A wave of LGBTQ+-led organizations is breaking down barriers and redefining what it means to be queer in nature. This blog post will introduce you to ten incredible groups that are fostering community, promoting inclusivity, and empowering LGBTQ+ individuals to explore the natural world with confidence and pride. Discover LGBTQ+ backpacking trips, queer-friendly rock climbing groups, and more!
Why LGBTQ+ Outdoor Organizations are Essential for Inclusivity 🔗
The outdoor industry has historically presented a narrow view of what an “outdoorsy person” looks like, often excluding diverse populations from the narrative. LGBTQ+ individuals may face unique challenges in accessing and feeling safe in outdoor spaces, including:
- Lack of representation: Feeling invisible or unwelcome due to the absence of visible LGBTQ+ role models.
- Safety concerns: Experiencing or fearing discrimination, harassment, or violence.
- Limited access: Facing financial or logistical barriers to participate in outdoor activities.
- Lack of inclusive spaces: Not finding communities or programs that cater specifically to LGBTQ+ needs and interests.
LGBTQ+-led organizations address these challenges by creating welcoming and affirming spaces where individuals can connect with nature and each other, build skills, and advocate for inclusivity in the broader outdoor community. They are essential to ensure everyone has access to the joy and benefits of the outdoors.
10 Incredible LGBTQ+ Outdoor Organizations Redefining the Outdoors 🔗
Here are ten outstanding LGBTQ+ outdoor organizations that are making a difference in the outdoor world, offering everything from beginner-friendly hikes to challenging wilderness expeditions:
1. The Venture Out Project: Safe Adventures for the Queer Community 🔗
The Venture Out Project (TVOP) is a leading organization dedicated to creating safe and inclusive spaces for the queer community to explore the outdoors. Through backpacking trips, day hikes, and other outdoor adventures, TVOP aims to build confidence, foster community, and promote personal growth.
“For too long, access to the outdoors (which you would think is accessible) has been completely inaccessible to so many. Our organization exists to provide spaces for the queer community to feel safe and confident.”
— SJ Lupert, Director of Basecamp
TVOP offers a variety of programs, including:
- Backpacking trips: Multi-day wilderness expeditions designed to build skills and foster connection. Imagine yourself on an LGBTQ+ backpacking trip in Colorado, surrounded by stunning scenery and supportive friends.
- Day hikes: Accessible and welcoming hikes for all skill levels, perfect for a casual afternoon of trail running or enjoying nature.
- Community events: Social gatherings and workshops to build community and share knowledge.
- 50-State Road Trip Series: TVOP has released their third installment of the TVOP 50-State Road Trip Series. Participants will be venturing out (ha-ha) to parts of Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico for LGBTQ+ community building in the outdoors. Registration is now open on their website.
Over the next five years, TVOP aims to launch nationwide to expand access to queer people all over the country, starting with a volunteer program. In this way, they hope more people can explore the outdoors with like-minded individuals.
2. Queer Nature: Reimagining Our Connection to the Land 🔗
Queer Nature facilitates nature-based workshops and multi-day immersions intended to be financially, emotionally, and physically accessible to LGBTQI2+ people and QTBIPOC.
Co-envisioned by Pinar Ates Sinopoulos-Lloyd and So Sinopoulos-Lloyd, the organization dreams about what queer “ancestral futurism” looks like and what alternative forms modernity can take. Their mentorship in place-based education inspires skills used to solve community problems at the ground level.
For Queer Nature, place-based skills include naturalist studies/interpretation, handcrafts, “survival skills,” and recognition of colonial and Indigenous histories of the land, which includes an emphasis on listening and relationship building with ecological systems and their inhabitants. Queer Nature hopes that these spaces cultivate new narratives and carve out a corner of the world where everyone belongs.
3. Wild Diversity: Decolonizing Outdoor Spaces 🔗
Wild Diversity is a Portland-based nonprofit working to decolonize outdoor spaces. They are redefining who can take up space in the outdoors through diverse leadership, educational resources, and community building.
“We are here so that our community can access the outdoors in ways that make them feel at home. And we are here to help bring the badass outdoorist that lives within each of us to life,”
— Kristen Trudo, Marketing Coordinator at Wild Diversity.
The organization aims to create a personal connection to the outdoors for BIPOC and LGBTQ2S+ communities through outdoor adventures and education. They build a welcoming space for both novice and experienced adventurers through programs such as their Adventure Guide Development.
“We are here for our participants, as they are, and to support BIPOC, queer, and trans folks in the outdoors so that they can recognize their place in these spaces.”
