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| The Windham Parks and Recreation Department is offering a trip to Biddeford Pool for seniors from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. on July 28. The beach there has been called one of the most scenic beaches in all of Maine. FILE PHOTO |
Summer is here and as COVID-19 restrictions finally relax a little, there are some great opportunities for seniors to get out and about in the community.
“I would love to have our seniors be more aware of are our beautiful parks that we have here in town,” said Lynn Bucknell, Adult and Senior Coordinator for the Windham Parks and Recreation Department. I would love to see more seniors visit these parks, and I’m not sure they’re aware that they are there and what they are like.”
Bucknell
said she tried to start an “Adopt a Park” program for senior volunteers to do
some planning and make the parks more welcoming, but no one signed up. She will put it out there again next year,
she said.
To
encourage more visitation to these parks, Windham Parks and Recreation has a
“Parks Challenge” posted in the senior programs section of their website,
windhamrecreation.com.
The final chapter of an ongoing fitness challenge, the park challenge runs through Sept. 1. Interested seniors should register via the website, to be included in the drawing for winners at the end of the challenge. The parks included in this challenge are: Donnabeth Lippman Park, Dundee Park, the Mountain Division Trail, and Black Brook Preserve.
On
Aug. 8, a Lunch and Lighthouse Tour is offered, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., for a
cost of $16. The trip will begin,
Bucknell said, with a stop at Two Lights State Park for a seafood lunch on the
deck. From there they will head to Fort Williams Park to explore the lighthouse.
Numbers
are limited on these trips, Bucknell said, because of continued restrictions
for transportation. Normal capacity for trips, she said, is 28 people, but with
these restrictions it drops to eight.
“That’s
kind of a been a challenge, but what we’ve done is make trips that we can pull
on a second one relatively easy,” Bucknell said.
The
Parks and Recreation Department is also offering transportation to the July
Concerts in the Park at Dundee Park on Wednesday evenings for those who wish to
attend, but not drive to the park, Bucknell said.
The
department offers weekly transportation to North Windham, which seniors can
register for by calling the office. Seniors are transported anywhere they have
errands to do in North Windham, such as grocery stores, banks, pharmacies, pet
stores and the dollar store. Seniors are
appreciative of this service, Bucknell said, because it means they can take
care of errands without needing to ask someone else for help.
“We
can’t do appointments, but we can get weekly necessities taken care of,”
Bucknell said.
According
to Bucknell, seniors should also check out what is available through Windham’s
designation as an Age Friendly Community on the website, http://www.agefriendlywindham.org, or on the Age Friendly Windham
Facebook page.
The
Lakes Region Senior Center at Little Falls Activity Center on Acorn Road in
Gorham is open at 9:30 a.m. for games on Tuesday and Thursday each week. President Geraldine Day said current
membership is just under 100 seniors from Gorham, Windham, and other area
communities.
“We are looking forward to reopening five days
a week in September,” she said. In the fall, there will be speakers, programs,
and luncheons, Day said, presuming Covid is not a problem.
Membership
in the Lakes Region Senior Center is $20 per year, and comes with some perks,
Day said.
"We
love new members," Day said.
Interested
seniors can call Day at 207-839-3859 for more information. <
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