Hey, Camp Fans!
I’m thrilled to say that we had our best turnout yet for our annual Everything Summer Camp ‘Share Your Camp Story’ Contest! Your camp stories were great! I had such a fun time reading through them all and now I’m excited to share them with all our readers online! We’re posting each submission right here on the Blog!
Since I’ve finished announcing our ten lucky winners who took larger prizes, I’ve
moved on to the rest of your submissions. The following post is from Merrill T. who wrote in to tell us about her summer days at Barry Conservation Camp. Here it is:
“The first time pulling up to camp was different than what I was expecting. Once we turned on to the winding forest lined road I was excited about what I would see. I knew there was a trout hatchery right next door to camp but I wasn’t expecting to see about ten hatchery tents lining the road to get there. Once finding out I was in Bobcat lair we pulled into the parking lot, got all my things out from our car, walked past a few cabins, and walked up the stairs to my cabin. Once everyone was there we met our counselors, cabin mates and had dinner. It was a much smaller camp then I had been to in the past but I still liked it very much. It was only a week long camp so the first few days flew by.
By midweek we decided if we wanted to go on the overnight hike, or canoe trip. A day went by and near the end we started packing for our trips. I chose the hike because everyone who had been there in the past said it was a very good experience. The next day we had breakfast then were on our way to our trips.
We hiked a trail called Unknown Pond trail. It was a 3.3 mile hike, but it was steep, rocky, and muddy, which made things slippery. About three hours later we got to Unknown Pond to have lunch. Once lunch was over we took an hour to filter water for people’s water bottles, then we dropped our bags near where we had lunch, and went on another hike up to the horn, which is the top of a mountain. We stayed up there for a little while, came back down, grabbed our bags and hiked to our campsite. Our campsite was right near a ledge where we got to watch the sunset. It was foggy, cold, and raining a little, but totally worth it. Later we had hot dogs over the fire, and s'mores, then went to bed.
The next morning we were up bright and early to hike down. It was the same trail as going up but even more slippery as the day before. We got down in a short two hours, took a break by the entrance of the trail, then walked the two miles back to camp. The bus drove us to our starting point the day before, so we didn’t know how far it really was.
Though in those 48 hours we hiked over 12 miles, this camp was an amazing experience that I will never forget and I hope to come back for years to come.”
What a great summer stay, Merrill! I’m pleased to hear that you had such a positive experience—right up my alley (I love to hike!). If anybody else is interested in Barry Conservation Camp, you can give it a closer look by clicking here and, as always, thanks for reading!
- John