Durham Parks and Recreation: Play More!

Did you know that July is Parks and Recreation Month!? In Durham, you can celebrate with us by participating in our Fun Caravan, which will be visiting parks all over the city. Fun Caravan is a mobile recreation program that brings recreation to communities throughout Durham by providing a variety of fun, active, and challenging recreation experiences for children up to 12 years old. The program offers a variety of unstructured activities from arts and crafts to obstacle courses to more traditional games like relay races. All children must be accompanied by an adult. Weather permitting, there will be five Fun Caravans this July- one every Wednesday morning! Unstructured play is critical for the healthy development of children. At Fun Caravan, we provide arts and crafts supplies and outdoor resources for games, and then encourage children and their parents to play freely! Allow your child to lead and create the games. When children are given the time and space to play liberally, the...

School is out and summer boredom will soon kick in...but we've got your teens covered with a full schedule of activities to keep them active and engaged! MyDurham is a free evening program held during the school year for teens 13 to 18 years old at six of our local recreation centers every Monday through Friday from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. This year, we're excited to announce the program is expanding into the summer months, with more free offerings for teens while they are out of school! Swing by Weaver Street Recreation Center (3000 East Weaver Street) or the Durham Teen Center at Lyon Park (1101 Cornell Street), for free drop-in programming starting at 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday through Friday. Teens must have an active 2019-2020 MyDurham membership, which is free to all teens, and can be obtained upon their first visit to the program. Activities will include gardening, video game tournaments, indoor hockey, arts and crafts, job readiness, and best of all, three off-campus fiel...

Durham Parks and Recreation’s Outdoor Recreation Unit invites you to spend some time in nature with us at the new Environmental Education Pavilion at West Point on the Eno. Last summer, the North Carolina State University School of Design’s Summer Design Studio designed and built a beautiful pavilion overlooking a sprawling meadow on the north side of West Point on the Eno Park. The project, funded by Durham Parks Foundation and various other supporters, was completed in ten short weeks during the heat of the summer and gave us a perfect place to present nature-based programming and to invite our community to explore the outdoors. Prior to the completion of the Environmental Education Pavilion, the Durham Parks and Recreation Outdoor Recreation unit did not have a specific programming area. Programs were led at many of the beautiful parks around the city but there was not a location to have a home base. Beginning in the Fall of 2018, upon the completion of the new pavilion, we were...

By: Danielle Haynes, Care Programs Administrator The smell of sun screen, children laughing in the back ground, Kidz Bop rhythms playing in the background mixed with sunny hot days is what awaits us! Durham Parks and Recreation offers 13 summer camps in total, all providing a different variation of activities and fun. Have you ever had the summer camp experience? Lifelong memories and friendships are built alongside the construction of plastic lanyards that takes all summer to truly master the top knot- but there are a few who will be determined to master this skill. There are games of imagination with play fire trucks, doll houses, board games, play kitchens and restaurant menus created with food items that we can only wish existed in real life. What about that favorite camp counselor? Nothing tops the feeling of seeing your favorite camp counselor walk through the door. There is a sense of excitement and security that rushes over participants. How do I know? I once was th...

In just a few weeks, Durham has the honor of hosting the 2019 USTA NC 40 & Over State Championships from Thursday, June 27 to Sunday, June 30. In May 2018, Durham submitted a bid to host the 2019 & 2020 championship and won! Previously this championship had been hosted in Winston Salem. Learn more about the USTA NC by visiting their website . With the tournament being played at several venues across the city, Durham Parks and Recreation facilities including Elmira Avenue Park, Morreene Road Park, Rock Quarry Park, Southern Boundaries Park and Whipporwill Park are set to host a good portion of the games. This tournament is expected to bring in approximately 1,200 players from across the state to compete and will require over 100 volunteers locally to host the event. In order to be eligible for participation, all players are current USTA members and have competed across the state in their local are for the opportunity to advance to the championship. For more information...

Every day, millions of people are celebrating birthdays and turning another year older! Whether you’re turning five or fifty years old, what better way to celebrate than to have a party with all of your close friends and family! And we have the perfect location for your party...our Durham parks!  Did you know that several of our parks and facilities are available to rent for your next event, family gathering, concert or birthday party? Make this year special and check out all of the rental options that we have to offer! Here are some tips to planning the perfect party… Choose a Theme Let’s decide what kind of birthday you’re trying to plan!? Are you going for a sports enthusiast party, summer water fun party, a quinceañera or a sweet 16 party? Your party theme will help determine which location you should rent based on what activities you want to have, how many people you are inviting and how long you are wanting to host the party. We can even accommodate those looking fo...

Can you believe summer is almost here!? This year has flown by...but we couldn't be more excited for all the fun things happening in Durham over the next few months. If you're making a list of things to do this summer, definitely add swinging by one of Durham's beautiful parks for an evening of music or movies at the Rock the Park Concert & Movie Series. And we couldn't be more excited to announce that Pulse FM is the Series Event Sponsor this summer. You'll be able to sit back, relax and enjoy family and friends while grooving to music or watching a movie on a big screen. Both activities are free and open to the public. There will be some food vendors will be on site and food will be available for purchase. We encourage bringing blankets and lawn chairs along but remember, no alcohol or smoking is allowed. If there is inclement weather in the forecast, our priority is keeping everyone safe! Before leaving for a concert or movie, call the Special Events weat...

By: Cynthia Booth, Public Affairs Specialist This year, Durham’s National Award Winning Bimbé Cultural Arts Festival will turn 50 years old. That’s right it’s 50 or as the younger generation would say, fiddy! Now I am going to go out on a limb and divulge a secret. Are you listening? Zoom in real close. Two years ago I turned 50 and it was a big deal. I mean huge! I had a big party and invited all of my friends. Well Bimbé is no different. We are hosting the biggest Bimbé Cultural Arts Festival celebration ever and all of you are invited to attend. Before I talk about the celebration, let me give you a little history about how Bimbé got started. I am not a gambling person, but I bet you know that Bimbé was created in 1969 by students from Duke University and North Carolina Central University. Yup. It was started towards the end of the Civil Rights era and there was a lot of racial tension in Durham. You see Duke did not enroll their first African American undergraduate students...