Hi! Our name's are Liselle Pires and Quena Batres and we're excited you're here!

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We live in Seattle, but spend as much time as we can exploring the mountains, towns, and coastlines everywhere beyond our city limits. We met doing a backpacking loop around Loowit (Mt St Helens), and immediately connected over our love for outdoor sports, as well as the melanin in our skin that has a funny tendency to make our experiences in the outdoors a little different.

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We're Indian and Guatemalan-American first generation women, respectively. In our collective experience, picking up adventure sports without a mentor is tough as hell, being in groups or teams where we're the only woman of color is common and often isolating, and there are centuries of racist, financial, educational, social and cultural barriers that continue to make it challenging for women of color to get outside and adventure.

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We believe we can play a role in changing that and sharing the places that have changed our lives. Becoming novices and becoming experts, learning in safe spaces where we can all nod our heads, accessing gear that has always felt like 'a little too much', building deep mentorship relationships, and showing up to show one another what we can do, and the joy we can all share. That's the goal.

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As of 2023, Trail Mixed Collective is a fiscally sponsored project of Community Initiatives.