Youth Camp 2006 (Round Rock Chapel at New Breed Network)
Breaking Free
Or, ``How I Spent My Summer Vacation: With a Few Hundred Teenagers''
This year's youth camp went deeper than I can recall
any other going, and they've all run deep. The thrust
of camp this year was that we not only need to break free
from something, but to break free
to or for something.
We took 31 people this year, with a freakishly high
counselor to student ratio. We had three women with
nine young women, and seven men for 12 young men.
Three of the younger male counselors were not full
time counselors, as they were helping with overall
camp duties, but they were counselors. We normally
shoot for one adult per five or six youth. At
least we weren't understaffed!
This year's youth were one of the easiest groups
we've ever had to manage. We had very, very few
problems. Most of the youth (from 7th grade through
just graduated from high school) had been with us at
least several months, we did have one newbie in
junior high, and one counselor took her (very mature)
going-into-fifth-grade niece.
We were back at Del Lago Resort
on Lake Conroe, north
of Houston. Houston got 10.5 inches of rain the day
before camp started (hurricane season!) but Lake Conroe
was doing just fine. Last tiome we had camp here we
were in the "cottages" (rather nicer than those in your
typical fairy tale!) but htis time we were in the tower
(hotel accomodations). We had a bit over half the 4th
floor, which was a good place to be since the place
really needs 6 or more elevators, has only three, and we
never saw more than two working (they're in the midst of
remodeling). We used the stairs a lot, which wasn't a
problem for most of us, but was rather annoying to those
on the upper floors (like 18) and to some older people
and folk with leg problems. But it still beat the tar
out of some of the barracks style camps we've been to!
The food was good, they had a pool and a small, lakefront
beach, basketball and volleyball courts, and other things
we chose not to use this year. The auditorium held our
900 or so people just fine.
Last updated:
26 June 2006
Copyright 2006 Miles O'Neal, Austin, TX. All rights reserved.
NOTE: The opinions and beliefs, along with
everything else, expressed here are those of the author, and may
or may not reflect those of Round Rock Chapel, New Breed Network,
Del Lago Conference Center, and their attendant staff, members,
or anyone else on the planet.
Miles O'Neal
<roadkills.r.us@XYZZY.gmail.com>
[remove the "XYZZY." to make things work!]
c/o RNN / 1705 Oak Forest Dr / Round Rock, TX / 78681-1514