So Many Fun Options

two summer camp girl friends

The recent streak of days with perfect summertime weather continued today as we woke to a foggy cool morning. As the camp begins to stir and the girls make their way to the dining hall for breakfast, it’s common to wear long pants and a sweatshirt or fleece. The temperature today was about 64 when we woke, so it felt great to cozy up like that. Then as the sun burned off the fog, we soon felt warm and comfortable under bright blue skies and clear sunshine. The temperature climbed to about 83, but with relatively low humidity it again felt really good to be outside. Since we essentially spend all of our time outside —even the cabins are open-air, screened buildings— this kind of weather is inspiring. It makes everything we’re doing pop with more vibrant colors, perhaps a little more pep, and an extraordinary freshness. Yes, it was ideal camp weather.

“Cinnamon Apple” was the surprise muffin flavor today. The bakers in the kitchen start about 7am to be ready for this mid-morning snack. Mixing, scooping, and baking 300 individual muffins takes some time. Having a freshly baked treat like this, though, is definitely a highlight of most everyone’s morning.  The muffins are so delicious, it’s challenging to have to limit yourself to just one!

cool tetherball fashion girl

Rockbrook girls know that wearing a costume adds to whatever we’re doing, making things funnier and more fun. That’s why we’ll occasionally declare a costume theme for the day, like today’s “Under the Sea” theme. It was fun to see how the girls and staff members interpreted that theme. They mixed things up with beach attire (Hawaiian shirts, sunglasses, hats), shark and octopus hats, seaweed skirts, and colorful coral leggings. The Hi-Ups and several counselors decorated the dining hall with streamers and painted banners, and an “ocean-related” playlist of music was queued up for all three meals.

There have been a flurry of adventure trips going out this week too. We went rafting on Tuesday, but today Clyde took an excited bunch of girls out to Looking Glass Rock in the Pisgah Forest for an all-day rock climbing adventure. They left early in the morning to reach the south side of the rock face in time to jump on a couple of popular climbs, one called “B52” and another called “Fly By.” Leland and Sarah took a few advanced kayakers to run the rapids of section nine on the French Broad River north of Asheville. Meanwhile, Jayne and Sam offered an overnight camping and canoeing trip on a different section of the French Broad.  All of these trips were offered to the girls as options they could choose, switching up their schedule as they like. So many options all on the same day!

shaving cream fighter

We presented another fun option to the girls during dinner when we announced that tonight’s twilight activity would be a shaving cream fight and slip-n-slide held down on the grassy sports field. This is an event of exuberant play. Girls of all ages, and counselors too, dress in their swimsuits, arm themselves with cans of white foam, and proceed to spray wildly being as mischievous as possible splattering unsuspecting friends. Soon, there are wild hairstyles, messages written on bellies, and even some girls completely covered in shaving cream. As you might expect, this makes the slip-n-slide an extra slick ride. Be sure to visit the photo gallery to see some of the wild messy fun of the evening.

It’s been another full camp day, one with plenty of adventure, creativity, and fun with friends. We couldn’t have asked for a better combination of cheerful campers, enthusiastic staff members, weather and camp activities. Life is very good here at Rockbrook!

Full-bodied Excitement

Tetherball game

Tetherball. It’s one of the simplest pastimes at Rockbrook, but also one of the most popular ways for the girls to spend a few spare minutes between activity periods, right before meals, or during one the three designated slots of “free time” each day. There are two tetherball courts at Rockbrook, one by the gym and the more prominent spot near the hillside lodge.  Made from a 10-foot tall locust tree pole, that tetherball court has a cool open feel to it, and since it’s centrally located, seems to always be in action.  Look over the hill and you’re bound to see a colorful ball swinging around the pole on a rope.

