On Saturday and Sunday, M and I joined a huge group of Girl Scouts, several GS mamas, and a couple of guys for an overnight at Hidden Lake Camp. I just mentioned this camp recently, in my Girl Power Summer Camps post, because they’re hosting a family camping program over Memorial Day Weekend.
It wasn’t rustic camping, really. Which was a good thing, since it poured rain and the temperature plummeted. We stayed in the main dining hall:
Many of the mothers had high hopes that the evening would bring an opportunity to sit on the porch and just take in the view:
Pretty quickly, the view was from inside, and it was a lot of rain:
Luckily, we did get the chance for a hike around the lake before the weather really turned awful. The girls found some frogs
and some cool plants. One of the mothers used to lead outdoor excursions, so she had plenty of knowledge to pass along.
After the hike the girls broke into smaller groups for a variety of activities. There was a lot of crafting. Here’s M doing a team building activity that Uncle Ray, who does survival training, improvised while the planned outdoor activities were washed out. She’s blindfolded and looking for little orange cones around a cabin, guided only by her partner’s voice. It was pretty comical to watch, although not quite as comical as the parents’ reaction when we realized that Ray had used duct tape as the blindfolds. We were convinced that our daughters were going to lose all of their brows and lashes, but luckily the decorative duct tape doesn’t have as much of the massive stickiness as the original duct tape.
There was more crafting, a lesson on making fires, and the girls were in charge of cooking their own dinner. One of the mothers knew how to braid hair, so almost all of the girls had some sort of braid.
By evening it was really cold and wet outside, but we were toasty inside making s’mores at the fireplace. The girls played games and made cat blankets for an animal shelter to wind down, although there were isolated flare-ups of tag and pyramid-building.
It was lights-out at 11 pm, and sleep was better than I’d feared, but not as good as I’d hoped.
In the morning, the girls took to clean-up with surprising gusto. M declared cleaning the toilet “fun!” I’ll happily offer her more opportunities for fun in the near future.
It was a bit bittersweet in the morning. M and I had to head home for church–I had a meeting, she was singing in the choir–so we weren’t able to go along for a final hike. I hated tearing her away, but as it was I was going to be late for the meeting and M was missing the pre-service rehearsal.
While the girls tidied, I took a final walk to get a look at more of the place. Here’s a lean-to for camping. I don’t know: I kind of like the way a tent screens away the bugs. I guess you throw a net over yourself? Hmmm. . . .
Here’s the Health Lodge:
We’d encountered the small fleet of kayaks and canoes on our hike, but at the time, I was too distracted by trying to take pictures of all the girls squealing over frogs and snails. We didn’t go out on the water this time. I shame, because it was awfully pretty.
I haven’t even gotten a chance to mention M’s favorite part, but I’ll save that for another post.
