What is ShoeFly?
Hello Adventurers! My name is Courtney Shoemaker, and I am the Founder of ShoeFly Adventure. I wanted to start our blog giving you all a little background about ShoeFly (more available on our About Page), and how it came to be by answering the most common questions I get asked as ShoeFly begins to take flight.
What is ShoeFly Adventure?
ShoeFly is a travel & fitness company that curates one-of-a-kind events and adventures designed to help you live your best life.
We lead yoga, fitness, and even fundraisers catered to you and your company or group of friends to leave you feeling accomplished and energized. These can be in person or virtual.
We also put together travel adventures for small groups to help you explore a new place with new friends while still staying on track with your fitness goals with included yoga & fitness sessions daily.
What made you want to start ShoeFly?
The short answer: I want to travel more and create amazing adventures to share with folks newer to traveling, or too busy to plan a full adventure.
I had not done much travel when I was younger but was always interested in it. In fact I almost stayed in PA after high school to be a travel agent. However 9/11 had occurred around that time I was deciding what to do after school, which caused a big dip in travel so I decided to opt for business school instead. The irony of that is as I sold my gym to start ShoeFly, COVID-19 basically shut down travel indefinitely 2 days later. So you might say timing has never been my thing. 🤓
After college I moved to Iowa to work at a cereal plant. My only friend in the midwest when I moved west lived in Madison, WI (oh hey Karla!) so I frequently visited Madison to hang with her, and for her birthday one year we all signed up to go skydiving! Weather kept everyone, except Karla, from making a tandem jump that day, so a few months later I went for my first Skydive in Iowa. I was instantly hooked and basically jumped non-stop for the next 2 years.
I then signed up for my first "exotic boogie" with Tsunami Skydivers to go to Belize for a week-long vacation with lots of skydiving over the ocean. It was an incredible experience with 100 fellow skydivers in a beautiful location and reignited my interest & love of travel. Bonus because I got to meet so many incredible people and share a once-in-a-lifetime experience with so many new friends.
Years later I moved to Fargo, opened a business and my travel basically stopped for anything other than a long weekend here and there to visit friends. Life was great, but the adventurer in me was feeling landlocked so I signed up for yet another jump trip, this time to Costa Rica with the same awesome Tsunami crew. During that trip I had breakfast with the organizer (the one & only Rich Grimm) and caught up on all things life, business, and travel. He brought up the idea that a similar format but for small groups, without the skydiving but with all the other kickass elements such as welcome dinners, excursions to nearby secluded islands, and adventures along with healthy food options and fitness classes to keep people on track while having the time of their lives would be a no brainer. And with that breakfast the idea for ShoeFly was born.
Over the years I've gone on these trips we've explored Belize, Mexico, Palau, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and most recently the Maldives, and they among the most amazing, fun, life changing adventures I've been lucky enough to experience. Each time I always leave with new life long friends, some of which I've even traveled across the world with (sup Shea!). I am so grateful and excited to be able to bring a similar special and unique experience to my non-skydiving friends out there.
Are you overdue for an adventure? (After quarantine I think we all are!) Make sure to join our closed Facebook Group to stay up to date with our upcoming Adventure Retreat in Costa Rica in February 2023. We have a few spots left, but they won't last long! So make sure to join the group to learn more about the trip as well as get instructions to sign up or be the first to know of all new adventures with ShoeFly!