Mountain festivals, be they music- or athletics-oriented, tend to have the same vibe: twangy pickers soundtracking a peak-bordered cohort of grizzly “outdoorsy” types, IPAs in hand, recounting the daring near-miss of their most recent paddle or pedal or point-to-point ski tour. I’ve lived in Colorado all my life, and have experienced enough of these spectacles to know that there’s no need to travel across the state when the bluegrass bash in my town is going to offer the same atmosphere — and leave the same mess behind. The GoPro Mountain Games are different. The annual four-day festival and competition in the Vail Valley breaks the mold on both counts, with a standard for inclusivity and environmentalism that makes it genuinely worth the trip.
Vail’s GoPro Mountain Games Turn Outdoor Adventure Into a Family-Friendly Celebration
What the GoPro Mountain Games does differently
Photo: Logan Robertson / Vail Valley Foundation
The Mountain Games began in 2002 as the evolution of an annual Memorial Day whitewater kayak race outside Vail. The event now also includes climbing, mountain biking, trail running, and canine competitions. Disc golf, slacklining, and yoga round out the offerings, alongside live music and food trucks at the base of Vail ski resort.
I attended this year with my four-year-old daughter, unsure whether she’d feel out of place. She didn’t. The event was full of families, dogs, and people of all stripes — athletes and spectators sharing tables at Avanti F&B in Vail Village, kids’ paddleboarding and kayaking, market-style vendors lining the village. The vibe was relentlessly approachable, free of gatekeeping even for a solo dad with a young kiddo, neither of us competing in anything.
At the hotel Saturday evening, my daughter made friends with a couple of other girls at the pool. One of their dads was there to run a trail race — not as a pro, he told me, but as a way to stay motivated and connected to the scene. Most competitors, he said, are “just people willing to pay the $75 entry fee.” His family makes the trip to Vail every year because the atmosphere is inclusive and they always have a good time.
The non-profit aspect of the games intends to have a positive impact on the community and on the environment. 30 shelter dogs were adopted during this year’s games.
GoPro Mountain Games sets a new standard for large event sustainability
Photo: Vail Valley Foundation
The Mountain Games draws nearly 100,000 people to Vail over four days, a logistical and environmental challenge of the first order for a mountain town whose residents have been vocal about conservation issues, from development pressures to a rising cost of living. What sets the Games apart from comparable events is its genuine commitment to minimizing that impact.
Vail Valley Foundation‘s Peggy Wolfe, Senior Director of Operations and the driving force behind the event, insists sustainability isn’t just a talking point here, and the organization has the numbers to back that up. The “Protect Our Playgrounds” initiative, launched in 2022, drove the event to a record 91% waste diversion rate in 2024, keeping the vast majority of its trash out of local landfills and redirecting it to compost, recycling, and reduction.
Two strategies have driven those results. First, Walking Mountains Science Center staff hand-sort every bag of trash from the event, ensuring maximum diversion at the source. The second is what Wolfe calls “precycling,” the process of working with partners to eliminate waste before it ever arrives on-site. Nature Valley, one of the larger food servicers at the games, removes all cardboard and paperboard packaging from its products before the event, bringing only individually wrapped bars to Vail, resulting in zero packaging waste from some 75,000 bars. Across the event, all vendor samples must be compostable and single-serve plastics have been eliminated at every bar and food truck.
“Keeping organic materials out of our landfills reduces the production of methane gas,” Harry Jasper, who runs the Foundation’s Aventon Green Team, told me, “and the compost is recycled and reused locally, which minimizes transportation of the material.”
Wolfe is proud of the numbers but aware that there’s still progress to be made. “The most important thing is that we just keep moving in the right direction,” she says.
Educating the next generation of mountain activists
The Kids Kayak & SUP Pool gets young attendees involved in the action. Photo: Vail Valley Foundation
That direction runs through education as much as operations. Most people want to do the right thing, Wolfe argues, but confusing recycling rules get in the way. Zero Hero tent stations, run in partnership with Walking Mountains, are staffed by Aventon Green Team volunteers who help attendees sort their waste on the spot.
Water gets its own focus. The Gore Creek runs through the heart of the competition venues, and in its early years Protect Our Playgrounds centered specifically on the valley’s most vital resource, with efforts including invasive species education and promoting reef-friendly sunscreen to protect the creek’s ecosystem.
Beyond mitigation, the initiative demands active restoration. The annual Day of Service sends staff, athletes, and volunteers back to the specific sites used during competition. “We’ve done everything from river cleanups to restoration projects where we’re planting native plants, trees, and shrubs along the river banks to protect the ecosystems,” Wolfe says. “Sustainability is in every aspect of what we do. There isn’t anything in our planning or the execution of the event that doesn’t have sustainability as at least a thought in the process.”
That’s a standard most mountain festivals don’t come close to meeting — and a reason, beyond the events themselves, to make the trip.
How to plan a trip to the GoPro Mountain Games
The Short Dog Race is among the most popular events, for obvious reasons. Photo: Vail Valley Foundation
The GoPro Mountain Games take place over four days each June. The event and its competitions are free to attend. Most activities take place in Vail Village, centered around a large plaza at the ski resort’s base where the live music, food trucks, and water stations are located. Running, climbing, and biking events take place on and around the ski resort, while on-water activities happen in Vail as well as nearby Minturn, as well as Glenwood Springs and the tiny town of Bond. The kids’ kayak and SUP pool is located at Golden Peak, near the base of the ski area.
I managed to book a last-minute hotel room for under $200 at the TownPlace Suites Avon Vail Valley, just outside Vail Village and reachable by the local (and free) bus service or Uber. Hotels and Airbnbs in Vail Village proper will cost you more, and accommodations are likely to be booked out in advance. We arrived in Vail from our home in Palisade via Bustang, Colorado’s inter-city bus service, which runs a line between Denver and Grand Junction that includes a stop at the Vail Transportation Center right near the event. This method of travel saves the hassle and cost of parking in and around Vail, in addition to reducing the environmental impact of our own travel.
You can attend as little as one day or all four days of the games, and come and go as you please. Restaurants and nightlife abound in Vail, so there’s no shortage of things to do outside the event itself. Kids and dogs are welcome and abundant. This year’s event featured a nighttime drone light show on Saturday night. Well-known bands perform throughout the event at The Amp, Vail’s outdoor amphitheatre. Of course, bring your own water bottle and refill it at the provided water stations onsite. 