Cotopaxi Questival - 24 hour Adventure!
- Girls Gone Adventuring
- Apr 19, 2018
- 3 min read
What could be more fun than 24-straight-hours of Adventure all throughout our beautiful state with a team of sheer awesome-ness?!? Not much, turns out... :)
The Cotopaxi Questival is an Adventure Race where each team tries to accomplish as many of the 269 available challenges as they can in the 24-hour time frame. It used to be based on points awarded for each challenge but this year it was based on "llama love" (Cotopaxi's logo is a llama) that was given by other racers and spectators through the Questival app. Each completed task had to have your team flag in it and a picture or video was uploaded to the app for other teams and spectators to either 'like, 'love', or skip. The app wasn't working properly so it wasn't super accurate on who actually 'won', but regardless Team Girls Gone Adventuring had a blast!!
We started in Salt Lake and completed tasks like hiking to Ensign Peak and the Block U, did some urban hammocking on the trax train (which included an unsuccessful attempt to chase down the train in an all-out sprint for 3 full city blocks to get back the hammock ropes we accidentally left on there... :), made a human pyramid, performed the "Cups" song Karaoke version in a crowded restaurant, made up a Cotopaxi rap around a campfire started with nothing but flint, and laughed until random strangers joined in.
The cool thing about Cotopaxi is their commitment to "DO GOOD", so many of the challenges were based around doing good in our community and world. We gave flowers to a police officer and expressed our appreciation for his service, donated clothing to a non-profit, bought drinks for someone behind us in line, picked up litter and cigarette butts in a park, and ate at Even Stevens in Salt Lake, which donates a sandwich to someone in need for every sandwich bought.
At about 2 am we headed down to Moab and caught the sunrise at the Crystal Geyser in Green River, did some morning Yoga, hiked to delicate Arch, went sand-sledding, and swam 1/2 mile -- with flippers and snorkel goggles just for the heck of it :)
Definitely one of the best ways to spend 24-hours!! Exploring our beautiful state in an Adventurous, fun way and learning a lot along the way! Did you know there are "bike taxis" in Salt Lake, there are multiple ghost towns in our state to explore, and that Utah is home to one of the largest living organisms on the planet? (Pando near Fish Lake - look it up!) We had an awesome week-end Adventure, thanks Cotopaxi! Here's to some Llama-Love for Team Girls Gone Adventuring!!
HOW TO DO THIS YOURSELF:
1) Watch for the Cotopaxi Questival in your city at their website: https://www.cotopaxi.com/pages/events-questival-home
2) Participant fee is around $40 and includes a Cotopaxi backpack. You'll also have other expenses like: gas for driving to/from, food, matching team gear or outfits if you go that route, and whatever entrance fees or costs you incur on your Adventures (like buying those new ropes for the hammock :)
3) Timing: You get the list of Challenges about 24 hours before the race starts, so plan on spending quite a few hours as a team planning your route and deciding which challenges you're going to do/timing/gathering gear/etc. Check-in for the Launch Event to get your backpacks and team flag is at 6:00 pm on Friday and Closing Ceremonies take place at 6:00 pm on Saturday. 24-hours of Adventure!!
4) There's an Oktoberquest going on in Salt Lake this fall -October 12-13, 2018!
** Is there an Adventure you think we should discover? Comment below
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