London Edition: Jurassic Research

London Edition Volume II: Jurassic Research

So, the main reason we took the long trip to London was for people. To meet all sorts of people: international counselors, Camp America Staff, Camp Directors from around the country. But that of course raises the question: "Aren't dinosaurs people too?"

(You don't actually have to answer that. A team of paleontologists are working around the clock to figure that very thing out.)

Yes, in our manic London schedule Jim and I managed to find a little time to pop into the London Museum of Natural History for the purpose of preparing for  Jurassic Week . We're super excited about this new theme (if you haven't signed up, sign up now! You have signed up, sign up again! Come to the same week twice! Make a clone! Bend the space-time continuum! Or just attend once. Whichever), and figured one of the best museums in the world would be a good chance to find some inspiration for the week. 

All right, impressive exterior, Museum. I'll give you that.

Gargoyles! Just a general observation about my life: I don't see enough gargoyles.

And an impressive interior!

You're all right by me, Museum.

Jim's found a souvenir he wants.

Yup. It'd go great above one of the fireplaces in the Dining Hall.

Velcro's great-grand-father?

Enough things that aren't dinosaurs. On to the dinosaurs!

Now we're talking!

The museum is very strict. They force you to do your best impressions of any and all dinosaurs displayed.

This was not my idea. Just following museum policy.

Allosaurus!

Pachycephalosaurus!

Parasaurolophus! (Dinosaur names are the best use of letters.  No contest.)

Aww. They're finally friends.

Now we need to pause. Because around the corner of the hallway was literally, the coolest thing I've ever seen. This is not hyperbole. I have never seen anything cooler in my life.

They have a life-size, scientifically realistic, fully functional, animatronic, knock your socks off, Tyrannosaurus Rex! If the pictures look blurry, forgive me. That's only because it's moving around and ROARING AT US. (Seriously, if you're not doing anything right now, here's my suggestion. Get on an airplane. Go to London. Go straight to the museum. Look at this thing. Get right back on the plane. Come straight home. Totally worth the trip. Holy cow, this was a cool dinosaur.)

Whaaaaaaat.

It's scary when it looks right at you.

Suffice to say, I want one. 

Fundraising campaign, anyone?

I promise I'd take real good care of it! We could keep it somewhere out of the way! Like the boathouse. Or Cabin #1.

So Jim caught me in this moment of pure child-like wonder staring at the T-Rex. The only other people with this look on their face were 4 years old. And then he had to drag me out of the room, or else instead of typing this I'd still be there right now.

And a non-Jurassic museum bonus:

A cross section of a giant sequoia. Like us, it's American and had to journey across the ocean to get here.

This is a thousand years of history marked on where it occurred in the life of this tree. The founding of Camp in '51 would be all the way down at the edge of the bark there.

Anyway, the trip gave us a lot of great ideas to help get all these Dinos to Camp. Be sure to check out Jurassic Week this summer to see the result of all we learned.


Next London Blogpost: Less bones! More real people!

L.G. Cook - London Edition: Volume I

Volume I: London Blogging (Sorry. That was a play on a The Clash reference I'm even several years too young to legitimately attempt to make.)

Wait a minute.

That's not me in front of a tree on Camp!

That's not Jim in front of the Dining Hall!

That body of water is NOT Lake Shawanni!

What in the world is going on here!?!?

A very good question. But first, some back story:

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Have you ever wondered how we manage to bring our wonderfully-accented, super-awesome international staff members across the ocean to their summer home at L.G. Cook? Well, the trick is we manage it by NOT doing most of the work! No, most of the work is done by a fantastic organization called Camp America.  

Since 2001 (thanks to Camp America) , we've had 63 international counselors spend a summer here, a bit over 20 percent of all our staff in that time. Camp America places over 7000 international counselors at camps across the nation every summer. 

In the past, we've selected our Camp America counselors from afar, considering in depth applications and profiles, conducting Skype interviews, and so on. However, this year we decided to take Camp America up on their offer to journey to one of their overseas job fairs and hire our Summer 2015 counselors live and in person.

And so with that, Jim and I were London bound. Which is how we get back around to the rarity of non-camp located photos like this one:

Not only did the trip feature this tremendous job fair (more on that in future posts), and several other exciting events (also more on that in future posts), but it included a celebration of Camp America's 30th Anniversary at Parliament (more on that in this post. Right now). 

This is Parliament (or the Palace of Westminster).Yes, that building attached to Big Ben. And that clock's not actually called Big Ben. Big Ben is the nickname for the large bell, which is in the clock, which is on the Clock Tower, which is attached to the House of Parliament. These are things I now know.

And this is a model of Parliament. I never go anywhere that doesn't have an easily accessible model of itself for consultation. 

This is what the British call "a very nice hallway."

It was so nice it gave us some good ideas for remodeling the Dining Hall. The main theme? More statues.

This led us through an area where no pictures were allowed (use your imagination, picture a super cool big old ornate royal place where pictures wouldn't be allowed and it's just that), on out to a terrace along the Thames River where Camp Directors from across the country and Camp America staff got to celebrate all the great stuff the organization has accomplished over the past 30 years.

Needless to say, it was super fun, and a super honor to be there, and just overall pretty super.

More on our other London escapades and quest for International Counselors soon! 

Right now, I'm still jet-lagged and badly need a nap.

The Last New Class (For This Here New Year)

We've made it to the reveal of our final new Camp class for the 2015 season! Which is good. Because people still talking about it being the New Year on January 16th need to find something else to talk about.

