trach, whole nine yards.

The doctors came in and directly told me I'll never walk again.

Part of me thinks I still haven't accepted it.

And that's where I might be a little different than most.

You just do things different now.

I've achieved a lot of things.

It's been, like, 37 years now, so just being independent.

All my family's passed on, so there's no safety net now.

I moved out to Colorado four to five years ago.

Pennsylvania was enough.

I've been enjoying it out here.

It's an active state.

I've always been an active person.

I have to be doing something.

I'm always moving.

(music playing) Power chair skating we're trying to brand it as.

We're trying to get other people out there.

I think it's a great activity to pair an able-bodied person together with a disable-bodied person.

It's fun.

- Wheelies I have to hold here.

Sometimes he catches me off-guard, and I'm here.

But this is where I hold.

When I come into work, I drop my bag off, I get my skates on, we get our sunglasses and the speakers.

Out the door we go.

And then, we come in, we eat lunch, rest a little bit, and head back out in the evening.

I've worked with Chad for approximately two years now.

I've gotten to see the city in ways that most people don't get to see the city.

I had not skated before.

Chad's chair goes very fast, and I'm very slow.

- We decided we're going to go to LA and Santa Barbara and Santa Monica for Christmas.

That's how it started.

She's like, "I'm not walking."

- I decided to get a pair of roller skates, and we roller-skated all over California and all over Vegas.

- She just grabbed roller skates and we hit the streets.

I guess it's very addicting.

- Together, we have skated over 1,000 miles so far.

We're trying to do 1,000 miles this year.

We're at mile 800 for this year.

When I'm skating, Chad is mainly in control.

On Chad's chair, he has a joystick and he has a little bit of muscle movement in his right arm.

He's able to control his chair and steer it with that.

- The experience is so fast.

You have to be in the zone.

You got bicyclers going past you, cars.

There's so much to watch out for.

That zone releases the adrenaline.

I'd probably be an adrenaline junky if I wouldn't have had my accident.

- I make Chad match my outfits because when I first started working for him, I noticed a lot of people staring.

So, I put us in matching outfits.

So, when people stare at us, they smile now instead of feel sad and feel bad for him.

I just like to spread the positivity and get more smiles.

- It's like the cherry on the cake.

We get so many people that smile and stop at us.

It's like, might as well be in matching costume.

[CHAIR REVVING] It gets you outside.

I'm a firm believer that outside, in the sun, and activities, is great for mental health and just all wellbeing.

You got to get out there.

- The chair went out of control, and we hit the curb of the sidewalk.

- No, we went right up against it.

- We hit the curb of a sidewalk.

You almost fell out of your chair.

- There's a difference between a guy and a girl.

I remember it differently.

[LAUGHTER] She says we hit.

We had, like, three inches.

- Yeah, we've had a few little mishaps.

But who doesn't?

We were at 1,000 miles when we saw you last.

And we are currently over 3,500 miles, almost at 4,000 miles.

- That's just on Denver roads.

- Just in Denver.

We have been all over the country, meeting all different groups.

We did San Francisco, and then we went to Los Angeles.

- And from there, we went to San Antonio.

From there, we went to New Orleans.

And from there, we went to Memphis.

From there, we went to Chicago.

Chicago and LA, I think, are the best cities.

Then we came back here.

We think we're the only ones on the planet that are definitely being at this level.

But it's all right.

We're going to set the bar way up there for the next ones.

- With what we're doing, I think we're the one and only.

- I think it'll change.

- I hope it changes.

(music playing) (music playing) - The sun, when it rises, that's when I say I wake up and stuff, but I like to wake up... to not a bad spot here.

That no matter what happens in life, the sun will always rise and set the same way, is amazing.

My name is Evan Gill, AKA Black Sherpa.

Grew up in Baltimore.

Just moved to Denver here three years ago.

I like to call myself an outdoor enthusiast, I guess.

I really fell in love with nature when I moved to Denver.

When I first came out, the mountains were here, I wanted to explore and get into the mountains and stuff, and really fell in love.

And just trying to gain my knowledge on how to successfully summit 14ers responsibly.

But my very first hike, I did everything wrong.

I did literally everything wrong.

I had jeans on.

I had a cotton hoody, non-waterproof shoes.

We didn't know anything about--I don't even think we had a first aid kit.

I was getting introduced to all of those issues and problems out here, so I had to learn about that.

The 14er is something not for everybody, but for people that want to push themselves, want to experiment and see what kind of conditioning your body is in.