— Kristen Trudo, Marketing Coordinator
4. QPOC Hikers: Sharing Stories on the Trail 🔗
QPOC Hikers believes that everyone has a story to share, and they aim to uplift these stories. Additionally, by bringing awareness to the issues faced, they provide a safe space for this underrepresented population to explore their interests.
As they work to create an intentional outdoor community, QPOC Hikers hosts hikes on various trails that anyone can join. They meet the participants where they are and ensure that the group stays together. By making solidarity a priority, they lower the intimidation factor that prevents many from exploring their outdoor interests. As a result, QPOC Hikers is reducing the barriers for queer, POC outdoor lovers.
5. Outdoor Asian: Connecting Culture, Community, and Conservation 🔗
“I love that Outdoor Asian brings history to the forefront and redefines what it means to get outside. We connect the outdoors to our food, culture, community, and history.”
Outdoor Asian connects history, culture, and recreation. In a white-supremacist society that erases POC from many mainstream narratives, they work to ensure that AAPI people can venture into the outdoors with their whole selves and not in the shadow of an “outdoorsy” person that has been constructed.
“Ultimately, we’re making the outdoors more accessible not just through education and gear but also through culture, food, and community.”
Outdoor Asian places conservation and environmental concerns at the center of its mission. They believe in respecting the land and its ancestral history, embodied by teaching the principles of “Leave No Trace.” Additionally, Outdoor Asian provides a safe space for LGBTQ+ people who have been threatened by recent legislation and partners with other outdoor groups for grassroots
6. Evolutionary Aquatics: Reclaiming Our Relationship with Water 🔗
In New York City, Black People Will Swim’s mission is simple: to smash the stereotype that Black people don’t swim. Through their “F.A.C.E” foundational pillars of fun, awareness, community, and education, they are reducing barriers and increasing water literacy for Black people. They operate at the crux of these pillars to ensure both education and enjoyment, fostering new passionate swimmers.
CEO and Founder Paulana Lamonier nurtured her love for swimming, became inspired to teach others how to conquer their fear of water, and has been in aquatic communities for over a decade.
“What is sad is that people truly believe that the past doesn’t have a trickle-down effect on today’s current events…Our goal and role at BPWS is to simply educate people on learning this lifestyle and why it wasn’t accessible to us over 50 years ago. Our goal isn’t to cause a division, but to educate and simply a call to action to the aquatic space that we need more swimmers of color,”
— Paulana Lamonier
and conditional language when facing challenges.
Evolutionary Aquatics reminds us that water played an important role in our lives when we were victims of human trafficking. It defines our spirituality through the Orisha Oshun. It calms us by telling us to “lay our troubles by the riverside” and to “wade in the water.” It empowers us to know that Tice Davids escaped human trafficking by jumping into and swimming down the Ohio River, the original Underground Railroad. And in the age of cries over the “Little Mermaid,” we find beauty in ourselves through the river maidens, Mami Wata, Mamba Muntu, and many others,” said Nadine.
As the social tide changes and more Black folks are exposed to swimming and other aquatic activities, Evolutionary Aquatics’ “each one, teach one” principle and partnerships with other organizations will allow club members to go as far as they would like with water sports and recreation. By owning their truth and empowering others to do the same, they are changing
7. EDGE Outdoors: Empowering BIWOC in Snow Sports 🔗
“I launched EDGE through a Gofundme campaign. From there it grew and matured into a beautiful organization. We’re still growing and building community.”
EDGE has grown into an inspiring community, with programming in Washington and new programs to come in Lake Tahoe and Park City. EDGE not only provides access and opportunities for BIWOC folks to get into snow sports, but also offers avalanche education courses, intro to the backcountry courses, athlete development programs, and instructor training, with accompanying scholarship opportunities.
“I’m super stoked and excited to be a part of that culture change that we see on the hill and to be part of the return to the mountain for BIWOC.”
Annette talks about how her priority is on women and femme-identifying people. Women of Color face unparalleled levels of violence, and her goal is to provide a safe and welcoming space for them to learn and build community.
Through the creation of EDGE Outdoors and her continued activism, Annette is
8. Brown Folks Fishing: Reimagining Fishing as a Gateway to Conservation 🔗
Brown Folks Fishing (BFF) is a community-based organization of anglers. Through storytelling, events, and community-building, BFF expands access to fishing for BIPOC and reimagines it as a gateway to conservation. Brown Folks Fishing is shifting the narrative surrounding who should be allowed access to the water.
Led by Vietnamese-American Tracy Nguyen-Chung, the organization is changing the face of the fishing industry as it stands today.
