The public is invited to a traditional family-oriented Christmas-tree cutting and posada celebration on Dec. 3.
A posada is a traditional Mexican party that occurs before Christmas and usually includes music, tamales and gathering with friends and neighbors. Three years ago, Wilderness Workshop, Defiende Nuestra Tierra and the U.S. Forest Service paired the tradition with Christmas-tree cutting in the Roaring Fork Valley, and they will partner again this year to recreate the celebration.
“A posada is a perfect way in the outdoors to connect the Latino community with this tradition that we do,” said Omar Sarabia, director of Defiende Nuestra Tierra. “On the other hand, we can cut Christmas trees — that’s one of the best memories that I have from when I was a kid. We want that chance for our Latino families to connect with our forest.”
Staff members from Wilderness Workshop and the Forest Service will be at the event to give out free Christmas tree-cutting permits and information about where and how to cut down trees. The event will be bilingual, and there will also be tamales and hot champurrado — a Mexican hot chocolate beverage made with corn and cinnamon. Smokey Bear will also be in attendance to teach families the best ways to pick out and care for a Christmas tree.
While the event is open to the whole community, Wilderness Workshop Communications Director Grant Stevens said that it’s a way to introduce individuals who may be new to the area to the opportunities that are available to them in the outdoors.
“For a lot of our Spanish-speaking community and people who just moved here, public lands are a new concept,” he said. “We’re so fortunate to live around these public lands, and people don’t realize they can go out and do things like cut Christmas trees. That’s part of why this is so great.”
Sarabia added that only a small percentage of the local Latino community takes advantage of the nearby forests, and Wilderness Workshop and Defiende Nuestra Tierra are hoping to increase their connections to public lands.
The event has also grown in popularity since its beginning. Last year, Sarabia said that 36 permits were given out, and given that each permit went to a family of four or five people, around 150 people attended last year’s celebration. Sarabia is planning to double the number of tamales this year. The celebration was a success last year, Sarabia added, and having bilingual information as well as all the ingredients of a posada only raised spirits further.
“It’s been becoming a tradition for our community to have Smokey the Bear, good food and the Forest Service is going to provide information in Spanish as well — it’s key to have information in your own language,” Sarabia said. “Once you’re having fun with your family and eating, it’s even more fun.”
Stevens acknowledged the long partnerships that Wilderness Workshop has had with the Forest Service and with Defiende Nuestra Tierra, adding that Sarabia’s events are always fun for the whole family. Both Stevens and Sarabia said they are expecting this year’s celebration to be a success.
“It’s a great event for families and we try to connect this tradition for the whole community,” Sarabia said.
The event will take place at the Babbish Gulch trailhead outside Glenwood Springs from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Dec. 3. Event organizers are asking those interested in attending to RSVP so they can plan to have plenty of tamales, permits and beverages. Registration can be done on Facebook or online on Wilderness Workshop’s website.