A lot of this was not just physical.

It was a lot of mental games.

About 48 of them I did solo.

14,255 feet , Longs Peak, down in the books, down in the books, man.

I didn't have someone waking me up in my tent or-- Number 35, down in the books-- motivating me next and say, "Hey, you got this," or anything like that.

All of that had to come within.

Number 41 down, man.

Capitol Peak is something.

That was my last 14er, and it was my last 14er for the very specific reason that it is the most dangerous.

I already understood that I set my mind to doing all 58.

I did not feel the need to rush to go and prove or do something that may or may not have been out of my comfort zone.

I really do love to hike.

I love to escape and get away from the moment.

In order to get people outdoors, that are of color and everything like that, one, we need the education.

Two, accessibility to gear.

The cost, yeah, the cost of just gear.

I get it, you acquire gear over time, but to make that initial investment is a big ordeal.

To get a setup like this, it takes... it takes money.

It is just dropping $400 or $500 on a piece of gear.

- Evan Gill is one of our climbers who we have enjoyed sponsoring, being the first African American veteran from Baltimore, Maryland to actually accomplish summitting all 58 14ers here in Colorado.

We provided him training, outdoor--backcountry training, avalanche training.

We provided gear for him.

- Just to feel safe, hand sanitizer wipes.

Jessica from Vibe Tribe, she reached out to me.

Satellite phone with me all the time.

Always carry bear spray, as well, for my hikes.

For her to really just get me those little things drastically allowed me to accomplish my goal.

- For my limited knowledge of Colorado and everything like that, I feel like a lot of Black people come out in groups.

Rarely do you see us during the week.

I think we're working.

I'm not trying to speak for everyone here.

But I would say the general sense is that we tend to hike in groups or together with other people of color.

That's the stereotype.

And I'm trying to get us away from that stereotype.

And that shouldn't be a stereotype anymore.

There's just a lot fewer of us.

I just want to remind people that this is here for us to explore.

(music playing) - When I first moved to the valley, and the difference between all of the beautiful, natural areas around me and all the sports that people were doing, and then the accessibility to a regular person of those sports, there was actually this huge gap and divide that I noticed, more so than in my hometown.

I grew up in Virginia where it was very expensive to get into these sports.

It was very difficult to afford lessons to learn.

Just regular, working people would not maybe partake as much as the visitors who are coming here from out of state or from other places to enjoy the natural resources around.

- I know it's a struggle to be able to afford sporting equipment, especially in the winter, but in the summer, as well.

I'm a local to the Roaring Fork Valley.

I grew up here, went to high school here.

You get a discount when you're in high school, like a student discount.

And since I didn't really go to college around here, I didn't get the college student discount.

But I did work for Ski Co, so I got a free ski pass that way.

And it was a few years ago, when I stopped working for Ski Co, and I got my snowboard stolen all in the same year, and the next year I was not about to buy all new gear and my own pass.

That's like $2,000 for the pass, plus an easy grand for new equipment.

It's really hard.

- I called up Kyle and was like, "Let's just do this."

[LAUGHING] - I met her this summer working at a farm up in Basalt.

And she called me with the idea, and I thought it was awesome.

I'm from around here, so it feels good to be able to help people out.

And here we are.

- We've been open one week, and we have about 20 members.

- After someone comes in, wants to be a member, they fill out our liability form.

And we run a credit or debit card just so we have it on file.

We only charge it $1 because we need to charge it $1 just to run it.

And then you're a member, and you can check out whatever you want.

We have received a lot of donations from the community and independent businesses.

That hasn't been the hard part so far, just getting stuff.

- We got some Fat Bikes donated today, which is really awesome, from this wonderful lady.

And she just asked us what we were most in need of.

We asked, actually, about the Leadville Gear Library, what they had had checked out the most in the past month or so , and it was actually Fat Bikes and Nordic skis.

So, we were like, "OK, a Fat Bike."

And so, yeah, we're really excited about that.

People can go biking in the winter.

That's why it's got the wide tires.

Yeah, now we're going to have a couple of those, and that's really exciting.

There are definitely people who come in here and just are very surprised, I think.

And they'll be like, "So, how much is it?"

And I'm like, "No, it's a lending library."

And then, they're just so happy because they're like, "Wow, I really want to go skiing with my friends tomorrow."

And it's great because we do have a good selection of skis.

People have come in here, and we've been able to find boots that fit, skis, poles, a warm jacket, goggles, all of the things they need.

And they just went skiing the next day, which they probably wouldn't have otherwise.

