Right underneath Longs Peak sits Annunciation Heights, a Catholic adventure camp in the Rocky Mountains. This past Saturday, July 29, 2023, the camp hosted its 4th Annual Fiat Fest & Adventure Race. Families from local towns and beyond came to participate in the wide variety of activities that took place across campgrounds.

Tommy Myers, the senior mission advancement officer for Annunciation Heights, has been running this event since its inception back in 2020. This race day marked the last day for Myers works for Annunciation Heights, and he is grateful to have a nice send-off.

“I love just watching everybody come together and just enjoy the day…I just feed off their energy, it’s really awesome to watch,” said Myers.

The day began with the Adventure Race which gives over 300 participants the option to do a competitive 5k run or a leisurely 2.5k walk. This is not your typical race, however, as runners are tasked with completing a series of tasks along the way such as hitting a target with a bow and arrow as well as sliding across a slip-in-slide.

The next portion of the day consisted of the Fest activities, including live music, a bouncy castle, food trucks, a volleyball tournament, and more. The day then concludes with a Mass at their outdoor chapel and a buffet dinner where the race winners are congratulated and the mission of the camp is explained to fest-goers.

Elizabeth Gideon is a mother of eight children, all of whom participated in the day’s race and festivities. This was the first Fiat Fest & Adventure Race the Gideons had ever attended and she expressed her experience thus far at Annunciation Heights.

“It’s fun to see the joy of other families together…building relationship[s] with each other and taking an adventure together,” said Gideon.

Fiat Fest & Adventure Race serves as a fundraiser for the camp’s missionary staff from the Altum Institute. The missionaries work for Annunciation Heights for either a 15-month or 24-month period helping with a variety of programming from youth and family summer camps to the “JPII Outdoor Lab”, which features a combination of student learning about both Catholicism and science.

William Muraski is currently a missionary at Annunciation Heights and disclosed what working in this type of environment means to him.

“Living in a community of people who are really committed and striving for the same goal as you and basically push you to be yourself and are also receptive to you pushing them,” said Muraski. “I think it’s such a gift.”

For more information about Annunciation Heights please visit their website at https://annunciationheights.org/.