Wait...What? It's Wednesday?

   

Campers woke up this morning in the groove and ready to  roll with the schedule of events.  The temperatures are supposed to be in the upper 90"s today and conselors are making sure everyone has a water bottle and stays hydrated during the day (so that also means lots of bathroom breaks built into the day's events.

  After geetting up and doing cabin chores our campers headed to breakfast where they enjoyed french toast, sausage, and the fresh fruit bar.  There is nothing like starting the day with fuel to make sure you get through all the adventures that lay ahead.

  After flag raising our campers headed out on their great adventures.  For our younger campers (head, heart, hands and health) they went for traditional activities this morning and headed out to the pool (got to love to play in the water), archery, canoeing, and fishing (and yes the fish were biting).  Our older youth (Earth and Sun groups) headed up to the High Ropes course while hte adventures headed to the rock wall for climbing fun and our Trekkers headed off site to Hanging Rock Park for the adventure of a lifetime.

  Our Trekkers are our older youth and they usually travel to pilot mountain and canoe.  This year they headed straight for Hanging Rock Park and will be hiking to waterfalls, getting a chance to play in the falls and then heading over to the spot where they will pitch their tents and make dinner.  Tomorrow they will get to climb up the rocks and just enjoy nature at it's finest before returning to camp on Thursday, probably sometime around camp store.

 After a morning of fun adventures our campers headed to lunch.  There they enjoyed "Better than Chick-fil-A" chicken sandwiches, potato wedges, and a chance to make their own salad.  Talking with our incredible kitchen staff today we confirmed our hungry campers are eating up a storm, and seem to be enjoying every meal.  You would be surprised how much some of our campers can eat. 

After lunch it was time to hit the road and get back to the work of having fun.  Campers got to stomp thru the creek, get sweaty in the Ga-Ga pit, and jump in the pool and even the lake (dont worry they have on life vests) in the lake.  There is nothing like the fun of camp activites to work up a sweat and hunger.

  Youth got their afternoon snack at camp store.  I don't know if they like camp store because they are purchasing litterally cool treats (ice cream and sodas being options), or if it is becuase of the free time after.  No matter what it is they enjoy camp store and we can hear the buzz through the crowd as they talk about the dance on Thursday night and hurry to learn all the line dances they can in time. 

After activities it is time to eat, again.  Tonight's dinner is a favorite with almost all youth, spaghetti and meatballs.  Let's not forget the breadsticks and for dessert tonight, vanilla cake with frosting,  How much fun is that?  While our youth are at meals they have responsibilities.  Each meal a different group is assigned to be the table waiters and table cleaners.  What that means is that the table waiters come in a few minutes early and set the table, then they are responsible for getting the food, making sure the table gets more if they need it.  The table cleaners follow the procedures for getting the items from teh table to the kitchen to be washed.  It is quite the production and it helps streamline for more than 150 youth being up and trying to do this all at once.  Kind of like a chaos control for these positions.

  Our Trekkers aren't the only ones out there having a good time.  Our Adventurers were at camp but living at Outpost making their own Hobo Packs for dinner over an open camp fire.  Hobo packs are small foil packets filled with things like meat, diced veggies, etc.  Each camper can make it like they want theirs and I can attest they  had to be good becuase they devoured them.  Maybe something our campers could make at home, if someone might let them build a campfire at home?   

After our meals everyone got ready for the talk of the camp, our evening activity, the much awaited talent show!  Please note talent is not necessary to be part of this show.  Acts ranged from stick twirling to comedy routines, dancing, singing, artistic drawing and more.  The best part is that the entire camp cheered for every act and every child who was brave enough to take the chance to get on the stage felt like the biggest star as they left the stage.  For me one of the highlights was seeing one of my 4-H Alums and current Adventurer Conselor, Andy, get on stage twice.  The first time with his campers singing as a group and the second time with a co-worker singing a duet.  At the end he gave the youth an motivational speech on challenging themselves and being winners everytime they try something new, even if it isn't for them, at least they try.  As he put it you never know when that spark will hit and for him it all started on the stage at BJP when he was a camper.

  After a rousing talent show the excitement was palpable as our campers headed back to their cabins (or to the outpost tents for the Adventurers) and showered before heading off to bed.  It is hard to believe that we just have one full day left before heading home.  To check out all the fun from Wednesday please click this link.  Stay tuned for more fun adventures.

PS-One quick note.  We realize our post for Wednesday will be late and we apologize.  All of us were reminded last night that internet is a luxury at camp.  About three pm there was a system outage for the provider that effected thousands of folks, including the camp.  It camp back online during the night.  We are excited about being reconnect and please note that it was not lack of want to post on our media sites but lack of availability of connection that meant we couldn't.  Best part?  The campers had no idea becuase they are engaged with each other and aren't on devices at camp.