Black people don’t frequent national parks or venture outdoors as much as their white peers, largely due to deep-rooted systemic issues.

I’ve lived in Colorado for 12 years, and I’ve never skied. I can count the times my family has hiked together on one hand. On most occasions, my mom and I try to avoid water activities at all costs.

To put it simply, spending significant time in nature has never been something we “do.”

When I moved to Texas to attend UT in 2018, I always enjoyed telling others I was from Colorado, because I felt like a novelty. People always thought it was cool that I lived in a place where the mountains stood in my backyard, and they always wondered why I would come to Texas. Then, the questions would come about my outdoor excursions. Had I been to this ski resort? Had I hiked this trail? Had I climbed this 14er?

More often than not, my answer was no. I’m sure my inquirers, many of whom had taken family vacations to Colorado, were confused about how they’d taken more adventures in the state than I had living there. I always told them my parents were busy with work all the time or that we just preferred other activities. I never shared with them the more complex truth that being outdoors—camping, snowboarding, rock climbing, hunting—isn’t a norm in Black culture.

For a long time I wondered why that was, why being outdoors was a “white thing,” or why I never felt inclined to ski or climb mountains.

When my family first arrived in the Centennial State from England, when I was eight years old,  I was immediately taken with its beautiful mountain ranges. But Colorado just seemed like a check on the list, a place we were just passing through. As a military brat, I was accustomed to living in one place for two or three years and then moving on to the next destination. 

Colorado is a place where natives love the state flag, athleisure rules fashion,  mountains are used as a compass and residents love the great outdoors—a lot. My family ended up staying in Colorado longer than expected, and I can say we still haven’t quite assimilated.

My peers in school went skiing, adventuring, or hammocking in the mountains every weekend while my family preferred staying at home, going to the movies, or shopping—and I was fine with that. When I was in high school, I would go on the occasional hike with my friends, if we didn’t want to spend money or there was nothing else to do. As a teenager, when I would visit my dad in California, Ohio, and later Virginia for the summer, we branched out, doing a bit more outdoor stuff on some occasions, like tubing rivers or ziplining. I always enjoyed myself, but I felt out of my element because these weren’t activities I did as a kid. And I know for certain my parents, who hail from Washington, D.C., never did such things growing up.

Aside from going on a school retreat and connecting with family at a cabin for a reunion of sorts one time, I hadn’t been camping until college when me and a group of friends “glamped” at Inks Lake, northwest of Austin. It was a great time, but it was hot and bugs were ever-present. Then the summer after my freshman year of college, I worked at a Christian summer camp with a predominantly white staff. I not only stuck out physically, but camp culture was also foreign to me in so many ways. I never went to summer camps as a child, and when I worked that summer, few campers were Black. The $1,000 price tag for kids to attend certainly wasn’t helping diversity.

I noticed a trend: the outdoors isn’t a Black space per se. This became more evident to me about a month ago, when I reconnected with a visiting friend, who is white. Her family is very outdoorsy, and we wanted to be as safe as possible during the pandemic, so she invited me on a hike. As we trekked through the trails, I saw no other Black people—not once. Maybe it was unwarranted, but I felt slightly uncomfortable thinking of this distinction.

Black people comprise just 1.2% of national forest visitors, according to data from the U.S. Forest Service. A 2010 NPS Comprehensive Study of the American Public survey found that of the 755 people who visited Rocky Mountain National Park during a one-week period in July 2010, 95% were white.

During our hike, my friend and I talked about the cultural complexities, about why I’d never been to all the outdoor Colorado destinations she frequented. She seemed to understand the cultural disparity, but I’m not sure either of us knew why it existed in the first place.

Nature is beautiful and outdoor adventures can be fun, so why don’t we see more Black people outside? Surely, we like beautiful things, fresh air and fun just like other people.

Then, I thought deeper. A large number of Black people in America live in dense, metropolitan areas, usually far away from any kind of natural wonders. And if they ever did want to go on outdoor adventures, travel, equipment, park fees, hiking gear and food would cost money they may not have, as Black people who live in these areas tend to be economically disadvantaged.

One could say spending leisure time outdoors on the weekends is a privilege enjoyed by those who have the benefit of paid vacations and aren’t working to make ends meet. Forty percent of outdoor enthusiasts are from homes with an annual income of $75,000 or more, according to data from an Outdoor Foundation report. So it seems that the system is at work, even in the outdoors.

But my family didn’t face substantial financial hardships, so I still couldn’t figure out why we rarely ventured outdoors as I grew up. Then, I did some research about the perceived anti-outdoors culture in the Black community.

Black people don’t necessarily have a natural aversion to the outdoors; it’s just a space we aren’t accustomed to. Experts say childhood experiences shape one’s attitudes toward the natural world, which would explain why I sometimes feel out of my element while hiking, why I’m afraid of water, and why it took time for me to adjust to working at camp. Many of my white peers grew up doing such things, while I and other Black children did not.

The desire of many Black people to pursue excellence and make a name for themselves despite systemic struggles might also play a role in their attitudes toward the outdoors. Ryan Kearney of The New Republic wrote in 2013 that a Black teenager who grew up in Washington, D.C. has most likely never been to Shenandoah National Park because their parents either didn’t have the money or interest to go. Then when the teenager becomes an adult, enters the workforce and starts making good money, Kearney said, they’ll feel less inclined to “spend a week eating freeze-dried food in the woods—rather than, say, reclining at a seaside hotel on Miami Beach, frozen margarita in hand.” When I weighed how I’d most prefer to spend my time—going out on the town, immersing myself in culture, or just being at home—I found that Kearney’s words speak to my perspectives on leisure.

America’s history of racism and segregation is also at the forefront of this phenomenon. Shenandoah National Park and others either banned Black people from national and state parks or segregated them, fostering the idea that enjoyment of nature is exclusive to white people. Black people, subconsciously at the very least, still feel excluded from these spaces.

Then, there’s fear. When Amy Cooper, a white woman, called the police in May falsely accusing Christian Cooper (no relation), a Black bird watcher, of threatening her life after he asked her to leash her dog, it only exacerbated the discomfort Black people feel in outdoor spaces,and that was just in Central Park. The reality of racial profiling and discrimination creates uneasiness for Black people in outdoor spaces. One reason this discomfort exists, particularly in forest settings, is because of America’s history of lynchings.

Like most things in American society, the history of this phenomenon runs deep, and it’s much more nuanced than I had ever considered. A reason exists behind why the outdoors isn’t something Black families “do.”

However, many Black people, particularly women, are changing this narrative by creating groups for people of color to enjoy the outdoors together. I used to attribute the tendency of Black people to avoid outdoor spaces to culture, but now I know this phenomenon is just a stereotype, another by-product of racism which puts everything into Black and white boxes.

While I enjoy the occasional nature excursion and love trees, I’m still not an “outdoorsy” person  like some of my peers who live and breathe hiking. This could be attributed to my upbringing, cultural norms, my personality, or a combination of them all; I couldn’t tell you.  But I do hope for a day when Black people enjoying outdoor spaces becomes normalized and the subconscious discomfort dissipates. One place I’ve always wanted to travel to catch some major “Twilight”vibes is the Hoh Rainforest in Olympic National Park in Washington state. The mossy floors, deep green hues, and the misty canopies are sights I’d love to witness in person. Maybe being outdoors doesn’t make all of us tick, but Black people can appreciate the beauty of the natural world, too. We just want to feel comfortable doing it, if we are so inclined