The game of tetherball is simple —hit the ball and wrap the rope around the pole as your opponent tries to hit the ball in the opposite direction… whoever wraps the ball completely is the winner.  When someone wins, that’s called a “tether.” The other day a few girls explained some of the other game terminology.  If a player grabs the rope instead of hitting the ball, that’s called a “ropey,” which is a foul of sorts, as is something called a “holdy,” which means grabbing the ball altogether.  When one player commits either of these fouls, the other player is allowed to employ the same foul. In addition to a regular single hit, there are two more hits that more advanced players use: the “double tap,” which simply means hitting the ball once before hitting it a second time, and “popcorn,” which means tapping the ball multiple times before hitting it around toward the other player. In a tetherball match, the winner of a game keeps playing until defeated by a challenger. The challenger always serves, which is a slight advantage. This may all sound like serious stuff, and to an extent it is for some of the girls, but playing tetherball is also a fun game of skill perfect for playing with friends at camp.

devils courthouse pisgah forest

Today the adventure staff announced a trip for the girls up to the Blue Ridge Parkway and a hike that included a stop at Devil’s Courthouse. This is a spectacular destination. At an elevation of more that 5700 feet, it has a panoramic view of the surrounding mountains. On a clear day, you can see 4 different states! This photo shows a girl crouching behind the marker that allows you to identify far off mountain peaks by sighting over the brass cones. It’s quite a steep hike to reach the summit, but this view is really incredible and definitely worth the trip when the weather is nice like it was today.

This afternoon, we paused our regular activities for “cabin day,” a time when each cabin sticks together and enjoys a special activity as a group.  Ordinarily the girls sign up for individual activity schedules, so this is a nice time to bond with bunk mates and do something special.  One group decorated t-shirts with markers, while another used paints to design colorful glass jars.  There was food involved for some— decorating cupcakes for the kitchen, using a scoop to make a huge bowl of watermelon balls, or shaping cookie dough for baking the evening’s cookies. Another group played games like an egg toss, and another took a hike to Rockbrook Falls for a wet-n-wild creek hike.

sliding rock north carolina

All of the Senior girls stuck together for a picnic dinner in the Pisgah Forest followed by a trip to Sliding Rock. This trip has become a tradition of sorts at camp because it’s so popular. The girls love loading the buses and riding high up into the forest to eat dinner and play a few games before screaming their heads off while sliding down the chilly natural water slide. One glance at the photo gallery and you can tell by the looks on the girls’ faces— an extraordinary combination of wide-eyed trepidation and full-bodied excitement —that sliding rock is a true thrill. It was impressive how many girls slid down the rock multiple times, each time getting just a little colder and even more excited for the ride.  The end of night brought all of us (almost 100 people in all) to Dolly’s Dairy Bar, the one and only ice cream stand.  This too is a loved tradition, a must-do part and the perfect cap to this thrilling night out.

rock climbing girl campers

Ordinary Extraordinary

Green river plunge
girl playing tetherball
Twin day at summer camp
Camp girls inside of their cabin
Bracelet making taped to leg

I’d say today was an ordinary day at camp, but that makes it pretty extraordinary too.

Take kayaking. Leland and Jamie brought a group out to the upper section of the Green River for an all-day event. With moderate class II and III+ rapids, paddling this river is quite an accomplishment.

At the lake, the lifeguards organized a fun relay race for the girls who signed up for swimming. The race involved two teams swimming a lap while wearing a t-shirt that after each lap they passed like a baton to the next girl.

In the WHOA (Wilderness, Hiking, Outdoor Adventure) activity, the girls were learning how to build a fire. Starting with the tiniest twigs and working up to larger sticks, their goal was to use just one match… And then to roast marshmallows for s’mores!

Today was “twin day,” which meant that the girls were encouraged to find a friend and coordinate what they wore to match like twins. Wearing the same color t-shirt and braiding hair similarly, made several sets of “twins” around camp.

All of the ceramics classes were busy glazing their work. Bowls thrown on the wheel, extruded pots, slab tiles and coil mugs —now had several layers of muted color that, after being fired in the kiln, will turn vibrant.

The girls rehearsing for next week’s musical performance filled the hillside lodge during the first free swim period. On the porch, a few campers worked on friendship bracelets. Just outside on the tetherball court girls were taking all challengers, and down the hill from there, two girls decided to spend their free time playing tennis.

For lunch Rick made everyone’s day by serving heaping baskets of his fresh, homemade focaccia bread. There was also his secret recipe chicken salad and tuna salad, along with fresh, local black berries, but the bread stole the show. I saw some tables go back 4 times for “seconds!”

It rained briefly during rest hour, but soon afterwards girls were firing guns down at the riflery range and proudly saving their targets, swimming in the lake again, and batting the ball around in a game of gaga.

