Why outdoor adventures can – and should – be for anyone | Canada Voices

Terry Hoddinott has always been adventurous. Since he was a little boy, the London, Ontario-based athlete has been drawn to thrill-seeking experiences: wrestling throughout high school, power lifting, biking across Canada for Cancer in 2009, and more recently representing the country on a global stage as a rock climber.

Another thing to know about Hoddinott: the now 63-year-old has been completely blind since he was three years old.

He picked up rock climbing just under a decade ago alongside his wife, Patti, taking a similar “no fear” approach to his previous forays into adventure sports. “It wasn’t so much hesitation as querying, how can I do this?” Hoddinott says. “Not, can I do it? It’s always, how is this going to be made possible?”

As it turns out, getting started in the climbing gym was pretty straightforward. He just needed a rope to hold him and someone to call out where the next hold was. (In Hoddinott’s case, Patti is his sight guide.) From there, it didn’t take long for him to head outside.”

“Once I started climbing on outdoor rock, I found out that, ‘Hey, this is even better,’” Hoddinott says. “I don’t have to stick to specific coloured holds. So that was an eye-opener, so to speak. It was like: I’m good at this. I can find anything on the face of this cliff and it’s fair game for a climber.”

Now, the couple looks for a similar thrill when they’re travelling, whether it’s climbing on mountains and crags across Canada and Austria, zip-lining in the forests of Costa Rica or exploring the cenotes in Mexico.

There has been a rise in Canadians looking for different kinds of adventure travel opportunities, and a corresponding increase in demand for accessible options. In fact, according to a 2025 Flight Centre survey, 42 per cent of Canadians say accessibility is of high importance when planning their next vacation.

For Kate Stewart, who has been executive director of the Canadian Adaptive Climbing Society since 2017, the increase in people looking to engage in accessible adventures makes sense.

“In this space, everybody’s excited to learn more and share,” she says. “I think a lot of it is, ‘This person [is] in my life; I want to share this with them.’”

Adventure tourism companies across the country are taking note. In Canmore, Alberta, Rocky Mountain Adaptive offers lessons and supported experiences in skiing and snowboarding. For those who prefer warm-weather adventures, the company also offers adaptive hiking and biking during the summer months.

For travellers seeking a longer and more immersive experience, Kelowna-based Adaptive Adventures plans days-long adaptive wilderness expeditions that include everything from hunting and fishing to kayaking and rafting. Elsewhere in British Columbia, the well-traversed Whistler Mountain also provides adaptive sports programming and activities so that everyone can enjoy the mountain.

For Stewart, accessibility in adventure sports is really about working with each athlete to figure out the best accommodations. “This is their life. This is how they live,” she says. “Especially if they’re excited about this adventure, they may have looked at different organizations throughout the world or Canada that are doing similar things and they’re coming armed with ideas as well.”

From there, it’s really about problem solving – and not being nervous about exactly how you’ll accommodate or adapt.

“It doesn’t always look exactly the same,” she notes. “Sometimes we have climbers come out on their first day, [and] finding the harness that works for them is the success. If you’re rafting, getting into the raft and floating around in flat water is what the first day looks like, and then maybe you build up to a more typical rafting experience.”

Hoddinott agrees. “Most of the time, accessibility and adaptability is a matter of finding a way to make it accessible,” he says. “It’s really a matter of talking.”