Camp Journal

Greens and Yellows do TBGs!

29th July 2022

It was like any other morning, the sun was shining and a storm was brewing.

After breakfast Julien smashed it with his artwork today in our life drawing session with non-languages. 

After a great panini lunch we headed to do some stretches in preparation for an intensive team building game session. 

Oliver was one of the greatest spies I’ve ever seen and disposed of at least four bombs in bomb disposal. 

Yohaan got soaked to the bone in water tower trying to save my ping pong ball. Was it worth it? I don’t know. 

The finale land ski relay was a struggle for Ariela, who had all the spirit but none of the skill. After our relay we all went inside and relaxed for a bit. The camp deserved it after such a fast paced session. 

After dinner the greens and yellows came down all dressed up and ready for karaoke night. Neev performed a great rendition of heat waves by the glass animals. It was so beautiful we have to get a whole new stock of glasses in. 

All knackered they went up to bed and got ready for the next day.

Racing down the slides at AquaParc

The Reds and Blues had a fantastic day today at one of Europe’s largest indoor water parks!!

There was something for everyone at AquaParc with massive 5 story high slides as well as the more relaxed but still exciting lazy river and wave pool.

The latter was particularly enjoyed by Christian and Eleanor as they whizzed around the many twists and turns. Although, everyone had a turn at racing each other through the ‘secret grotto’ portion. As well as this it started raining halfway through the day which left the outdoor portion to be even more exhilarating.

Now of course there was also our massive waterslides for our thrill seekers. Bouke and Hadi managed to best staff members at speeding down the largest slides. We even had one race so close it was an exact match down to the millisecond.

All in all it was a truly brilliant day enjoyed by all! 🙂

Languages & Fire Lighting for our Reds & Blues!

28th July 2022

Wednesday began with language lessons, a final class for many of our campers before a hot lunch and preparation for bushcraft. The reds and blues set off down the bushcraft hiking trail- with riddles and songs told along the way. The children grouped up and under the supervision of group leaders, gathered dry thin sticks to make a fire. We learned how to layer the sticks, how to make a spark using a firelighter, and how to light cotton pads to create a small campfire. After afternoon cookies, we took a stroll back up the trail, with group leader Anthony teaching ecology. We learned facts about ferns and what plants are edible in the wild. It was a fantastic day for team work and socialising, with every child happy back at camp.

Dreamy Days on Lac Léman for the Greens and Yellows

Thursday Morning brought a beautiful alpine start for the Greens as they returned from a high mountain camping adventure, where they joined the fresh and ready-for-the-day Yellows at the bright blue Villeneuve pool for a day of sun and fun.

The day was filled with laughter and a round of games and sports, intermittently split with long stretches of relaxation in the pool and the occasional ice cream and cold drink to stem the heat. Following lunch, the kids loaded up onto the unsteady banana boat to be thrown off into the deep blue waters of lake Geneva, where jeers of joy and laughter could be heard from the shoreline.

In the evening, the yellows finished off a lovely day by sitting round the campfire, singing songs and playing games while watching the sun set on the Dents du Medi. Concurrently, the greens were testing their cultural knowledge of music of the past and present, and displaying a level of knowledge that made the counsellors reconsider their perspective of music altogether!

Altogether, a wonderful day along the Valais canton’s famous body of water lent itself well the the beginning of the end of the first week, and the campers can’t wait for the next week to come!

A cracking day for the Greens and Yellows!

27th July 2022

Today Greens and Yellow began the day with language lessons! Meanwhile the non-language campers went up on the chairlift to survey Les Crosets from above in preparation for today’s hike. They learned to read maps and spot key features to help navigate in nature. After lunch, Yellows got in touch with their surrounding doing a nature art jam, creating masterpieces inspired by the environment around them.

Greens, with the navigational help of their non-language teammates, headed up the chairlift to hike around Les Crosets where they will be spending this evening camping at a local ski club. The challenge for the day: keep a raw egg safe and sound on the journey and through the night (rip to the eggs we lost on the hike, and good luck to our remaining competitors!).

A spectacular day for the Reds and Blues!

The Reds and Blues had a spectacular day today, despite the early start! 

We had our invigorating wake up to glacier themed songs like “ice ice baby” and “let it go” which went down well. 

We then began our long journey to Les Diablerets and Glacier 3000 which was completed (with a bit of sleeping on the bus) and we arrived! We ventured up to an altitude of 3000m and we hiked over to the dog walking which Bouke particularly enjoyed. Where we got an up close encounter with alpine husky dogs. We all had an amazing time navigating the ice and managed to make it up to the world’s tallest alpine coaster! Where all of our little thrill seekers really enjoyed careering down! Liana and Nicolas particularly enjoyed this part! 