Shaving Creak Fight Hair styling

The most exciting event happened after dinner during our “Twilight” activity period: a huge shaving cream fight for the entire camp. Like all Twilight activities, this was optional, but we still had about 140 girls, some from all age groups, arrive at the grassy landsports field dressed in their swimsuits “ready to rumble” with some slippery white foam. A shaving cream fight is not much of a “fight” really. It’s more a shaving cream bath, or hairstyling session, or friendly body painting party. As the girls run around spraying and smearing each other, laughing hysterically, it’s takes very little time before everyone has shaving cream in their hair, on their stomachs, arms and backs. Some, thanks to their friends, literally get completely covered with the stuff. We also brought our a long sheet of plastic to make a super fun slip-n-slide, made even better with all that shaving cream lubricating everything. This is another example of silly camp fun. Sure it’s messy; sure it’s loud; but, it’s just as wonderful too.

Overall, I’d say we had an ordinary extraordinary day.

Extraordinary Shaving Cream Fight Group of Girls

It’s a Highlight

First tetherball game
Greeting her first camp horse

It’s a highlight of the summer, the largest opening day of a session with 210 campers, 78 staff members, parents, grandparents, a good number of little brothers and siblings all arriving at Rockbrook this morning for the start of our second session. More importantly, today is a highlight of the year for many of the campers arriving, because they’ve been waiting since last summer to return to Rockbrook, to see their camp friends, to take a deep breath of the woodsy mountain air, to sing their favorite camp song in the dining hall, and to get busy with all the fun activities of camp. And for new campers, today is a highlight simply because it is their first day of their time at camp. The directors, Sofie, Chase, and Grace, the program staff and the superb group of cabin counselors assembled this session are all equally excited to welcome everyone to camp. You could feel it as girls and their families arrived all morning; this is a amazing bunch of people and we all are pumped up for a great session!

Throughout the morning, those campers who arrived early jumping right into things by taking a hike to Rockbrook Falls, the largest waterfall on the camp property, learning to make a new patterns of friendship bracelet, greeting a couple of the camp horses, brushing up on their tetherball skills, or simply getting to know each other relaxing in one of the many red porch rocking chairs around camp.

Girls finding a waterfall on hike
Feet of girls waiting to swim

It was easy to guess this year’s t-shirt color because just about everywhere today you saw girls wearing the same heather green. Likewise, the girls all proudly wore their wooden name tags. These tags, following a long Rockbrook tradition, are thin slices of dried Mountain Laurel strung simply on a piece of vinyl lanyard, but each is designed and decorated by every camper’s counselor and is presented right when the girls arrive at camp. Some girls add to the decoration and collect them as souvenirs of their years at camp (so many wooded camp name tags hanging in girls’ rooms at home!).

After a comforting lunch of Rick’s homemade, baked macaroni and cheese, salad and fresh fruit… and pausing to sing Happy Birthday to Katie …the girls gathered in their cabins for brief meetings. These are opportunities to get to know all of the cabin mates, but also for the counselors to discuss cabin chores, the daily camp schedule, and important safety rules. Next, everyone began a rotation between camp tours, swimming demonstrations, and games in each age group’s lodge. By this time the weather had turned cloudy and a slight drizzle was falling now and then, not thunder or lightning, but the occasional burst of raindrops that would last for ten minutes or less. This made our swimming demonstrations a bit chillier than usual, but you would be surprised how this barely slowed down these girls. With encouragement and support from their counselors, coaching from all 8 of the lifeguards, reassurance from Sarah and the other directors, and cheering from their cabin mates, most girls easily earned their swimming tags and were quickly wrapped in towels chatting wildly about how “freezing” the lake is.

Camp Staff Skit

Just before dinner, the entire camp assembled in the gym to enjoy an introduction to all of the Rockbrook activities presented by the counselors. Each team of instructors took the stage to perform a skit or song related to their activity. In most cases, if their activity involves special equipment, it was featured in the skit. In this photo, for example, we have the paddling instructors singing and dancing decked out in spray skirts, helmets, and PFDs. We’ve found this to be a great way for the campers to meet the activity instructors, get a glimpse of their enthusiasm for their activity, see some of the cool craft projects available, and understand what’s involved in each activity…all in preparation for the time tonight when they will sign up for their first set of four scheduled activities. There are always fun new aspects to the activities (this year, the new Nature Nook out in the woods, for example), so this assembly gives both new and returning campers ideas about what they’d like to do while at camp.

As we settle in here at camp, I hope you begin following along by checking the online photos available each day in your parent account, reading and sharing these blog posts, liking our Facebook page, and even following us on Twitter. There’s always a lot going on at Rockbrook, and these are the ways you can keep up a bit.

