CPAWS Big Wild Challenge Accepting Applications
This summer, the Canadian Parks & Wilderness Society (CPAWS) is inviting you to transform your outdoor adventure into an organized fundraising event.
Whether you’re planning a day-hike, a weeklong canoe epic or something even bigger and more impressive, registration of your trip in CPAWS’ Big Wild Challenge will create an opportunity for you to raise funds that will protect Canada’s wilderness while embarking on a fun, challenging and personalized outdoor adventure.
In essence, the Big Wild Challenge is a program that allows registrants to set up a fundraiser — much like large-scale events like The Ride to Conquer Cancer — framed around a small-scale, individual or group outdoor activity. Once established, registrants will receive their own fundraising webpage — as well as chances to win prizes from MEC and other benefits (including reduced subscription rates to explore) — and can then begin raising funds framed around their adventure. Rather than a single fundraising event, this will create a network and community of events, all raising funds for a collective cause, right across the country.
“The Big Wild Challenge is more than just a fundraising initiative — it’s a way for Canadians to help ensure we’ll always have natural spaces to explore and enjoy. Through the Big Wild Challenge, we hope to inspire people to experience nature in a meaningful way that builds a foundation of love and appreciation for Canada’s wilderness,” said Eric Hebert-Daly, Executive Director of CPAWS. “The Challenge gives people the opportunity to share their passion for nature with their friends and family by supporting on-the-ground conservation work being done by CPAWS across the country.”
All funds raised by the Big Wild Challenge will go towards supporting CPAWS’ conservation campaigns across Canada, which protect at-risk wilderness areas such as watersheds in the North, BC’s South Okanagan, boreal forests stretching from Alberta to Quebec, the marine environments of the Maritimes and others.
All registrants should ensure their trip meets the following requirements:
• Trip must be set in a wilderness park or on crown land or water. (Emphasis is on “wilderness.”)
• Your means of travel during the trip must be self-propelled (after arriving at the start point, of course).
• The 7 Leave No Trace Principles must be followed throughout (www.leavenotrace.ca).
• You and your team are committed to raising funds for CPAWS.
• Your trip must include a personal challenge of some type — this could mean bringing someone who has never canoed/hiked/camped before; or going to a location that is new to you or someone in your group; setting a fundraising goal beyond your comfort level; or just about any other angle you can come up with.
• The trip can be as short as a single day or as long as the entire summer season.
Registration opened May 15, and continues until Labour Day. Click THE BIG WILD to register and find out more.
