Finally! The sounds of laughter, animated voices, and piglets giddy with excitement has returned to the F&W fields, rolling hills, and forests. Camp isn’t real until the energy of young people and teens punctuate the air. Some campers have gone on trips already, others are just getting back in time for our all camps Interdependence Day gathering.
Early mornings find staff swimming, Indian Brook campers gaining endurance to swim to Bear Pit, or for those really driven as swimmers, to complete a circuit around Woodward. Tamarack Farmers are making amazing progress on a cabin build, raising walls and rafters this week. Timberlake campers are enjoying feasts of delicious food. SAM campers are just back from their cabin trips and are practicing their interdependence skit. Barn Day Campers had a fantastic Topsy-Turvy-Tuesday and successful overnights. Flying Cloud campers have been cooking, playing games and enjoying the simple life in the clearing.
This afternoon, all camps and programs except Questers will gather at the BDC fields for songs and skits, after parading down Farm & Wilderness Road. Saltash Mountain campers will perform a montage of songs and a skit, as all other groups will express what interdependence at F&W means to them, or feature some aspect of Farm & Wilderness. Your young people share such imagination and creativity, it’s one of my favorite events of the summer.
We did have one concerning event this week that I want to make sure you know about. This past Wednesday, a hiker wearing a backpack and rifle (which is legal in Vermont) cut through Flying Cloud while campers were present and did not heed our staff ’s request to avoid the camp. Fortunately, not many campers saw the stranger, and staff immediately activated their emergency response. They (and I happened to be at FC for this) gathered the campers to a safe spot, notified the sheriff’s office, evacuated the campers to SAM as a precautionary initial measure, and called Flying Cloud camper families to apprise them of the incident and steps taken. The campers came down to Tamarack Farm last night and will be staying there until Saturday morning, as we continue to work closely with the county sheriffs to resolve this situation. Please be assured that the campers were cared for as their safety is always our priority.
As Zach, Flying Cloud co-director said, in his many years at FC, this is the first time something like this has happened, and our community responded thoughtfully, efficiently, and effectively. Most importantly, on this day the response showed our collective care for our community and interdependence. Feel free to contact me if you have further questions.
One of the joys of F&W is how our community continuously steps up and demonstrates our core values of service and integrity. This is one of the big reasons why our camp is so special, and families return for years and generations.
In peace,
Rebecca Geary
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