Activity Spotlight: Climbing

Rockbrook is all geared up for an excellent summer of climbing! What was once an appointment-only event, climbing is now offered as a weekly activity. The Alpine Tower is open every day and the gym’s rock wall is our rainy day alternative. But the adventure doesn’t stop there! To create more of a challenge, we have founded the “Blind Girls’ Walk” club. To be inducted into this wacky band of girls, a camper is blindfolded and guided up the tower with her friends’ help. Many have already joined and the line to climb is growing. GO GO CLIMBING HEROES!

Kids Camp Ourtdoor Memories

More comments and memories from a Rockbrook Alumna…

“Every memory is a favorite memory, but there was one that my friend and I do get a kick out of (by the way, her name is Natalie Berry and we have been best friends for 30 yrs). One year our cabin was one of the wild cabins. We all were friends and had gone to Rockbrook for several years. We came up with this name that whenever anything went wrong we blamed “Bob.” Needless to say it picked up like wild fire and we got in trouble for stirring things up. It’s one of those ‘You had to be there’ situations.

“I truly miss Rockbrook. It is my childhood and a great past that I can share and relate with my grandmother Virginia Summer, who also went there. Now I have a 7yr old daughter who I sing camp songs to. My wish is to send her to Rockbrook and who knows maybe one day she’ll have a daughter that she can send too.”

Nature-Deficit Disorder

In his recent book, Last Child in the Woods: Saving our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder, Richard Louv talks about summer camp serving as a healthy response to our modern tendency to be “plugged in” (to electronic media) and “in motion” (between school, lessons, sports practice, etc.). He writes, “as the young spend less and less of their lives in natural surroundings, their senses narrow— physiologically and psychologically. This reduces the richness of human experience.”

At the same time, there’s something magical about the sort of sustained exposure to nature camps provide. Louv sites an amazing array of studies linking nature experience and healthy child development, and concludes “I believe that offering children direct contact with nature— getting their feet wet and hands muddy— should be at the top of the list of vital camp experiences.”