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Date: 5/20/2020
ENFIELD, CT. – Watch colorful tropical fish swimming in a coral reef, participate in an online yoga or body building class, make a COVID-19 time capsule, improve your smartphone photography skills, set-up a game of backyard bingo, or get the kids busy with some online coloring. The Enfield Recreation Department is offering over 40 online activities for all ages at its Virtual Recreation Center. Just log on to www.enfield-ct.gov/recreation to gain access to fitness classes, crafts, learning opportunities, outdoor activities, and virtual tours and adventures.
The town’s Recreation Department Manager, Allison Alberghini, spotted the idea for a virtual rec center on the National Recreation and Park Association (NRPA) website. An emerging trend, the programs come at no cost to the town or people using them. Users may have to skip ads or donation requests that pop up on some of the sites, but it is easy to navigate ones way through the many options.
The full-time staff at the recreation department notes they scour through potential offerings and is “picky” about choosing which items get linked to the website.
The recreation department tried to find virtual options for some of the activities they would be offering in “real-life,” such as yoga and chess, and then proceeded from there. They are planning to add about six new items every week while the virtual center is operating, and will alert people to when they have a last chance to access a program before it is phased out.
Some of the virtual tours and adventures include Ellis Island, Versailles Palace, the Louvre Museum, virtual dives and live webcams at the San Diego Zoo and Monterey Bay Aquarium. If you visit the California sites, remember that it is three hours earlier there, which may affect the activity levels of the animals at either site. The tropical fish tank at the aquarium shows colorful fish swimming amongst the coral. At the virtual dive site, users can further enhance their underwater experience if they have a virtual reality headset or goggles, although they are not strictly necessary.
The 15 different exercise and fitness classes are all delivered via YouTube videos, and there are options for children, adults and entire families. Choices include TaiChi, foam rolling, yoga, body building, cardio classes, Pilates, HIIT and more.
Listed under Enrichment Activities and Crafts, users will find ideas for at-home science experiments, making a COVID-19 time capsule, Boston Red Sox, Yankees and Yard Goat activities, and both printable and online coloring pages – no supplies necessary.
Participants can learn how to play chess and practice against a computer or another learner, juggle, cook with the family, learn magic tricks, and more. Outdoor activities include back yard bingo and scavenger hunts, nature activities, and links for local hiking, fishing and bird watching. On the bird watching site, users can access the Audubon Society and learn which plants will attract specific species of birds to your yard, among many other interesting facts.
To suggest a topic or recommend a resource to add to the town’s website, just drop an email to recreationsupervisor@enfield.org and the staff will vet the information and add it to the site if they think it would be a worthwhile addition. The recreation office, although physically closed for now, is staffed from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. The department can be reached at 860-253-6420 or via email.