Last night, The Wild Way had the honor of being one of two nonprofits to receive an extremely generous corporate donation from Valley Wealth Group. Along with our partner organization LEAP, we received $10,000, which is a HUGE donation for our small organization.

This was the dream team...for real. Summer 2026 will be hard to beat. For our events this season, we had our new Adventure Coordinator Laura on board, along with our steadfast Wild Wayfarer Caroline and our simply unforgettable Field Intern Emily.

Is it already over? Today was the last day of our August Paddleboard Camp and the last event of summer 2026.

Today, we went to Douthat State Park to practice our SUP FLIP RESCUES! This is a technique that is used to get an exhausted or unconscious paddler back onto their board.

Today was another gorgeous day on the James River. We applied our SUP skills to the river and learned how to look for downstream Vs to navigate the rapids, plus practiced our rescue skills with throw bags.

Today was zen. We began our FINAL week of Paddleboard Camp, and we went to Carvin’s Cove to learn all of our basic strokes. We were also joined by Dr. Sarah Henry from Virginia Tech who guided us through a Nature Bath.

A sunny day spent paddling Carvin’s Cove. In case you all haven’t noticed, the water is low. REALLY low. It changes the geography of the cove dramatically, but it also provides opportunity for new exploration.

A jumbled pile of vines transformed into works of art! Working with Maya Ittah from TerraVie Wellness, LLC, our girls created beautiful handmade baskets using ONLY kudzu vines.

Intro to SUPing and Macroinvertebrate Exploration. Did you know that you can measure how clean the water is by checking out the little water bugs that live in there?

We finished our West End Center For Youth Summer Camp week at Roaring Run, and it’s always a crowd pleaser. We hike out to some waterfalls that make fantastic natural waterslides.

Summer SUPing with our West End Center For Youth girls. Some of these girls have been paddling with us for the past FOUR YEARS, and they have become very comfortable on their boards and in the water.

We took the first day on the water with the West End Center for Youth slow and easy with tubing on the James River.

First day of Wild Way Summer Camp for our West End Center For Youth girls! It was calling for rainy, chilly weather so we kicked it off with yoga taught by our Adventure Coordinator Laura at Uttara Yoga Studio.

Intro to SUP with the girls from The Community Youth Program (CYP)! “This is scary!” We hear that a lot. And we like to hear it…not because we want to scare little girls, but because it means they are being BRAVE and pushing themselves.

The Wild Way and Roanoke Star Cycling took a group of girls out to Carvin's Cove for an Introduction to Mountain Biking day. RSC is our local youth mountain biking team, and their coaches know exactly how to get girls up and feeling comfortable on the trails.

Earlier this week, we took a group of Afghan girls from Commonwealth Catholic Charities out for an Introduction to Paddleboarding. These girls were absolutely thrilled that they had the opportunity to swim in the river and paddle a SUP.

Yesterday, we took our West End Center For Youth, Inc. girls to Spring Valley Farm for a horseback trail ride.

If you hang with The Wild Way this summer, you will meet our Field Intern Emily Cook. Emily is AWESOME. She is an outdoor enthusiast who loves to climb, paddle, and explore.

How summer has been going so far…we’d say it’s been pretty darn good.

We had the incredibly good fortune to run into The Roanoke Times reporter Jeff Reid at Smith Mountain Lake on the first day of Paddleboard Camp last week.