Activity ideas for the summer nights

During the summer months, the nights are lighter for longer which creates a different more pleasant ambience to the day.  With that in mind, what things can we do to add some fun physical activities into the summer evenings?

Lots of clubs such as tennis, badminton and bowls will have the option to book a court or a game in the evening. Why not opt for this as a way of keeping active and enjoying a social evening with a friend, or to meet some new people?

Signing up to a sport can be a great way of keeping you motivated, it can be more fun than being active alone and the focus is less on what you’re doing and more about the taking part. If you enjoyed a sport in the past, and are thinking about taking it up again, there couldn’t be a better time than right now. The lighter evenings tend to make us feel as if there is more time in the day and by building something into your routine now it will be easier to maintain in the darker winter months. If you are working around any injuries or mobility problems there are adaptive versions of sports available such as walking football, or perhaps give our chair-based routine a go via the link here.

If sports aren’t for you, consider doing some of these activities after you have had your evening meal. That way you can benefit from using up some of that circulating blood glucose which can be beneficial for your general health.

• With friends or family sit around a campfire and play duck duck goose, or each person tells a short story and once complete must briskly walk or jog around the circle and return to their spot and keep going

• Try out some glow stick activities. As it starts to get dark use glow sticks to play with, you can create hoops and play glow in the dark ring toss, or have a glow stick disco

• Go out on a night trail walk with torches and watch the sun go down

• Try a ‘flip a coin’ walk, at each junction flip a coin to decide which path to follow, heads turn left, or tails turn right and see where the coin takes you

• Visit your sports centre/gym in the evening, there is a very different atmosphere in the evenings where most gyms tend to be much quieter and calmer with potentially some classes on such as yoga.

One of the most beautiful things about the seasons, is how the landscape around us changes. When thinking about moving more it needn’t be about gyms, long walks, or sports if that’s not for you. You could try changing up your evening commute and walking part of the journey home.

Simply pottering in the garden for half an hour rather than sitting inside will get the body moving and allow you some peace to relax at the end of the day. You might even catch a beautiful sunset along the way.

Make the most of these lighter and warmer nights, it helps to energise you in preparation for the autumn. Tell us in the comments how you will make the most of the lighter evenings?