P.S. Don’t be shy about commenting on these blog posts! We love hearing from you.

Summertime Sleeping Out

Girls going backpacking at summer camp

Backpacking and camping have been an almost nightly trip this week. Michelle our fabulous hiking guide, who is a Wilderness First Aid Responder and who has been a Rockbrook girl for thirteen years (she started at 7 years old), has been leading these trips. She’s been taking our Juniors in cabin groups, 2 at a time, out to the outpost campsite here on the camp property. After a short hike through the woods towards Rockbrook Falls, there’s a small trail that leads to a clearing below Dunn’s Rock where we have two tent platforms and a fire ring. The girls have a campfire, sing songs, tell stories, and enjoy making s’mores. All the girls from each Junior cabin plus their counselors go on these trips, and when it’s time for bed, everyone sleeps together, “slumber party style,” on the platforms. Out in the woods, armed with their flashlights against the sounds of the night and filled with nervous excitement, it can take a while for everyone to fall asleep.  But that’s part of the fun!  Michelle also took a Middler backpacking trip out into Pisgah Thursday night.  With their tents, sleeping bags and food (s’mores again!) stuffed into backpacks, they hiked about 2 miles into the forest to one of our secret campsites.  These trips are great outdoor adventure opportunities to get to know each other.  Telling stories around the campfire and just sharing the experience overall, the whole group grows closer.

Making a tie dye t-shirt
Stop action photography activity at camp

This has also been a week of tie dying in the “Hodge Podge” activity. There’s a lot of variety here as each camper twists and folds her shirt in a unique pattern and then adds different color dyes. After letting them rest over night, it’s exciting to untie the shirts and see how they turned out— vibrant spirals, bullseyes and stripes.

In the photography activity, Jane has been teaching the campers about stop motion techniques.  Working in groups of 2 or 3 campers, and using Play-Doh, the girls animated short sequences of photos which when strung together create motion videos.  This takes not only creativity, but real planning, a steady camera, and plenty of patience to accomplish.

girls rock climbing at Looking Glass

A group of girls went rock climbing today with Maddie and were lucky to set up 3 different routes on Looking Glass Rock out in Pisgah.  Again, excellent weather, dry and clear, made the equally excellent rock even more enjoyable for everyone.  A packed lunch, complete with muffins, went along to keep up their energy, and when you check out the photo gallery, you’ll see just how well and how high these girls climbed. There are some amazing rock climbing girls around here.

Back at camp, everyone else got to dig into some of Rick’s homemade chili complete with all the fixin’s: diced tomatoes, cheese, sour cream, Frito’s corn chips, and our super stocked salad bars. There was some debate about whether the vegetarian or the meat version was better, but that was never really settled!

camp teatherball tournament at twilight

After dinner during the “Twilight” block of free time, a couple of counselors organized an open tetherball tournament for anyone interested in playing. It was the “triple T” (Twilight Tetherball Tournament). Should we add “terrific” in there? 🙂 Paired up by age group, the girls took turns playing each other as the rest of the crowd cheered them on. Quite strategically, the counselors chose players to make sure that the brackets kept everyone involved, not so much to determine who “won,” but to see the girls enjoying the games. With the late evening sun setting across the valley, it was a beautiful summertime moment.

Tetherball Games Strategies

Tetherball Playing Strategy

Do you have this in common with Napoleon Dynamite— being a tetherball champ? Sure you’ve played before at camp, and you know how to play tetherball, but maybe you need a few more strategies to really pump up your game. Here’s a couple of things to practice.

The most important strategy is mastering an extreme angle when serving. By hitting the ball sharply down, it can swing high over your opponent’s head. This is always a good tactic.

It’s also important to use both hands when playing tetherball. You can hit the ball more powerfully, but also add unexpected spins and hits by changing which hand hits the ball. You can surprise and confuse the other player with different fast/slow, open/closed, left/right hand maneuvers.

Equally important to mastering tetherball is being quick on your feet. Moving forward and backward quickly, and knowing when to move sideways. This not only makes it difficult for the other player to decide how to serve or hit the ball, it gives you a better chance to make defensive hits.

Of course, being a tetherball sports champ takes practice, but that’s what the games at camp are for!

OK, do you have any other tetherball tips, strategies or tactics?