Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Go for the Gold - Girls' Camp 2009

Thanks to my sister for taking my girls for the week, I was able to attend the entire week of Girls' Camp. It was an amazing week. My spirit has been lifted, my resolve to improve strengthened and my body exhausted.
Jeff and I and another couple in our ward were lucky enough to get to lead 8 4th year girls on their overnight backpacking trip. We took them up to Boulder Creek and hiked up to Boulder Lake and Lake Louie. This was no easy hike. Packs were heavy (due in part to enough smore's fixins to feed an army), weather was wet and we covered around 14 miles, mostly uphill, inspite of Brother Blaser's claim that we were "coasting" most of the way :)
Here we are at our uppermost point of the hike. That's Lake Louie you can see through the trees. We were able to drop our big packs at Boulder Lake, where we set up our campsite before continuing on to the upper lake. It is so beautiful up here, especially with the wet spring. There were wild flowers everywhere.

This is the mountain of boulders we had to navigate to get back to camp. Our tents were right on the other side of the embankment. Below us you can see Boulder Lake.


After 6 hours of hiking, we were ready for some good, warm food. Everyone was wet from their knees down since it had been rainy and we were walking through tall grass part of the way. Warm hawaiian haystacks hit the spot, followed by Smore's...yummm...

Here are the girls the next morning preparing to head back down the mountain to our cars. They look pretty good for having hiked long and hard the previous day and what seemed to us leaders as an entire night of yelling, wrestling and truth-or-daring in their tent. Thank goodness we OLD leaders had our own tent.

A morning view of Boulder Lake.
After meeting up with the rest of the girls' camp at Camp Ee-Da-How, we had the traditional and infamous skit night. Here are our valient Priesthood leaders. They were doing a skit...or were they...
Group picture at Cascade Lake.
Group picture on our hike.
Activities like Girls' Camp really make me realize how good kids are these days. They get a bad rap sometimes, but I am continually amazed by their kindness and real desire to live as they have been taught. I am strengthened just be being around them. It gives me hope and excitement for my own girls to be this age.

5 comments:

Kellie said...

Beautiful pictures! Glad you had fun!

Jonathan & Heather said...

It looks like everything was so fun. I am so sad that I wasn't still there for camp. I know you probably weeped every night because I wasn't there. I hope you were able to somewhat enjoy it.

Rebekah said...

I'm so glad you were able to go. You have a good sister. I'm also glad you are home. Maybe I'll be able to reach you on the phone now...

Wolfingtons said...

Looks like fun. Girls camp is the best - glad you got to go.

Ty & Andi said...

That makes me soooo sad. I miss you all sooo sooo much! Give everyone a hug for me. I, of course, am in primary now, and I really miss the spirit in YWs. I miss hanging out with you mostly though :), don't worry