After this we headed down to Aigle pool and had a lovely splash around. Although we still had time for some exhilaration with the two-storey water slide and the suspended zipline which Rayan enjoyed!

It was a great day all together and we were happy everyone had so much fun!!

Greens and Yellows go to the Glacier!

26th July 2022

It was an early wake up for the Greens and Yellows as they had a long day planned ahead at the Glacier and Aigle pool. We took two cable cars up to the Glacier. It was chilly up there and the campers were well prepared for the weather. The yellows started off with the peak walk, which Patricia was initially scared to do, but she faced her fears and like the other yellows, crossed the bridge twice. The greens started with the husky walk and Ariela got mud all over her trousers while petting the dogs. The groups then took the chairlift to do the Alpine rollercoaster. Bassam, Frederik and Tommaso clearly had a need for speed as they didn’t stop accelerating while they where going round the corners on the rollercoaster. The Greens and Yellows then went to the pool to relax and cool down from the Aigle heat. Tala and Jeremy went straight to the diving board and the others followed straight behind. The slide was definitely a fan favourite for the Greens and there were plenty of laughs as many of them fell of the inflatable rings. In the evening the campers had a casino night, where they gambled camp chips and they learned how to play strategically and have plenty of fun while winding down after a long but entertaining day.

The Red and Blue Linguistic Legends!

The sun rose early on our fabulous reds and blues today as they got ready for another fun filled day of camp! French classes today saw Anna, Adelina and Maisy speaking French as fluently as President Macron whilst Léo, Kyara, Bouke, Liana and Nicolas learnt at family vocab at lightening speed !

In Spanish, Mika, Danielle, Christian, Neve, Amelie and Eleanor learnt a song about prepositions and directions and then navigated each other in Spanish on an obstacle course and treasure hunt better than Google maps! They then learnt body part words and designed fabulous monsters that were girl friends and boyfriends for single staff members before painting flags of different Spanish speaking countries for our project!

In English, Clara, Mathilde, Hadil, Line and Hadi read English stories and learnt about family in English!

There is simply no stopping these linguastars!!!!!

The non-language crew comprised of Yousef, Emma, Ella and Jaziel headed off to Champéry for a swim on the chairlift and put Micheal Phelps to shame with their unparalleled skills!

After lunch the juniors split into teams for a competitive afternoon of team building games!

We were all so proud of them as they showed fabulous kindness, friendship and helpfulness as they navigated through the water tower, sheep pen, marble run and lava river!

Christian and Eleanor took the water tower on with next level enthusiasm and absolutely smashed it whilst neve was the floor is lava queen !

Very proud of the red and blue legends again today! Big well done icons!

The Greens and Yellows at one with nature

25th July 2022

The Greens had an exciting day today with a mixture of languages, bushcraft, landscape drawing, and nature art jamming. 

The day started for the language groups with some chilled out and relaxing English, French, or Spanish lessons. The groups learned new vocab, improved their conversation skills, and decided on a group project for the next two weeks.

Meanwhile the non-language group hiked to a campsite to learn how to start a fire. This included using a fire striker and cotton wool. Also, the campers learned about fire safety and and how to extinguish a fire safely.

After lunch the Greens got a chair lift to a scenic mountain top in order to try their hand at sketching landscapes. Afterwards they made their way back to camp and did some nature art jam. This involved finding flora from the surroundings to be used in their paintings. The campers then got stuck in to painting pictures with their collection in addition to some paint brushes!!! 

After dinner, evening entertainment will include sports followed by either a film or chill out games.

Reds and Blues conquer the Labyrinth!

The Reds and Blues had a fantastic day at Labyrinth Adventure Park. From Dutch lessons from Bouke to Arabic lessons from Yosef, the bus journey went fast.

It was a piping hot day down in the valley so sun screen breaks were many. We began on the zip lines and slides where Kyara conquered her fear of heights.

We moved to the sea-saws, the swings and the pirate ships.

The kids had a ball at the corner shop and bought plenty of squishy rubber toys.

We leaped around the bouncy Elimination area and climbed around the Castle.

The Reds took turns racing down the rubber slide on inflatable rings.

We had afternoon tea and set up for the indoor arcade. Hasid beat everyone in table tennis, while Emma and Léo challenged each other with an intense game of air hockey.

We then took on the huge Labyrinth Maze- which every group escaped within ten minutes! It was a memorable experience full of laughter and one the kids will remember for years to come!

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