A WEEK AT CAMP BENTZON

    A Week at Camp Bentzon

Super, double hooray! We just got to spend the first week of Term 2 at Camp Bentzon on Kawau Island! When we got there, the first activity we did was an exhausting 2 and a half hour hike. We went up and down hills and had a 30 minute swim at a beautiful beach called Vivian Bay.

The next day was an activity day. Tuesday 24 April 2012 probably held the biggest highlight for my time at Camp Bentzon: Kayaking! We kayaked all the way to Survivor Island, a small island a little way from camp, and got to have oysters. I didn’t have any because I don’t like some types of seafood. When we returned, we had kayaked 1.75 kilometres.

On the same day as kayaking we did raft building. You are supposed to build a raft out of rope, 4 large barrels and some logs and paddle it out to the pontoon. Our raft was not the best raft ever and as we approached the pontoon the rope came loose, but we still made it... just.

On ANZAC day Mr K read the ode and we had a moment’s silence. After that we took a water taxi to Schoolhouse Bay. From there we hiked to a copper mine. The experience was awesome. The mine was right on the edge of the sea, so there was a huge pump house. I found some copper ore (green stuff that they melt into copper) but was told to leave it behind. Then we hiked all the way to Mansion House. Mansion House was huge and really old. Apparently it was alarmed so if you touched something you weren’t supposed to, it would go off. It took about 30 minutes to go around, it was so big. Someone brought tennis balls and we got to play with them for 15 or so minutes. Then we took a ferry back to camp.

Thursday was another activity day and this time group 5 (my group) did sailing. I was paired with Abigail and she did a good job moving the sails for someone recovering from a broken knee. There wasn’t much wind so our boat wasn’t moving much and that made it hard to steer. The people who were solo sailing had it a bit easier, because they were lighter and therefore faster. Sam was the only person who capsized out of about 65 kids and he was in group 5.

On Thursday we also made bivouacs. We were on a hill, so that made it that little bit trickier. We split into 2 teams to see who could make the best bivouac. The other team had a head-start but my team found a giant log and we worked together to wedge it in between two trees. Our bivouac turned out quite and Rory found a towel to put on it. In the end, once we’d finished, water was thrown over them to see how waterproof we had made them. I stood right out and blocked about 90% of the water with my back. Man, was I soaked!  Luckily it was really sunny and I dried pretty quickly.

Friday was the last day at Camp Bentzon and I woke up feeling pretty sad, but also slightly happy that I was going to be back in my own bed. It was raining in the morning so they unveiled a 40 inch Sony TV on which we watched a movie about Garfield, the cat. We had already packed our bags, but it took us ages to load everything onto the ferry once it arrived. The ferry ride back to Sandspit was fun, but everyone on the lower deck got a coke and I wasn’t there. When we arrived, our buses were waiting for us and Fraser and I were talking about stuff all the way back to school. When we got there, a huge mob of parents were waiting for us, like a mob of fans waiting for a movie star. I spotted my Dad on the side-walk and couldn’t wait to tell him about all the adventures I’d had.

Camp Bentzon was super awesome and I would give it a 9.5 out of 10. The only thing it could do with, is fishing rods for hire.