This weekend my daughter and I decided to go do something fun and interesting so we went to TreeGo in Mactaquac Provincial Park. I had gone before with my son, but this was the first time for my daughter as she is now tall enough to go on the adult portion of the course.  Along with her first time on the adult course, it was my first time wearing my VFFs to TreeGo and this post is about our excursion this weekend.  Unfortunately there was a restriction on having “electronic devices and cell phones” on the course so I had to be sneaky in taking photos and video, so I don’t have as many photos as I was hoping for.

What is TreeGo?

TreeGo is an obstacle course up in the trees.  It has a wide variety of obstacles, such as zip-lines, scramble nets, Tarzan ropes, tight-ropes, wooden plank bridges, ladders, and so on.  The course starts easy and progressively gets more difficult for four levels with around 70 obstacles to complete.  There are locations throughout the course where people can get off should they reach the limit of their inner monkey.  My daughter and I finished it and would have gone again as our inner monkeys were just warmed up.  We went first thing in the morning and were in the first group to get onto the course in the morning and we were the second and third people on the course after we finished the required training and demonstrations of how to use the equipment.  It took us about 2 hours to complete the TreeGo course.

While on the course you wear a climbing harness which has two safety lines and a tandem pulley for the zip-lines.  You clip the safety lines onto loops and cables throughout the course to prevent you from falling; well falling to the ground as you still drop a few feet and most likely slam off the obstacle that you were climbing.  My daughter took a bit of a tumble on a plank bridge but she bounced up and carried on no problem.  She does have a nice bruise today and enjoys telling her friends how she got it.  There are guides along the course to assist if you need and in the event of an injury can lower you to the ground safely.

My Daughter’s Impression

My daughter said it was the best day ever which sums it up pretty much.  Her favorite obstacle was the zip-line.  I was surprised at how keen and how unafraid of the height she was.  She even took a tumble when the gap in one of the many plank bridges got bigger then she thought, but she shrugged it off and completed the course.  Ideal for kids.

My Impression

This was a great way to spend the morning with daughter being active and trying out something different.  The course develops confidence for kids and lets them move in ways that they don’t have the chance to do very often.  Most kids don’t have the chance to climb 30 foot ladders into a tree and then slide along a 200 foot zip-line.  Along with the confidence, it has kids moving and using their bodies to pull themselves up and down and develops balance on tight ropes and wire bridges; so it is a fantastic way to be active.  While the $60 cost prevents it from being done frequently, it is something that we will be doing at least once more this summer.  (Quicktime Video of me zip-lining at TreeGo).

Now for the reason why you have read this far; I had done the course before in runners but this was the first time I did it in my KomodoSports.  Once again VFFs excel at another activity, and allows you to appreciate how your foot moves while climbing instead of just running or walking in them.  They worked great on almost all obstacles, allowing me to wrap my foot and toes around whatever it was I was climbing.  There were only a few obstacles where they weren’t the best.  One was the small scramble net where the rope got stuck in between my toes and then had my little toe pulled out of its pocket.  The second was where they had a cable bridge with small pieces of cable that you stepped on.  This flexed around the foot and kind of squeezed it in the cable; while not painful, it wasn’t really comfortable.  Other than those 2 obstacles they worked like a charm.  One obstacle that the FiveFingers worked really great on was the tight rope.  I put my foot at a slight angle along the cable and my foot folded around it and gave me great balance along it although I wouldn’t do it without the safety harness.

Recommendation

TreeGo was well worth the money and the time spent completing it.  It’s a great place to wear VFFs and to see how your foot moves in one of the most natural yet neglected activities we can do which is climbing.  The best part however was getting to spend hours with my daughter being active and trying a challenging and novel activity.  I would highly recommend it to everyone to try at least once this summer.