 here at the National Disabled Veterans Golf Clinic and we're here at the Terry True Blood Recreational Center and I'm here with Chris who is a part of an organization called Adaptive Adventures and as you can see they have adaptive biking, rock climbing and even kayaking here and Chris tell us a little bit more about the organization Adaptive Adventures. So Adaptive Adventures is a nonprofit organization and basically we travel full of trailers with all these different items in it so we can come to VA hospitals we can come to recreational facilities every state in the nation well we can't drive to Hawaii but we do have bikes there and in Puerto Rico as well but we basically bring bikes and programs and equipment to those places so that people can take you know they can find out how it works get the right fitting and then learn how to do that activity and go forward and maybe continue to participate some of the things like bicycles and cycling you know a veteran can get that bike from the VA once they figure out which bike works best for them they work with their team at the VA hospital and when they ride enough and figure everything out and we have as you can see behind me plenty of bikes to try they tried one earlier they can get the most appropriate bike for them that's gonna work the best and move forward because you know we don't want that thing sitting in a closet or in a garage because they can't get it out it's not properly fitted so we want to make sure that everything they get is good to go and it'll fit in the car they'll use it on the trail it's appropriate for where they live all those different things and it's fitted properly so they can when once they get one they can go out and just you know ride miles and miles I mean we have people that have come to us as beginners and now ride literally three thousand miles in a year we had one gentleman that never rode and he rides an upright bike you know some other issues he rode from California to Washington DC in 21 days that's just impressive that's all that is yes yes it's it's so good that you can get people out and just you know they can have fun and enjoy nature and the environment get out with the kids get out with the family get out with loved ones caregivers whatever and just go or participate in you know little 5k races or community events or go to the grocery store you know all those things yeah absolutely let's talk to me a little bit about the bikes here and I know they are designed for different challenges I rode one is for visually impaired folks there's also hand cycles which is for you know folks who are paralyzed and whatnot what else we got here absolutely so we have we have hand cycles so spinal cord injuries anybody lost limb loss that sort of thing can't use legs legs don't work anymore maybe we got braces you know we still have the legs they're attached but they don't really work right so hands so we can use our hands hand cycles we got many different kinds and then we go to recumbent bikes there's two different kinds of recumbent bikes once it's a little higher called a delta once it's a little lower called a tadpole tad poles have two tires in front one in back deltas have one in front two in the back okay and so those recumbent bikes have three wheels kind of like a trike but we call them recumbent trikes and they are super stable so balance issues anything else where you can't be on a regular upright bike and feel comfortable the recumbent bike is the way to go we have different gearing different ways to get in and out some are higher so you can transfer out of a wheelchair in if you're you know if you just have that leg strength issue and then we have you know we go from there to tandem bikes oh yeah so if you may might have a visual impairment but you still want to ride and everything's working great all it's kind of missing is you know being able to see that stop light to stop or you know stick in the middle of the trail we have upright tandems we also have upright recumbent track tandem so you can sit back and do those things and ride comfortable so you know there's just all sorts of different ways you can ride we even have bikes that you can ride side-by-side four tires quad and sit by side-by-side balance issues it's kind of like a side car but you know when you're sitting in front you know you have to voice you have to look and all that thing but when you're sitting side-by-side with different health care issues that we have sometimes it's very good just to sit here with that person and you're just next to him it makes you feel comfortable and safe and of course once you feel safe then all of a sudden you start to have fun yeah and you know all sudden when you're having fun you know all sudden learning starts to happen yeah and healing too and healing and it's that safety fun and learning and all of a sudden they're learning and they're doing this and they're doing that and they don't realize oh hell I you know I've just ridden 10 miles you know and then a month later they're riding 20 miles a day and they're riding three days a week and all sudden we have health issues start going away you know the blood sugar drops the diabetes drops we got all those different things we're healthier we feel better we're out with the family we're spending more time with family maybe spending more time with friends social all those different things come into play and you know our health care issues hopefully go away a little bit you know it's one of those things where we can keep people out of the VA hospitals not that that's it's not good to be in the hospital but you know it's there if you need it but we'd like you to not need it as much absolutely you know I think in my head I'd I'd much rather you know see us give $5,000 for a bicycle than spend $10,000 on an ER visit you know you know it's just that much better healthier and it just makes for a better community and a better you know that's what we need to do absolutely and so let's talk a little more about that healing aspect what do you see when you see veterans get in the bike and maybe they're a little bit anxious or unsure and then they go out on the trail and I mean what's that like to see that transformation well you know it's you see the smiles and you see the feeling and you see people come back to you year later or maybe the next event hey you know what I've been riding and all of a sudden you're like wow you look really good you know no seriously it's like you look good and you're doing this and oh you know I figured out that I could ride but you know what it did I also figured out that if I can do that I can go and play this I could maybe I can play golf and walk the course maybe I can play handball maybe I can do more bachi maybe you know those Bowl it's they can get out and do different things because all of a sudden it's like well if I can do that then I can do this and it just it's kind of that snowball effect did it just start the world absolute yeah oh maybe I will go try water skiing maybe I will try skiing maybe I will go out on a fishing tournament yeah yeah maybe I'll start to do those things maybe I will rock climb because those guys made it so easy maybe we'll go kayaking and instead of in a tandem kayak I can go in a single kayak yeah right maybe I can fish in my kayak and so it's just snowballs and that's that's what we see the smiles are great the laughter is great just that exuberance of you know oh my goodness I can do this yeah so much fun yeah you know I'm sure we see it at the golf course we see it here we see it just about everywhere and everything that we do and it's it's it is just fabulous excellent I can't get used to it for us we we kind of see it every day but we see it every day and we just it's just that infectious for us to get more people out of doing things and to spread that wealth of knowledge and get it everybody else it never gets old it never gets old absolutely awesome well Chris thank you so much for your time and for explaining a little bit more about adaptive adventures and you can check that out at adaptiveaventures.org and make sure you're checking all the social media for the Department of Veterans Affairs which we co-present this event with the golf clinic every year we could not do it without them great partnership and also make sure you're checking veteransgolfclinic.org for all the coverage we have thanks a lot