A Day In the Life of an Alpine Camper
I thought it might be helpful and interesting to share a typical day for your campers. If you’re like Carter and me when we’re not with our girls it’s fun for us to picture what they are doing at given times. I’ll give a pretty high overview so I can get the whole day in this post. Hopefully I can go more in depth on some of these daily events later in the term.
Wake up every morning is at 7AM Central Time. We are on the eastern edge of the Central time zone, about 10 miles from the border, so the sun is rising in the sky by this time. Boys take the first 15 minutes to wake up, use the restroom and brush teeth (hopefully!). At 7:15 each age group makes their way to designated areas for Morning Watch. We have 6 Head Counselors, veteran to Alpine staff, seniors or recent graduates of college, who serve in these roles. They lead Morning Watch, beginning with some fun “wake up songs” like Father Abraham or the Fruit of the Spirit (some of you dads might remember this one from Father son weekends! “The fruit of the spirit’s not a banana . . . . . but the fruits are love, joy, peace . . . . ). Ask your boys to sing them when they get home! Then it’s usually one or two hymns like Amazing Grace or Come Thou Fount, followed by a devotional from God’s Word.
At about 7:50 a bell rings calling us to a hot breakfast at 8. We line up on the ramps and outside the doors, peaking through the screens to see what the KB’s are plating on tables. We eat family style so they put hot platters of each dish on every table. Once the food is out, Richard, our program director, invites us in and leads us in the singing of the Alpine blessing. There’s one for each meal of the day.
After breakfast, Richard gives us our schedule for the morning on the PA system and sends us off to cabins for cabin cleanup and inspection. If your campers takes a morning medication he pops by the Infirmary, just behind the Dining hall, to get his med directly from the nurses.
At about 9:15 a bell rings indicating it’s time to go to your first activity period of the morning. Boys attend 3 activity periods in the morning, each 50 minutes in length, with 15 minute transition periods between them. During that 15 minute interlude between the first and second of the day, Richard and the KB’s offer a snack on the porch of the Dining Hall. It’s a drive by snack where you can get crackers, an apple, or a banana, water, and keep moving to your second class of the day.
At 12:30 our third period is over and it’s back to the Dining Hall for a hot lunch, consisting of a meat and 2 or 3 veggies and some kind of starch. I’ll be sure and do a post about the food at Alpine soon and tell you more about our newly renovated Dining Hall. We are so excited about it. At lunch we celebrate any birthdays for the day, complete with a raucous rendition of Happy Birthday and a to die for vanilla cake with chocolate frosting in the shape of an Alpine tree.
After lunch the boys’ counselors stop by the Store to gather all the mail and emails for the cabin. Back at the cabins a required and much needed rest hour commences. It’s a welcome break during the heat of the day (although no real heat or humidity yet on the Mountain). Boys read their mail, write letters, or read a book. Some even snooze for a few minutes (or the whole time for most boys on the Ridge, our oldest campers!).
At 2:30 a bell rings out and instantly the sound of hundreds of feet hitting the floor echoes in the Canyon cabin area where the youngest boys live. The next sounds are slamming doors as boys race to be front of the line for Store Period. At store boys can get an ice cream treat or a candy treat and then a drink. And for a brief 25 minutes they can enjoy their snack with friends and play some of the games around the store like Ping pong or Gladiator Ball or Frisbee golf.
The mid afternoon brings 2 more of our regular, enrolled activities, same length as the morning 3. Our schedule is a snaking or rotating schedule. Boys have 11 periods on their roster and do 5 each day. So today they attended periods 6-10 on their lists. Tomorrow 11, 1, 2 in the morning and then 3 and 4 in the afternoon. Once you get the hang of it it’s fairly refreshing to have a rotating schedule every day. It adds a bit of variety to the routine of the day.
Just after 5PM we are called back to cabins for a Shower period. Every boy in our Mountain and Canyon cabins is required to take a shower during this time. Our older boys get a bit more flexibility and can clean up in the morning or evening. Oftentimes after showers and before dinner, boys can be seen playing tennis or getting in a quick round of frisbee golf with buddies before dinner.
Retreat begins right around 6:20, lines of cabins in front of the Dining Hall in formation. We recite the Pledge of Allegiance as the flag in front of the Lodge is lowered. And Richard announces our night programs for the evening.
Tonight for dinner we dined on spaghetti noodles with a meaty red sauce, green chopped salad with tomatoes and ranch dressing, and buttered toast. After dinner all of camp meets in the gym for our nightly Glee Club. Glee Club is a whole Alpine tradition unto itself that will take more explaining another night. We sing camp songs, led by our Glee Club musicians, mostly famous rock tunes rewritten with Alpine lyrics.
We close out our evening with Night Program, most nights varied games by age group throughout camp. Tonight guys are playing games like Capture the Flag, Spotlight, and Extreme 4 Square.
Around 8:30 or 8:45 Richard calls us to cabins to begin to wind down for the evening. Maybe my favorite part of the day is when cabins gather on the floors, flashlights only, and share a cabin devotional to end the day. Counselors share from God’s Word and oftentimes ask boys to share highs and lows of the day. Prayers are said as boys climb into bed, the good kind of tired from a full camp day. Oftentimes, counselors will read a story while boys are in bed falling asleep. Speaking of which, it’s about that time. Thanks for reading and good night for now, Glenn