People have been just pretty excited about it.

I'd like to be a spot where people in the community can get together and teach each other and help each other access outdoor adventures.

(music playing) - The outdoors, to me, are a place where you can just be in the moment.

You just show up to the trailhead, and you leave all your life stuff right there.

You walk into the mountains, and you forget about everything that's going on.

You forget about the 30 emails you got to send or the phone calls you have to make or whatever meeting or whatever fight you had with your significant other.

You just are in the moment.

And that is so powerful to just let everything be and just look around and enjoy this place for what it is.

There's a thing about the outdoors where it has these great parallels between the military and the outdoors.

The teamwork, the self-reliance, all these things that make those two worlds feel kind of the same.

In the outdoors, it's often also a pursuit, a mission, a goal, something to drive you forward, which everybody needs in a life, to keep putting one foot in front of the other.

I was in the military from 2005 to 2011.

I did two deployments, one to Iraq and one to Afghanistan.

When I got out of the military, I started taking wounded vets out on climbing and hiking trips.

I saw all the things that they were experiencing after their transition.

We'd do the ceremony one night.

We had them write the names of their friends that had died overseas on a flag so they could summit this mountain with that flag.

And so, I started writing down some names, the birthday, the name, and death day of my buddies.

The next thing I knew, I had 10 names written on the flag.

I was crying a little bit.

Like, I'm 24 years old, I shouldn't be able to do that with my friends.

It was a hard thing to come to terms with.

But at the same time, it's been one of the most powerful driving forces for me.

All the things I do in the mountains are in the name of them.

(music playing) - I came to farming because I needed to work on my healing.

And every single season, I get better at that.

Plants, they die.

Snow comes early in Colorado.

But then, the snow melts, and the sun is out, and everything starts blooming again.

I am a farmer and founder at Hampden Farms.

And I also maintain the lavandins at Chatfield Farm for a profitability study.

I had an entire life that had nothing to do with farming.

I joined the Air Force.

I was a photojournalist.

And when I got out of the Air Force, I was still really interested in healing and wellness, and I wanted to know where exactly my food came from.

And so, we happened to move to Colorado.

And I was with some other veterans, talking about how I wanted to increase my healing and wellness.

And one shared with me that there was a Veterans to Farmers Program at Denver Botanic Gardens.

So, I applied to the program.

We were exposed to working with the lavender here during the Veterans to Farmers Program.

I was like, "What are you guys going to do with it?"

And they said, "You go ahead, and, Zephrine, have at it."

So, my role is to maintain the lavandins and track how it can be profitable for not only the gardens, but really how we work with other makers in the community.

The first product has been able to do community-supported agriculture, so people, when they order their flower CSA, they can order a lavender CSA.

That is one way for it to be profitable.

Collaborating with other local makers and providing the lavender, or providing lavender for a product, and then collaboratively selling products that go along with that.

And once again, just pulling resources to make that successful.

The lavandins are generally the taller plants.

They make more oil, but it's got a really strong medicinal smell.

The English lavender, which most people are used to seeing, smaller plants, less oil, but higher quality oil.

And it has what is a sweeter, more floral smell often, and most likely used in culinary.

After completing the Veterans to Farmers Program here at Denver Botanic Gardens, I started Hampden Farms, which is a backyard micro-farm and also a farm business.

It's really important to me that farmers have access to community wealth.

It's extremely rewarding work, but it's hard, and the margins are often slim.

So, I wanted to farm for my own healing, my family's healing, and community connection.

But what I found is, it is extremely hard to make a living as a farmer.

And that's unacceptable.

It's no different than any other business, and so that's my focus, on not only learning how to farm and how to cultivate, but also how to grow a business while farming and make it, like I said, profitable.

Farmers should have thriving wages.

Ag workers should have thriving wages.

My goal is to continue to work with the organizations that are already doing this work.

They already have products.

They already are working on hubs.

They do workshops and classes.

What they need is financial support.

They don't need anybody to tell them how to do it.

It really does take money for these organizations to move .

It takes funding to have commercial kitchens, to have working refrigerated trucks.

These are all things that people may not see.

When you see lavender, we need to move it, that it takes supplies or different tools.

More than anything, I am grateful for the organizations that I work with, and that I'm learning from them.

These aren't my ideas.

I spend time with them, and I work with them, and I go, "Wow, you're doing something amazing.

How do we get you funding?

How do we get more people behind what you're doing?"

We all have our role in this, so I'm here for it.

(music playing)