People often wonder what they are going to do during retirement. I had given it some thought but life got in the way and events unfolded until I found myself living alone in Boulder at the age of 65. I wondered what was next for me until one day on a dog walk I ran across a sign asking for volunteers to help become Volunteer Naturalists for the City of Boulder Open Space and Mountain Parks (OSMP). One thing led to another and I have found great fulfillment in volunteering to help give back to the community. This is a list of volunteer opportunities that I have found rewarding and helpful to the community.

Volunteer Naturalist - City of Boulder. Attend a nine week training course and you can be leading nature related hikes for elementary and middle school students. The topics tend to be focused in specific areas but the most fun ones for me are Geology (after all how many places can you live and hike through seven geologic layers covering 1.8 Billion Years?) and Birding. The birding hikes cover all age groups and are always well attended. People seem to not be able to get enough of birds probably because every time out we see a different set of birds.

Raptor Monitor - City of Boulder This is one I really wanted to do but at first they were completely full. Eventually enough people moved or retired from monitoring that I was able to become a Peregrine Falcon monitor in the area of the Flatirons. It involves a lot of hiking uphill with gear but is all worthwhile when the falcons have their first hatchlings and they begin to fledge. Unfortunately the time from hatching to fledging is all too short but we monitors take pride in every successful clutch.

Volunteer Mechanic at Community Cycles - What a great program! Community Cycles (or CC for short) was founded on the premise of expanding the cycling footprint in Boulder and surrounding communities. We take in donation bikes (most at least 10 years old and some 50 years old or more) and refurbish them into safe rideable bikes. These bikes are sold to people who cannot afford fancy new bicycles and, in some cases, given to others who have to donate time in order to earn them. It is a great challenge to work there since we rarely have two bicycles that are the same and each bike has its own challenges. No information comes with the bikes so we have to figure out their history and repair them - each bike is its own unique puzzle.

Technical webmaster for Boulder Audubon - Boulder County Audubon Society is a wonderful organization focused on environmental sustainability in Boulder