Throwback Thursday: Summer camp memories #TBT

[#1]

It's Thursday!

Last week, I went on a men's boot camp down in Williams, AZ. It was so awesome. Got to know great men and sweet brotherhood formed. It was held in a facility that holds summer camps for youth during the summer (called Lost Canyon).  

Soooo, what summer camp memories do you have?

Let’s make it a great Thursday!
KGM

[Stephen_Lugton]

It was with the Scouts, camping in a field that gently sloped down to a river with woods all around, we sent young Andy off to put the milk in the fridge.  2 hours later he cam back to tell us he couldn't find it.

[Dan Breyen]

Most of my summer camp experiences were with Scouts.  I was always hoping it wouldn't rain too bad because our tents didn't have floors in them, and I didn't want everything to get all muddy.

Finding the ideal fire stick was always part of the ritual.  Because it had to be long enough and thick enough to last the whole week.  

I caught my first fish on my own at camp.  It was a 4 inch sunfish.  That one certainly had to go back.

Now my summer camping includes 4 walls, a comfortable bed, and a continental breakfast at a hotel somewhere.  It puts a different meaning to foraging for food when now it involves pouring the batter into the Belgian waffle maker.

[Susan Waldrip]

I went camping once with the Girl Scouts, what a nightmare! 🤣 We weren't even in sleeping bags on the ground or in tents, we were in a cabin with screened sides to keep the bugs out and cots on a cement floor. And yet, one bug happened to find its way into one of the girl's suitcases and, as we were trying to settle in for the evening and get ready for sleep, the girl opened her suitcase, the bug flew out and into her face, she screamed and everyone got all freaked out and wanted to go home (over a bug!). Not much sleep that night, and that was my one and only summer camp experience. So funny now. ☺️

[Amanda Barber]

Fun topic! My friend runs an adult summer camp that always sounds like a blast. I don't have any specific memories. We went camping as a family every summer, but I don't remember going with my Girl Scouts troop at all. I have, however, taken the troop I'm a leader of! Lots of fun memories made and way too little sleep! :-D

[Mike Rink -drawio Diagrams-]

I was recently listening to a podcast that made me think of summer camps, and the spooky season! If you went to summer camp in Canada (or some camps in the US) you might've heard the scary legend of Anson Minor around the camp fire. Now you can get the full story, including the truth! https://firesidecanada.ca/the-legend-of-anson-minor/

[Laurie Sciutti]

Sadly, I never did go to summer camp as a kid.  Probably best ~ the Friday the 13th movies would have made those trips scary! 😆

[Tomislav Tobijas _Koios_]

I never went to these 'American summer camps', as people from Europe like call them 😅

Nevertheless, I went camping once as a part of a regional sports tournament and I remember sleeping in one of those big military-sized tents with over 200 people inside. Everything was great apart from one night when there was a thunderstorm and ⚡ lightning struck not far from the camp so that was a thrill...

Quite recently, I went camping at a music festival and everything, including the weather, was great. The only thing I need to improve next time I go camping is to find a location close enough to the showers and toilets 😆

[Liz Tanner]

5th grade Summer Camp in Ohio: You could fish or do archery. My next door neighbor hunted (and shared) deer meat, but I'd never caught a fish. Learned fishing kids got ot wake up at 4:40 AM in a perpetually cold Ohio. Learned to cast. Caught my 1st fish, 3 of them! I tried to sneak one back in my shirt to eat it. I was 10.

Taipei, Taiwan B Team Basketball Tournament: I sucked at basketball, I'm slow and I am 5'4. But, I was the only American which, idk,qualified me to play. Similarly, our coach was an American lady who was blonde and 6'1". She hated sports. She was the coach. I was 11-12. B Team fueled up on bulgogi and Burger King. Won 1st place.

Only two times I got to go!

[Kristján Geir Mathiesen]

Takk for all your memories :=) Have a great weekend!

[vikram]

Hi @Kristján Geir Mathiesen 

Good Topic always like.

its not summer for us, 

But usually we go for summer camps for children where they play and we all elders gather for some drinks and snacks. 

Vikram P

[Barbara Szczesniak]

When I was a kid, we went to day camp, which was run by the town recreation department. You didn't stay overnight, but we spent the day playing in the playground area, playing (American) football in the field, and going in what I believe was actually a 2-foot-deep giant fountain (as opposed to a pool) to cool off. 

[Brant Schroeder]

@Kristján Geir Mathiesen I never went to camp.

[Tuncay Senturk]

I’ve never been to a camp, but I believe when I go younger I will :D 

[Vronik]

Hi

I have always found camping to be an incredible experience for maturing, growing and learning to live with more people than your family, to adapt to what there is and give up a little of the comforts of home.

I highly recommend experiencing it at least once in your life.

Regards

[Javier Martinez Caballero]

Sounds like an awesome experience! 🌄 My favorite summer camp memory has to be late-night campfire stories in the North Spain mountains and making s’mores with friends—nothing beats that feeling of being outdoors and connecting with great people. Thanks for bringing back those memories! 🔥🍫 #TBT

[Andy Gladstone]

My wife hates when I tell this story, but since she's not in here (yet), here it goes.

My parents sent me to sleepaway camp for the month of August from the year I was entering 6th grade until the year I was entering 8th grade. The weekend before my second summer at the camp I was invited to a friend's weekend Bar Mitzvah at a hotel. The hotel was new - in 1920 - and had not had so many updates by the time I stayed there in 1990. The bedspread and comforters  were like burlap - so itchy. I was at the hotel Friday and Saturday, and on the coach bus to the sleepaway camp on Sunday.

One of the first things that the camp did as we disembarked the bus was a head check for nits and lice. Well, the burlap bedspread was more than just itchy material - turns out it was lice infested - and some hitched a ride up to camp on my head. 

I was immediately assigned to the infirmary for the first two days of camp. All of my belongings were sent for high heat treatment to kill any lice that may have been on them. I was basically given nurses scrubs to wear for two days, had to eat meals on my own (well, with the other two unlucky kids that had lice), lost all of my canteen money that was hidden in my jeans pocket in my duffel bag which had been completely pillaged and plundered, lost my bunk assignment when they filled my empty bed and needed to be assigned to a lower aged bunk, and basically ruined the summer before it started. Oh, and instead of helping me move in to the bunk, they gave me back all of my belongings in large garbage bags that I had to schlep all by myself from the infirmary to the bunkhouses. 

I only went back for one more summer after that. Not the fondest memory.

[Dave Mathijs]

I remember summer camps in Austria, Switzerland and Italy.

One time, when I was in Italy, I woke up one morning to realize my dad's car was parked before the chalet, totally to my surprise. It turned out that my mother missed me so much my dad had to drive from Belgium to Italy to visit me. On top of it all, we were leaving by bus for Venice that day, so she saw me like 10 minutes.

[Barbara Szczesniak]

@Dave Mathijs Such a sweet story, especially after the traumatic events of @Andy Gladstone 

[Valerie Knapp]

I worked every summer at summer camps during university all over the USA. My favourite memories are mainly around pranks we counsellors pulled on each other, like one time I hid someone's bicycle and came back to my tent for the evening to find my bunk had been replaced by a kayak, that sort of thing! Lol