The Week In Review
On Monday, we had our first full rainy day in three years. The rain might have kept us inside, but we didn’t skip a beat. We had a rousing game of all camp bingo, one of the campers favorites. The energy of the staff and campers made it a great day. Since then, though we have had just perfect weather!
Tuesday was our second Cruiser Day. Cruiser Days are some of my favorites days at camp. In many ways, it is like our weekend at North Star. Cruiser Day is a cabin day, which typically falls each Tuesday at camp. It is a break from our normal routine where each cabin plans a full day of games and activities that they will do together. Each Cruiser Day starts with breakfast in bed. We follow that up by changing our sheets and sending out our laundry, and a community pickup, where each cabin takes responsibility for cleaning an area of camp.
From there it is up to each cabin what they will do that day. Some Cruiser Day favorites include tubing, visiting one of the resorts across the lake, scavenger hunts, slip and slides and more. Kim McCormack works hard to make sure each Cruiser Day is filled with special events for the campers. This week she set up a scavenger hunts, cookie baking, and a slip and slide.
The slip and slide is one of the seminal moments of the summer for me. It is living proof of how the energy of our staff fuels our summer. With two sheets of plastic, some shampoo and a hose, our staff can create one wild and crazy day of slipping and sliding.
Each village also has a village cruiser day. The first week was the Junior Village Cruiser Day and our youngest guys spent the day at the water park, mini-golfing, after having their own Hunger Games themed activity at camp. This week our Senior Village campers headed to Wild Mountain water park and enjoyed the beautiful weather.
Each Cruiser Day, every cabin cooks out their dinner over a fire. For the first cookout we made Tinfoil Surprise, a camp favorite. It’s a combination of ground beef, potatoes, carrots, onions and topped with cheese. You wrap it up in Tin Foil, and the outcome is the delicious surprise! Then we finished with my personal favorite dessert, banana boats. This week was hot dogs, and there is nothing as classic as roasting a hot dog over the fire. Dessert was the traditional yet scrumptious S’mores.
The best part of Cruiser Day is getting to see the relationships that have formed within the cabins. These groups really do become close because of the efforts of our staff. Each cabin has their own unique identity and the friendships born out of them are the glue that makes our community such a strong one.
Now we are in the buildup to United Nations Day this Sunday. It is a tradition since camps very first summer, where the whole camp is divided into four nations. This year’s teams are Ireland, Spain, South Africa and Morocco. Tonight’s Friday Night Service was about the importance of being a Global Citizen. We heard from our international staff members about their home countries, and we read, spoke and sang about the importance of embracing the differences between people from all over the world. We are lucky have campers and staff from over a dozen countries here this summer, and we are working to ensure that everyone leaves having learned from camp the importance of being a global citizen.
