Lifestyles

Most people look to their town parks and recreation department to organize sports, run swimming pools and stage July 4 fireworks shows.

There's quite a bit more to eight North Hills departments, which for eight years have banded together to offer group tours and travel.

"It's really just a service to our residents," said Heather Jerry, director of parks and recreation in Marshall, one of the towns in Community Tours. "As a single municipality, we could not fill a bus for anything. By joining together, we are reaching out to about 100,000 more people.

Community Tours is made up of Franklin Park, Marshall, Ohio Township, Richland, Pine, Ross, Cranberry and the North Hills YMCA.

Its trips include everything from one-day jaunts to sporting events or Mountaineer Casino Racetrack and Resort to exotic trips that last several weeks and cost several thousand dollars.

Among Community Tours' offerings are an eight day-trip to London and Paris, an 11-day trip to Croatia, Slovenia and Italy, as well as trips centered around California railroads and the backroads of New England.

In the past, Community Tours has sponsored trips to the South Pacific, Alaska and Beijing.

Not all of the group's tours are geared to those with fat wallets, plenty of time and a taste for exotic locales.

The most popular trip, organized by Ross parks and recreation officials, is the daylong fall leaf Amtrak tour between Pittsburgh and Altoona, which costs about $80 per person.

"Everyone wants to go on that trip. It always fills up," Jerry said.

Jerry's own nautical nature and dinner boat trip in Moraine State Park is another inexpensive, yet popular, tour.

The tours, which are managed by professional travel agencies, were first organized in the North Hills by Jim Watenpool, parks and recreation director in Franklin Park.

"We are trying to offer some travel opportunities to the community," said Watenpool, who said the municipalities involved receive only a minimal amount of money from the tours.

While communities such as Mt. Lebanon and Moon are large enough to organize their own trips, many North Hills towns are generally too small to individually sponsor successful trips, he said.

"We do a number of things together and probably should do more. The movies in the park involves five municipalities that screen summer movies in various parks," Watenpool said.

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