June 25, 2024

“A Plethora of Activities”

We don’t use fancy vocabulary words at Kingswood very often, but yesterday Mike Wiff, the program guy, could not resist using a big one in describing all the action he had planned for the day.  Miraculously, nearly all of it came to pass despite a mean weather front (read: cold, windy and spitting rain) passing through exactly as “B Block” commenced at 4:30.  More on this below.

In the morning, we ran the traditional three instructional periods from 9:30 to 12:30.  Boys got to pick from three columns of activities, the columns being named as Waterfront, Teamsports and Choice.  This last one, Choice, is everything we do that is not on the water or involving team play.  I will paste the roster in my photo album after I post this blog.  Hope you can read it.

We call these sessions “clinics” in that the idea is for campers to have some serious training, guidance and instruction. This is about as structured as Kingswood gets but we train the staff to make clinics informative, fast-paced and fun.

Actually, Sara’s album of photos captures the very start of the first day of camp with Polar Bear dips as boys come down to the waterfront at the sound of reveille (music, not a bugel) and plunge into the palliative waters of Mother Tarleton.  More on this theme some other day. A bunch of her photos show those first clinics held under dark gray skies for the most.

It was at lunch where Mike dropped the plethora word to describe a host of things doing on from 3PM to dinner time at 6. My photos show the white board listing all the choices.  A Block is that period from 3-4:30 where boys go to one activity and stay at it for the full session.  Yup, Pickleball and firebuilding soaked up all that time.

Then, at 4:30 on the dot, the weather got ugly. The wind shifted to the north and suddenly a cold rain was falling.  Off to the cabins they will go, I thought to myself only to be stunned by the noise of the boats running up and down the lake with wakesurfers and tube riders.

Raven described it as the most miserable B Block she could ever remember.  But boys kept getting in line for tube rides, especially, and the stalwart boat drivers kept at their tasks. Finally, Raven had had enough and called it quits. “But my friend has never done tubing,” complained one lad whereupon Raven informed them that if they went in these conditions, they would never try it again! (Check my pix, mostly shot from a dry vantage point!)

The plethora continued at dinner when the counselors filled the evening slots on the special “Sponsorship” board with a combination of indoor and outdoor things. It was blustery but on went the show.

The day ended with all the campers coming down to the Dining Room to get their Kingswood tee shirts and frisbees (to 3 year campers.)  Neither Sara nor I attended.  She was busy editing her photos while I went to bed!

Today is a completely different story:  Sunny and warm!  Cannot wait to see what happens!