“I learned to fish from my father, who grew up doing the same back in Vietnam. I was about 8 when I caught my first fish,”
— Tracy Nguyen-Chung
As a film producer and outdoor enthusiast, Tracy’s academic background in conflict resolution, peacebuilding, and restorative justice deeply informs her lens on the outdoors and environmental justice. Her parents grew up in and around water and carried these relationships to the United States after fleeing the Vietnam War. Tracy’s family and ancestors have always had deep connections with fish and water.
“Rivers are
9. Latino Outdoors: Connecting Latiné Communities to Conservation 🔗
Latino Outdoors began in 2013 when José González realized there was an unmet need for a conservation organization that served Latinés. This motivated him to create an online blog and networking platform for members of the Latiné community who were interested in recreation, environmental education, and conservation.
As the community grew, Latino Outdoors began providing outdoor activities for youth and families through its Vamos Outdoor program, expanding from California to a national organization, now nationally present in 27 locations.
The organization continues to focus on programs that highlight outdoor experiences, narratives, and leadership through Let’s Go Outdoors (Vamos Outdoors), I Count/I Matter/I Tell a Story Outdoors (Yo Cuento Outdoors), and We Grow Outdoors (Crecemos Outdoors). They advocate for storytelling that connects participants to their roots.
In 2021, they produced Yo Cuento: Nurturing Grassroots Advocacy for Conservation, a follow-up documentary to their 2020
10. Diversify Outdoors: Advocating for Equity and Inclusion 🔗
Diversify Outdoors is a coalition of digital influencers, entrepreneurs and consultants advocating for a more equitable and inclusive outdoors.
Embrace the Outdoors with Confidence 🔗
These ten organizations are just a starting point. Many other LGBTQ+-led groups are working to create inclusive outdoor spaces across the country and around the world. By connecting with these communities, you can:
- Find support and camaraderie.
- Learn new skills and gain confidence, whether it’s navigating with a map and compass or setting up a tent.
- Advocate for inclusivity and equity in the outdoors, ensuring that everyone feels welcome and safe.
- Experience the transformative power of nature.
Join LGBT Outdoors for an Alaskan Adventure 🔗
LGBT Outdoors is planning an Alaska pack rafting trip with Justin and Jewel in July. This is a special opportunity to connect with other adventurers in an environment that they’re open to be impressed by the rivers and the mountains! This trip will include a kayak, paddleboarding, and a life vest!
Dates: July 16th - 22nd
All of your food, lodging, transportation, and equipment is included once you get to Anchorage.
Details: LGBToutdoors.com/AdventureTrips
FAQ: LGBTQ+ and the Outdoors 🔗
1. Why are LGBTQ+ outdoor organizations important?
LGBTQ+ organizations create safe, inclusive, and affirming spaces for LGBTQ+ individuals to connect with nature, build community, and overcome barriers to participation. They ensure access to outdoor activities for all.
2. What types of activities do these organizations offer?
Activities range from hiking and backpacking to kayaking, rock climbing, camping, and nature-based workshops, catering to all interests and skill levels.
3. Are these organizations only for experienced outdoor enthusiasts?
No, many organizations offer programs for all skill levels, from beginners to experienced adventurers. Beginner-friendly queer backpacking trips are common!
4. How can I find LGBTQ+ outdoor organizations near me?
Check online directories, social media groups, and local LGBTQ+ community centers. Search for “LGBTQ+ hiking groups near me” or similar terms.
5. What if I’m nervous about joining an outdoor group?
Start with a smaller, low-pressure event or activity, and communicate your concerns to the organizers.
6. Do these organizations welcome allies?
Yes, many organizations welcome allies who are committed to supporting LGBTQ+ inclusivity in the outdoors.
7. How can I support these organizations?
Volunteer your time, donate money or equipment, or spread the word about their programs.
8. What are some of the challenges LGBTQ+ individuals face in the outdoors?
Challenges include lack of representation, safety concerns, limited access, and lack of inclusive spaces.
9. How can I be a better ally to LGBTQ+ individuals in the outdoors?
Educate yourself, challenge discrimination, create inclusive spaces, and support LGBTQ+ organizations.
10. What is pack rafting?
Pack rafting is a multisport where you essentially have like an inflatable kayak but it’s smaller it weighs less it’s much more capable to handle River features. Pack rafts weigh anywhere between six and 14 pounds and they pack down very soon.
Take Action Today 🔗
Ready to embark on your own outdoor adventure?
- Connect with an LGBTQ+ outdoor organization: Find a group that aligns with your interests and values.
- Plan your first outdoor adventure: Start small and build your skills and confidence.
- Share this blog post: Help spread the word about these incredible organizations and inspire others to explore the outdoors.
By embracing the outdoors with confidence and community, LGBTQ+ individuals can experience the transformative power of nature and create a more inclusive and equitable world for all.