In all but the far southwest part of the state, the New Year brought sun and unseasonably warm temperatures and 19,033 people came out to welcome 2017 and enjoy guided and self-guided hikes, bikes and horseback rides in our 37 Virginia State Parks. 

This was our sixth year offering this national event and I have had the privilege to coordinate our participation and moderate the contests each year. January 1 is a holiday and I appreciate our staff and volunteers that come out to support this great event. I love seeing the pictures that are submitted to the contest and while I don't get to go to a park, I feel like I am at all of them.

This year I want to share two photos - one from the 2012 contest and one from the 2017 contest.

I told their mother that it has been like watching these kids grow up the last six years.

Along the way, I find touching stories about some of the pictures. They aren't contest winners but they warm the spirit. This year, these two caught my attention (which is pretty amazing considering the number of photos we received). The text below each was submitted with the photos and, of course, is what pulls at the heart strings for our giant family of what Shellie calls "Park'rs."

"Getting inspired for the New Year! Out hiking 6 miles for the New Year
with my brother, a blind cancer survivor.
29 surgeries later, 8 on his head, nothing can get him down." 

"We enjoyed a few hours at York River State Park with our miracle baby.
Beautiful day to share together hiking and enjoying nature." 

In fact, this last photo reminded me of a contest winner for the 2014 First Day Hikes. This was one of the years when we used online voting to determine the winner. When the story of this miracle child came out, people all over the country voted for this picture (below on the left) to win.

This is Charlie, born 19 months earlier, after 26 weeks, weighing one pound, eleven ounces (left) and Charlie today enjoying the trails (right)

You may have seen her picture since then because her mom now volunteers for us in a number of ways including blogging. I was blessed to meet them because of this picture.

Anyway, I know you are all anxiously awaiting the announcement of the contest winners as opposed to my walk down memory lane through six years of First Day Hikes.

We had more than 1,200 photos submitted to the photo contest by the deadline of 11:59 p.m. on Jan. 1. This also was the highest participation ever and it really kept me jumping doing contest moderation.

As usual, we awarded more than just one photo as winners in all of the categories except the grand prize. Winners will receive email confirmations this weekend on prizes and redeeming them but in the meantime, enjoy viewing the winners here:

For the New Year Challenge

We had 1,236 people sign up for the contest but only 779 logged in to complete the challenge by the 11:59 p.m. deadline on January 1. The results from applying a random number generator are:

I know we reached some new visitors with this program and I want to personally invite you to visit more Virginia State Parks. Check out our Trail Quest Program:

As you visit parks, you log them into the system and earn pins along the way to the ultimate Master Hiker designation when completing all 37 parks. And since you visited a park for the First Day Hikes, you can sign up and will receive your first pin in the mail. Please note that multiple family members including children can participate since one email address can be used. You can find the details here. If you are just starting this program and have visited other parks already, we welcome you to add them in with an approximate visit date.

So as we close the book on another great Virginia State Parks First Day Hikes, thanks to everyone who came out and participated, we now have a whole year of great programming at our Virginia State Parks to look forward to, we hope to see you often as the year goes by and certainly next year when we start out another new year on the right foot.