Posted: Fri, 19 Feb 2010 01:30 PM - 8,775 Readers
By: Pamela LeBlanc
The boys of Dobie Cabin are flopped on their bunks, munching dry Froot Loops and Coco Puffs and discussing what's to love and not to love about summer camp here at Camp Balcones Springs.
The stuff they like? Tonight's fiesta dance, for one. That means girls. And music. A live burro and excellent snacks, too.
Not so much? The heat. And the hint of homesickness some of them feel.
It's an afternoon break at this Hill Country summer camp just outside Marble Falls. About 300 campers at a time, ages 7 to 17, converge here for two- or three-week sessions packed with horseback riding, water skiing and team sports.
So far this day, campers here have honed their archery skills, played basketball, paddled a canoe and hung out in a really cool tree house. They paused at noon for lunch, a decidedly lively event with a lot of chanting and singing (plus chicken strips and a pan of blue Jell-O topped with a school of red gummy fish). Later this afternoon they'll shoot down a water slide, scamper up a climbing wall and sip frozen slushies at a beach-side shack.
Ah, heaven.
"I like how they always keep you busy," says Cory Mills, 12. "You're never bored."
"It's just really fun," says Houston Keene, 14, of Dallas. "You can just be yourself and never worry about what other people think."
Oh, and the pranks.
Mills and the rest of his cabin-mates love to talk about cabin pranks that have taken place since Camp Balcones Springs first opened 18 years ago. Last term, someone stole a bunch of overnight trunks and buried them in the sand around Lake Travis. Another time, someone filled an entire trunk with green Jell-O. More recently, someone tossed a bunch of bottles of sunscreen, their sprayers taped open, into a cabin.
"There's just this fun energy out here," says Leslie Moore, general manager of the oak- and cedar-dotted 250-acre facility, which doubles as a corporate retreat and wedding facility in the off-season.
I poke my head inside Lady Bird Cabin next, where a bevy of girls shows off the quarters. The place looks like a Target exploded in it — books, markers, stickers, posters, cards, hair brushes and T-shirts are scattered everywhere. A list of chores is taped to the wall.
"I love this camp," says Emily Kordzik, 14, of Austin. "I plan to keep coming until I'm a counselor."
One thing that sets Camp Balcones Springs apart, says assistant manager Todd Darby, is the intentional way the staff builds relationships with its campers. The counselor-to-camper ratio is one to four.
"We're a Christian camp. We have strong Christian counselors who walk the walk but don't try to indoctrinate the campers," says camp owner Christine Baskin. All faiths are welcome.
There are rules, too: No candy, iPods or cell phones. Campers must write home at least once a week.
As for that occasional case of homesickness?
"We're a home away from home," says camp founder Marietta Johnson, who knows just how to deal with it. "We want campers to feel loved; we want them to feel secure."
I feel cozy and nurtured just listening to her explain how she encourages homesick campers to focus on what is good here, and how she calls their parents to let them know how their children are doing. But she discourages the kids from talking directly to their parents.
Usually, it works. Most kids are fine after a few days. "It's an opportunity to grow in a safe, friendly and somewhat challenged environment," Johnson says.
I leave the cabins and head toward spring-fed Lake Ted, named for the previous owner, a rancher. Two ducks — one named Aflac — toddle past, and Rider the resident llama stops by for a nuzzle. Buzzing cicadas provide background music.
Baskin, the camp owner, meets me by the zipline, where I gather my nerves as I'm buckled into a safety harness. Perched on a wooden deck high above the lake, I finally shove off and zoom across the water. I'm a pterodactyl!
Safely on the other side, I wander to the sandy beach and climb in a canoe for the short trip back. Then I spend a glorious half-hour shooting down a water slide, climbing on a gigantic inflatable that looks like a space capsule and swimming across the lake.
Before my visit is over, I also experience something called (appropriately) the Screamer. For that, I strap on a harness and hang like a fish on a pole as four or five people hand-crank me up a suspension wire. When I'm so high I almost have tears in my eyes, they shout at me to pull the release that will send me swooping forward. When I finally work up the nerve, it's a hoot. I careen like I'm on a gigantic swing, and the feeling of weightlessness makes me giddy.
When I'm finally back on terra firma, I stop by the kids' lounge, where a couple of teen-agers are watching movies and playing Ping-Pong. Then I meander into the camp store, where kids browse stocks of cheap faux mustaches, beach towels and bracelets.
I learn more about the camp, too. Once during each session, I'm told, the boys and girls go separate ways for a night. The guys enjoy what they call "man's dinner" — a barbecued rib and turkey leg feast eaten off butcher paper, with beverages sipped straight from the pitcher. But don't worry, the girls get their own night, too. A much classier one, with fancy tablecloths, a lot of pink and sophisticated food.
Tonight, though, dinner is fajitas, guacamole and queso — a precursor of the evening Fiesta.
But first, there are songs, stories and a game of musical chairs that involves a bunch of whipped cream pies in a bunch of faces.
When we are adjourned from that, we head to the covered court, which has been transformed into a dance floor. A real donkey overlooks the festivities, which include dancing, hot sauce sampling, pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey (not the real one, of course), confetti-filled eggs and tres leches cake.
Happy that I'm getting to finally live that childhood dream of going to summer camp, I snuggle under the covers of the bed in my air-conditioned cabin.
I need a good night's sleep. I have to be up early for the trail ride.
photography by Ricardo B. Brazziell
