Mustache Monday!
June 23, 2014 by Don Gentle
Mustache Monday got me thinking about the wackiness of camp and how a child can thrive on being the person they want to be. One of my favorite parts about summer camp is the ability to recreate yourself. That is especially true at High Rocks. We favor our small size and resist every temptation to get bigger. Most all our peers have a fraction of the space and more than twice the enrollment. Our cabins have no more than two boys from the same city, making it ever more possible to leave all the clicks, chaos, and outside world far away. There are few communities more accepting of being who you want to be than Camp High Rocks.
Speaking of leaving the outside world away. We gave the boys a treat this afternoon for choice period. We played the USA vs. Portugal game. There has been strict rules in place since The World Cup started. You can talk about soccer, you just can’t talk about the games or the score. We forced a “communication blackout” for the boys today until the game was re-played. The boys were super-excited about the outcome! It’s pretty hard to pull off something like this in the day of technology and information.
Our morning started with a bang as five trips headed out of camp. The first three were all overnight trips. The paddlers took off to the Nantahala River for a couple of days. The climbers were heading over to Looking Glass Rock for two days and there was a three-day hike heading out to Panthertown Valley.
One of the cool features of having over 1000 acres of property is that you can do overnight hikes without having to drive anywhere! One of our younger hiking groups took off for a two-day hike…right from the hiking shed! They will spend their time exploring the fields and streams of High Rocks and they don’t even have to take a tent. The guys will stay in one of our five open air shelters for the evening. That sure makes it easy and light! It was fun to see them march off proud to be in charge of their destiny while being able to carry everything they needed on their backs.
Finally, our mountain bikers had another great trip over at DuPont Forest. It is quite possibly the funnest place to take any level of rider. When people ride over there for the first time, they are always amazed at how fun they have on the beginner trails.
Well, only three more days… We are going to pack in every minute! Just you wait and see.
Have a great night,
Don