Our All-Camp Games, Evening Activities, and Afternoon Recreation Times all fall under  what we call the "Resource" area of Camp, and we are adding our first ever Resource class, operating in a no-man's-land course area all of it's own.

What is this brave, ground breaking, intrepid new class?

Lawn Games, naturally. Lawn Games. (As brave, ground breaking, intrepid things go, it's pretty relaxed.)

Lawn Games

Nothing beats some leisurely recreational lawn activities as a way to while away a couple hours at camp. The campers and their counselor instructor will choose what games they feel like partaking in each individual class, and they’ll play until they feel like playing something else. Frisbee golf, whiffle ball, ladder ball, bocce ball, can jam, badminton and many other games will be among the available choices.

It'll be fun, and a great way to choose to spend a morning at Camp.

How much fun are we talking?

We're talking as much fun as Alissa-Cutter-kicking-a-soccer-ball-with-way-too-much-energy-as-a-group-of-campers-look-on-approvingly-fun.

New Class for a New Year: You'll won't believe what course we've upgraded.

It's fishing.

(Oh man. I ruined the suspense on that almost immediately! I should have strung it out longer. That's my bad.)

Yes, indeed, in addition to our standard Fishing Course we now have...wait for it...ADVANCED Fishing.

Cause here's the thing about fishing: 

Everyone loves fishing.

We catch 'em! We release 'em! We catch 'em again. What's not to love?

Not convinced? See the evidence below.

This wasn't fishing. This was Eel-ing. Eeling is weird. 

And how do you take Fishing and make it Advanced Fishing?

Why, you roam around a bit, that's how.


Advanced Fishing.

Ages 12 and up.

Fishing has always been one of the most popular activities here at camp, and our advanced class gives a chance for the avid fisherperson to get even more experience with the pastime. In addition to learning some advanced techniques and more in depth information, the class will utilize some rarely fished areas of camp. The center piece of the course will be a long hike through Stokes State Forest to the Big Flatbrook River for some late morning trout fishing. Not only will they enjoy one of New Jersey’s premiere trout fishing areas, but they’ll have lunch on the banks of the Flatbrook before hiking back to Camp.

Spots in Advanced Fishing are going fast, so snag yours now!  Not only will it be a fishing opportunity outside of our regular class and rec time fishing, but it will mark Camp's first modern excursion to the mighty Flatbrook River...

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We've still got one more new class to roll out, in the course area of...no course area.

Is the mystery really getting to you?

Good. That's kind of what we were going for.

More New Classes for the Same New Year

The Waterfront is a tried and true area of Camp, where we've got canoeing, kayaking, swimming and nothing about that ever changes. Nothing ever changes about that until  Summer 2015, that is, when we're adding a BRAND NEW WATER FRONT CLASS:

Lifeguarding 101
Ages 12 and up.

Every wonder what it takes to be one of those orange-tube carrying whistle-wearing guardians of Lake Shawanni? Our Lifeguard Basics class will answer that question and more. One of our advanced classes for older campers, the class will go into various swimming strokes and techniques, as well as some basic drills and life guarding philosophies and protocols.

Members of the class will get some great water safety tips, both for themselves and others who will be swimming with them.


***This class offers no certifications and is not part of any professional lifesaving curriculum.***

Be sure to check back soon, because in Environmental Education we've taken one of Camp's favorite classes and made it even favoriter.

Favorite-er?

Favorite-y-er? 

More favorite?

The point is we've got another good new class.

New Classes for a New Year

Happy '15 to all you year-round Summer Camp folks!

For those of you who have already signed up for Summer Camp, or those of you looking to sign up soon during our Early Bird Registration (which extends from now until March 15th), you may notice a few brand-new options when choosing Camp classes.

Every so often we try to spice up our course areas with by adding some never-before-seen classes, and we've thrown in a slew of flavor for 2015 with new courses across the board in Environmental Education, Arts and Crafts, Waterfront, and even one out by itself in no-man's land. (Sorry, Shooting Sports. Nothing new for you this year. How about we just throw in some new and interesting archery target games. How's that?)

So for the first edition of "New Classes for a New Year", meet our expanded Arts and Crafts selections:

This is the Craft Shop. It is not new. It's actually kind of super old.

Repurposed Art: 

Why throw it out when you can turn it into art? Our new Repurposed Art class will ask this question of recyclables, pieces of supposed trash, and all sorts of other disposable ever day items. A a variety of projects will show off the potential all mundane or forgettable objects hold inside of them.

This is not Repurposed Art. This is clay. We haven't done Repurposed Art yet. Because it's new. Hence the whole reason for this post.

Junkyard Band
The maintenance shop, kitchen, and other forgotten corners of camp have been raided and what we have is a pile of…junk. This class will take that pile of junk and transform it into a variety of musical instruments, and then those instruments will be turned into a functioning band. The class will teach different kinds of basic, simple instruments, and each camper will get to select and construct one of their own. The campers will then all come together, and find how their new junkyard instruments complement each other as the class plans, composes and practices a couple junkyard songs. They’ll then perform these tunes for the camp as the house band at our closing campfire.

I want to be clear: I am not implying that these are Junkyard instruments. There are real instruments. Since Junkyard Band has yet to exist, we just don't have any pictures of it and this is as close as we could get. So Real Instruments, please don't take offense and feel like I've called you a junkyard instrument. Except that rubbermaid container in the right hand corner. That could be the beginning of a junkyard instrument.

Stop by again soon (y'know, as in stopping by here on the internet) to see what new classes some of the other course areas have to offer!