Camp 2008! Part 4 - the Ranch

The Ranch...

This is where I've spent 3 of 4 weeks so far this summer. I LOVE it there. I've had 2 weeks of trailblazers (children 9-12) and one of pioneers (12 and up). 

I'll take you through a typical week out at the ranch. 

Monday: morning staff meeting and preparations for the week, leaving the "valley" around 11:15 am to drive 45 minutes to our meeting place in honeycoulee. We meet the kids at 1 pm and start our 2 hour hike into camp, including a creek crossing to start off with. Now, this is no easy hike. It's up and down some very large hills, and some of the kids are not in the greatest shape. Our hike can take quite a long time if the kids are unmotivated. I'm constantly fielding "are we there yet?" questions, and yet the kids learn that they really can do it, and have a sense of accomplishment at the end I hope! I certainly enjoy the hike!

We cook our dinner in cook groups over an open fire, then saddle up our horses for our first ride of the week. Finally we have campfire and bedtime! Mondays sometimes get a little late because there's a lot to do the first day!

Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday: Staff meeting at 7:45, devotion time for 30 minutes, and then kids wake up at 8:30 and start cooking breakfast at 8:45. After breakfast, usually around 10:30, we have chapel, and then saddle up and ride out for our daily ride. Our rides range from 45 minutes to more than 2 hours one way depending on the experience level of the kids. We have lunch and games on the trail and are usually not back from the ride until 4 pm or later. Then it's games, supper, games, quest, campfire and bedtime all over again. 

Quest is a discussion time for smaller groups of kids and staff to talk about what the kids are learning for the week and any questions they have about God, etc. I love it, and really enjoy the questions that come up! Kids are really deep thinkers!

Our skit at campfire is always a big hit. This year it's about a fumbling superhero (kind of like inspector gadget) who eventually learns to show mercy along with enforcing justice. This year I've started video taping it, because I know I'll watch it years down the road and laugh my head off at our ridiculous skits! I wish I had video footage from past years because they are now just a fading memory! Sad.

Thursday: Thursday is our day of rest for the horses, where we have a competition between cook groups all day. This usually starts with a pancake breakfast cook-off, and continues after chapel with all manners of games. We do crazy cheers with costumes, skits, song and dance to get into the spirit of the day. We do relays, wide games, tug of wars, bucking barrel, horse dress up, scavenger hunts, etc. The end of the competition is usually the boot race. This is a relay where the kids take off their shoes at one end of the corral, and then starting at the opposite end, they have to ride a horse bareback, find their shoes and put them on, and then ride back. Don't worry, the staff leads them and helps them up and down, and it's always a lot of fun and excitement! All of the teams get a candy loaded prize of some sort, and we often have kids on quite a sugar high just before bed. Sigh. 

The other thing we do on rodeo day if the weather is nice, is slip and slide. I forgot to mention that we don't have a shower at the ranch, so we all smell pretty bad by the end of the week! This is our chance to suds up with dish soap and creek water on the slip and slide and get as clean as possible! I get going pretty fast, and last week I slide 5 feet off the slide on my bum and got some nasty cuts from the grass on my legs! Oh well, my entire body is sore, full of cuts and bruises, but I'm loving it and playing hard out at camp!

Saturday: Cleanup, chapel, group pictures and then the start of the hike out, which is more downhill thank goodness! We meet the parents at noon in honeycoulee, and say our goodbyes, then leave for the valley to shower, wash clothes and enjoy our short, but awesome weekends!

So, that's a week at the Ranch. I could talk about experiences and fun times for a lot longer, but my fingers are getting tired. I wish you all could experience this wonderful place for yourselves!

Camp 2008! Part 3 - family time!

I've had a great time with family as well as friends this summer. My Auntie Carolyn and Uncle Chris came down to Robin and Doug's in early July, and we had a great time enjoying each others company, some wonderful food, and a bit of hiking in the hills. We hiked up to Cougar Ridge, which has a really great view of the mountains across the valley. It is called Cougar Ridge because there was a cougar found there once. We've seen a couple cougars around both camps. That's pretty scary because cougars actually will stock humans. I don't even want to think about it when I have to walk in the dark to the outhouse at night. It's especially scary when there's no moon and the night is pitch black! One consolation is looking up at the incredibly bright stars, and reminding myself that I have a relationship with the Creator of the entire universe, and my life is in His hands. I am learning to trust Him more each day.

So our family times have been great. I love it that Bjorn is my cousin now. I keep deliberately calling him my cousin just to remind myself how true it is! Bjorn and Al are such a wonderful couple. Thank you God for the precious gift of family in my life! We always have such a great time together!

Camp 2008! Part 2 - staff

Just a few more pictures to post of the amazing staff I work with! I feel so blessed by them so often!

Camp 2008! Part 1 - end of June

It's been a long time since I've updated this page, and a lot has happened! Mid-June I started JST (joing staff training), a time of preparation for the summer. It was a great week full of preparing what we would be teaching the kids during the summer, and doing many crazy activities. In some ways it was like being a camper at a week of camp for me. It's been quite a few years since I went to a week of camp, so I really enjoyed it. 

The biggest highlight of the week was spending time with my good friends on staff with me at Wilderness Ranch. Also, I enjoyed the toilet bowl olympics. Okay, so this is how toilet bowl olympics work: there are 4 different camps involved in JST, and we have this toilet bowl that is hidden each year in a different place in the camp that hosts JST that year. Last year, Wilderness hosted JST, and the toilet bowl was hidden on our property. We found it, and hid it this year at Hastings Lake Bible camp where JST was held. Throughout the week of JST, each camp gets to make up a crazy activity that we have to compete in each day. This year we had some interesting activities. First and most disgusting of all was a relay involving dunking your head in a rubbermaid full of lukewarm oatmeal and mashed potatoes to search for bouncy balls. Yuck! After everyone found one, we as a team had to consume a large can of Spam or a can of artichoke hearts. The pictures speak for themselves. I honestly felt a little sick after that one. 

Wilderness Ranch's competition was also quite memorable. It was a fire-building competition. The catch was, there were only 2 axes and 2 knives for 4 teams. So we had to compete for the axes and knives by snot-putting marshmallows into each other's mouths, and dropping grapes into each other's mouths from our buttocks. Sounds crazy?? It was! 

Altogether it was an awesome week. 

The end of June, we had a work week at Wilderness to prepare our facilities for the onslaught of kids that would inevitably start coming the first week of July.