We had an action packed last few days. First session is zooming along. Can you believe that two weeks from tomorrow the first session campers will be on their home??!! Yikes!
We hope you’ve been keeping up with the pictures on “Smugmug”. If so, you’ve been able to see many of the past week’s program highlights. Here are some of our highlights from the past week.
You already know that Monday’s evening program was Halloween Night. There was one very important part of Halloween Night that you didn’t see — the Haunted House. It’s pretty hard to take pictures in a haunted house because it’s, well, dark. Let’s just say, the campers found the Haunted House really scary and FUN! You’ll probably hear more details about the Haunted House from your daughter.
Another of our program highlight of the past week was Saturday night’s Council Fire. One reason we enjoyed it was that the season’s first Council Fire had to held indoors, so just being outside at the Council Fire with the “fires leap toward the sky” was a pleasure. And the campers seemed to enjoy a quiet evening program, too.
Here’s a couple of more personal highlights from the past few days.
On Sunday Cabin 2 Porch 2 was in the middle of their three day canoe trip. I needed to get a simple message to Tripper Nick and I knew the group was camped on some property we own on Lake Andrusia. It’s only a few minute drive from camp and I thought it would be fun to visit the gang so, after the evening program, I jumped in a car. When I arrived at the campsite, I found the whole gang sitting around a campfire and enthusiastically singing the Unicorn song. (Tripper Nick had a copy of all the words.) When the campers saw me, they jumped up to say “hi”. Every camper immediately started telling me about her canoe trip, and because they were all talking at once, all I really could figure out was they were having a ton of fun. Within a few minutes I was sitting around the campfire with the group. The campers continued to talk rapidly as they filled me in on the very, very minor details of the trip. There were a lot of giggles and outright laughter. After a few minutes it was time for me to head back to camp, and when I walked back toward the car, the whole group was still sitting around the campfire and talking up a storm. It was a picture right out of the movies. Campers and counselors sitting in the woods around a campfire simply enjoying being together. Ain’t camp great.
Here’s another incident from the past few days that impressed me. At Monday’s dinner, I sat with the campers and counselors of Nutshell Porch 1. All the Nut 1 campers are spending their first summer at Kamaji so I was looking forward to getting to know them better. As I sat there I was amazed by the almost ballet-like coordination between the campers and counselors. Let’s just say that eating dinner with 7 nine year olds is action-packed. Campers bring the food to the table, pass platters around the table, pour milk and water, even take time to eat, scrape the plates, take food back to the kitchen, get dessert, pass out dessert, eat the dessert, scrape the dessert plates, clear the table, and wipe the table clean. All this is accomplished with constant chatter, giggles and laughter. The counselors seem more like choir directors as they keep everything moving in the right direction. Even though you don’t normally associate eating dinner with a lot of activity, camp obviously isn’t normal.
Here’s a few notes from other Kamaji departments.
Health Department: What a difference a year makes!
Last year at this time, we were in the middle of good ‘ol swine flu. Flash ahead to 2010 and the folks at Kamaji’s Club Med have seen a few bumps, sore throats, and headaches, but nothing more serious. As a matter of fact not one camper or counselor has been admitted to Club Med this summer. (Keep those fingers crossed!) For the first ten days of camp, Kamaji’s medical team was headed up by Dr. Judy Meisner, an anesthesiologist from Wayzata, MN. While being a doctor is a good thing, Judy’s number one qualification for being a camp doctor is that she is also a MOM to camper Anne. Judy just spent her 14th summer at Kamaji: her 9th summer as camp doc after spending 5 summers in the ’70s as a Kamaji camper. Last Saturday, Judy headed home and Martha Bowman, an internist from Rochester, Minnesota took over as Camp Doc. Martha is from Rochester, Minnesota and she arrived at camp with her three children and husband, Mark. Joining Martha in Club Med are three nursing assistants. Rebekah Bass, Cari Zuckerman, Sharma Prosser are all nursing students and spending their first summer at Kamaji. It is Kamaji’s policy to have Cari, Sharma or Rebekah call you if your daughter is admitted for an overnight stay in Club Med or is taken to see a doctor or dentist in town. (We do NOT call if your daughter spends a few hours just resting in Club Med or if she visits for a scraped knee, sore throat, bug bite, applied band-aid or Tylenol request). Kamaji’s policy assures you that if your daughter receives anything more than routine health care you’ll hear from us. No health-related news is good news.
Travel Department
Kamaji’s Wilderness Trip Program is busy, busy, busy. Since we last wrote, Cabin 2 Porch 2 went on a 3 day Mississippi River trip to Lake Andrusia. Monday morning a group of campers from Cabin 3 Porch 1 and Cabin 3 Porch 2 left on their 3 day trip to the Crow Wing River. On Tuesday, the wilderness woman of the Hatchery set off on their expedition to Webster Lake. Also on Tuesday, eight very lucky campers left for their three day Lake Superior Climbing Trip. Nutshell Porch 2, Nutshell Porch 1 and Tikinagan all have trips schedule for later this week. By the way, Monday evening marked the return of Kamaji’s Pine Manor Canadian trippers. From all reports, they had wonderful week-long wilderness trips. We posted a ton of pictures taken by the Canadian trippers. Take a few minutes and check them out. Kamaji’s Wilderness Trip program will be taking the 4th of July weekend off, but will be at full speed again next week.
Weather Department
Even though we had plenty of rain last week, much of it was know by the technical term “Camp Director Thunder Showers”. For those of you who aren’t meteorologists, that means the rain begins after the evening program and ends before morning wake-up. This week it’s been mostly sunshine. It was a bit cool on Tuesday, however, temps are expected in the upper 70s today and mid eighties tomorrow. Yea!!
Well, that’s all for now. Have a great few days. We will.
Thanks,
Mike (and Kathy and Kat)