The Best Outdoor Summer Activities You Didn't Know Were Approved

Summer activity guides are everywhere. Hike this trail. Take this road trip. Host this party. Very helpful. Very normal. But if you came to the Mountain Dew® universe for normality, someone lied to you about what we do here.

Naturally, our recommendations for outdoor summer activities are… spectacularly (im)practical. To sweeten the deal, we’ve even suggested a Mountain Dew flavor for the optimal summer experience. Use it however you see fit. We believe in you.

Here's the situation: it is hot outside. You are hot. A full-size pool is logistically complicated. The solution, as with many things, is Mountain Dew. Open a cold bottle of Mountain Dew Original and put the cap on an even surface. Now listen carefully. Fill that cap slowly with your beloved citrus soda until it’s just about to overflow. And voila, you’ve successfully engineered a wading pool for your tongue. Cooling. Refreshing. It's the drink-to-pool pipeline you didn't know existed that requires zero inflation or child supervision. Also, the HOA has no reason to get involved.


Watch The Wading Pool Tutorial

There is a lake out there, somewhere, that is the exact color of Mountain Dew. You have probably seen it before – the internet has, and the internet doesn't forget. It's green. It's vivid. It's giving something between "serene afternoon" and "suspiciously beautiful". Finding it counts as a legitimate outdoor summer activity with real cultural merit. We can't tell you exactly where it is. That's the experience. Pack a cooler with Mountain Dew® Baja Blast® — appropriately aquatic, appropriately bold — and start looking. Tag us on social with #DewPond when you find it.


How To Find The Dew Pond: Hint

Standard pool floaties are fine. Store-bought floaties, however, lack personality. This summer, you could spend an afternoon crafting your own, using whatever materials the garage and the internet say are acceptable for this type of project. The point isn't the floatie. The point is the commitment. The point is that you're a person who would do this. Pair with Mountain Dew Voltage® — raspberry citrus flavor, electric blue, the obvious choice for someone who has decided today is a DIY day. Better yet, make it a competition. Bring the plans out of the group chat and see who’s floatie floats best, all while you sip on Electric Lemonade poolside.


How To Build A Dew Floatie

Not the coffee. Not the cleanliness of the facilities, though that matters for obvious summer road trip reasons. The only metric here is the Mountain Dew flavors situation: how many, how cold, which flavors are in the fountain vs. which ones are bottled, and whether Original is front-facing. Bonus points if the snack wall has something worth grabbing alongside it. A gas station with a full Mountain Dew cooler and a working fountain is a five-star establishment. One with a single warm 20oz and nothing else is a tragedy you should tell people about. This is a legitimate quality-of-life summer engagement — and by the end of the season you’ll have developed opinions that are completely non-transferable to anyone who doesn't also do this. You’ll also have a practical map of the best places to grab Mountain Dew near you so… you’re welcome.

Baja California is a real place in Mexico. So is Sparks, Nevada. Voltage, Virginia is not — we checked — but the point stands that the Mountain Dew flavor lineup reads like a geography lesson that got really into citrus. Pick a destination this summer purely because the name has the same energy as your favorite drink. White Lake. Blue Ridge. Something with "storm" or "blast" or "flash" in it. You don't need a better reason than that. The drive counts as an outdoor summer activity and you can bring whatever's in the cooler. This is Mountain Dew culture at its most geographically committed.

Summer is short and the window is open. Do the Dew. Figure out which one of these summer activities you're doing first.