Waterfall Revealed

In all of my years working at Camp Old Indian and previous years camping I never saw the waterfall in the photo you see hear. I had heard people talk about one and I think I even heard it but their was never a clear trail that led the way to it. Since I last worked at Camp Old Indian in 1989 and new trail has been created that goes around the side and to the back of the "third lake" which for all practical purposes is a swamp. The waterfall is part of a stream that feeds into the third lake and I'm glad my friend Ronny and I decided to take the short hike as seeing it was worth the walk and even going to the reunion. If you are familiar with Camp Old Indian is their something that has recently surprised you that has always been there but you were not aware of?

2008 Camp Old Indian Staff Reunion Video

Here is a video of the reunion I "slapped together." I may do a "special edition" later but for now enjoy the memories!

Oh, the credits are meant to be slightly humorous and not entirely literally so please don't get offended if your name is not there. Hope you don't mind the slightly cheesy music clips and sound effects.

2008 Camp Staff Reunion Photos uploaded

I have uploaded two sets of photos from the 2008 Camp Old Indian Staff Reunion. The first set is of various people at the reunion and scenes around camp. The second set is a photographic project intended to help preserve the staff leathers in photographic form. Some of the images did not come out originally so I am working on those with the original RAW files. Of course these images have also been added to the Camp Old Indian photo pool which, if you also have a Flickr account you can add your photos of Camp Old Indian as well.

A few photos of note I would like to showcase are;

The waterfall behind third lake

Tada! 2008 Reunion

Twilight

Chatting outside the trading post

Hope you enjoy these and many more. Sometime in the forthcoming week I plan on sharing a video I have put together as well. The video however will take a bit longer to put together but I have already started.

2008 Staff Reunion: Meeting friends, recording memories

Just got back from the 2008 Staff Reunion at Camp Old Indian. In addition to over 70 photos I will be uploading and sharing to flickr I will have a video as well. I wasn't able send Tweets from Twitter of other Internet updates as my cell connection was non existent in that mountain hallow. I was pleasantly surprised to see my cabin mates, Ronny Franke and Rusty Bost as well as quite a few others who were not at the 2006 reunion. However it's late on a Sat. night. I'll post later when the photos and video are available online.

Today is the day - 2008 Reunion

It's early Sat. morning on May 3rd, 2008 and I in the process of getting ready to head up to Camp Old Indian for the second official reunion. I'm in the process of updating this an other blogs and charging up the batteries in my still and video camera. I'm going to try my best not to look overly "techie" in such a natural place but it means so much to be able to record images of the place and also memories via voice and writing drafts to this blog I can publish after I get back home this weekend. Hopefully I will see many of you there. I'm going to make this short as I need to do the usual "morning get ready" routine.

One week till the next Camp Old Indian Staff Reunion

It's only one week to the next Camp Old Indian Staff reunion. I'm really glad this one will be in warmer weather and for the most part Camp will look like it does during the summer months as most of the trees in the area have leafed out. The last large scale reunion about two years ago was at the end of March but everything looked and felt like the dead of winter. We even got some snow flurries on that day!

The last time I attended it had been about 15 years since I last visited the camp and seen a lot of the people there. Some of the people didn't look any different but a few looked radically different. The biggest shock to my system was seeing how something that had been there forever had finally subcome to the ravages of time like the old Museum cabin that was destroyed in a recent ice storm, the "New Staff Cabin" looked more like the "old staff cabin", etc.

Other things were brand new like the new and larger Health Lodge and Dining Hall and a radically different Trading Post. I was also greatly saddened to see that the old O.A. Lodge has been torn down as well as the stone steps leading up to it. I hope one day they will decide to build a new O.A. Lodge based on the design of the original one but with modern standards.

This time I hope to get some better photography done both at reunion events and in some natural areas I wish to share and showcase. I will more than likely have the laptop I am writing on now and plan on doing some writing and recording of the events there so I can give a more first hand account while things are still fresh in my mind. I may even send updates to my Twitter account via my iPhone if I can get a cell connection. I yet also record a podcast.

Hope to see many of you there. Look me up.

2008 Camp Old Indian Staff Reunion Info

Reposted from the COI Myspace page;

Schedule - COI staff reunion will be Sat. May 3

The second Camp Old Indian staff reunion will be Saturday May 3. Past and current staff members are invited to attend. Come up to Camp for a great time of fellowship and food.

The cost is $10.00 and includes lunch. If you would like to stay overnight, indicate that on your registration form. You will be on your own for meals for Saturday evening and Sunday morning. There will be a breakfast run to Travelers Rest Sunday morning for those of you spending Saturday night.



Schedule:

10:00am - 11:00am Check In Camp Office, Socializing

11:00am – Noon Business meeting / Introductions – Dining Hall

Noon – 1:00pm Lunch – Dining Hall

1:00pm – 1:30pm Visit the Ordeal Circle

1:30pm – Until Organized Activities / Free time



You can spend the afternoon catching up with old friends, walking around Camp, hiking one of the trails, boating on the Second Lake, or at the Shotgun Range.



Bring any pictures or other artifacts from your time at Camp to display in the back of the dining hall.

Staff Weekend

It was about this time of the year 25 years ago I checked in for my first Camp Old Indian Staff weekend. Most people don't realize it but working on a camp staff starts long before the summer camp season starts. Of course the summer is the busy time but things are going on the whole year that from the last day of camp where everything is stored away, later in the fall the executives send out information and contracts so that new people can apply to work on staff or renew their contracts for the following summer.

One of those out of season times that signaled camp was just around the corner. Staff weekend occurred, at least during "my day" around late March or sometime in April. The purpose of Staff weekend was to take inventory of what we need to get camp up to spec for the season, the get to meet our fellow co-workers and to know what the jobs we would be doing in our departments.

The first few years I worked at Camp Old Indian I worked in the Scoutcraft Department. We didn't set up our place until Staff week which was a week before regular summer camp but if we needed new equipment, books, etc. we could get those lists made so the council could get their orders in ahead of time.

It's been awhile for me but does anyone have and special memories for your staff weekends?